Alumni News

Progress Notes

1960s

Ronald S. Banner, MD’67, published three articles in 2017. “The Best Possible Health Care” appeared in two parts in the International Journal of Healing and Caring; “On Being a Doctor” appeared as a special guest feature in the spring issue of the Newsletter of the Pennsylvania Society of Chaplains. He practices internal medicine in Northeast Philadelphia.

1970s

Matthew F. Gutowicz, Jr., MD, GME’77, has been appointed to the advisory board of Essential CRE Inc., the sister company of Radiology International, an organization which coordinates CRE Conferences for radiologists worldwide. He is a diagnostic radiologist in La Quinta, Calif.

Stuart A. Lipton, MD’77, PhD’77, was named professor and inaugural co-director of the Neuroscience Translational Center at the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, Calif. Lipton is also professor of Neurosciences and a clinical neurologist at the University of California, San Diego, School of Medicine. In his new position, Lipton is developing and testing new treatments for Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and autism spectrum disorder.

1980s

Lewis Wetstein, MD, GME’82, has been awarded the Arthur Ellenberger Award of Excellence in State Advocacy from the American College of Surgeons. He is the president of the Medical Society of Monmouth and Ocean Counties, and a clinical associate professor of Surgery at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey.

2000s

Jonathan J. Hogan, MD’07, GME’10, has been appointed to the medical advisory board of Dimerix to help guide the DMX-200 clinical program. He is clinical director of the Penn Glomerular Disease Center, and an assistant professor in Nephrology at the Perelman School of Medicine.

2010s

Alana M. Feiler, MD’12, GME’15, has joined Lancaster General Health Physicians practices, at its LG Health Physicians Hospitalists. She recently completed an internship and residency at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania and Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.

Obituaries

1950s

H. Newton Spencer, MD’50, GME’58, an orthopaedic surgeon; Nov. 3. After completing an internship at Presbyterian Hospital in 1951, he served as medical director at Cannon Mills in Kannapolis, N.C. In 1953, Spencer served as an Air Force flight surgeon. After his military service, he completed a residency in orthopaedic surgery at Penn in 1958. After earning a certificate from Harvard University Graduate School of Business Administration in health systems management in 1973, he developed a network of clinics that completed pre-employment exams and medical assessments for workers. He is survived by his wife Mary Johnston Spencer BA’44, MD’48.

Allen E. Yeakel, MD’51, GME’61, an anesthesiologist; Oct. 22. He served in the U.S. Navy from 1944 and was honorably discharged in 1946 and enlisted in the USN Reserve. He completed his internship at Philadelphia General Hospital and his residency in anesthesiology at the University of Pennsylvania. He served as a professor and founding chair of the Department of Anesthesiology at the Pennsylvania State University School of Medicine at the Milton. S. Hershey Medical Center. In 1976, Allen left academic medicine and returned to private practice working at Lancaster General Hospital until he retired in 1990.

George E. Ruff, MD’52, emeritus professor of Psychiatry; Sept. 29. He completed a psychiatric residency at the University of Michigan. From 1957 to 1959, as an Air Force investigator of stress and fatigue, he helped choose America’s first men to go into space. In 1959, he joined the Psychiatry faculty at Penn. He served as associate dean of the medical school from 1975 to 1980. With Gary Gottlieb, he established the section of geriatric psychiatry, and was research director for the Research and Training Center in Aging. He retired from Penn in 1995 as professor emeritus, but continued his private psychiatry practice.

James Cox, MD’53, a retired psychiatrist; Sept. 12. Cox spent many years as chief of staff and president of the staff at the Institute of Pennsylvania Hospital and was proudest of his work with schizophrenia patients. Cox was also socially active in the University City section of Philadelphia, co-founding and leading the neighborhood’s racially integrated swimming pool that opened in 1964.

Gordon K. Danielson, BA’52, MD’56, GME’63, a cardiovascular surgeon, Oct. 2. He was associate surgeon and chief of Cardiac Surgery at University Hospital in Lexington, Ky., then was recruited by the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. and worked as a cardiovascular surgeon and educator from 1967-2002. He was selected by the U.S. State Department for a joint USA/USSR congenital heart disease exchange program and traveled to the USSR several times. He contributed over 800 articles to medical journals.

1960s

Wendell B. Whitacre, MD, GME’60, GME’71, a plastic surgeon, Oct. 20. He earned his medical degree from The Ohio State University College of Medicine in 1955. He trained in general and plastic surgery at Penn. He had a plastic surgery practice in Tucson from 1962 to 2006. He was awarded the 2003 Pima County Medical Society Physician of the Year and he held academic medical positions at the University of Arizona. 

1970s

Paul Gschwend III, MD’70, GME’77, a surgeon, October 22, 2017. His training at the Graduate Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania was interrupted when he was drafted during the Vietnam War to serve as a medical officer in the U.S. Navy in Indian Head, Md. He returned to Lancaster, Pa. to practice general surgery for 22 years. He served as chief of Surgery and also as medical staff president at what was then St. Joseph Hospital. He also served as president of the Lancaster City and County Medical Society, and helped to establish the Edward Hand Medical Heritage Foundation.

2010s

Danielle Peress, MD, a second-year fellow in Maternal-Fetal Medicine; Nov. 26. A graduate of Cornell University, Peress attended Mount Sinai School of Medicine and completed her residency in Obstetrics and Gynecology at Northwestern University Prentice Women's Hospital before beginning her fellowship at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. Peress was a published author of research on preterm birth and other obstetrical topics, and of a first-person essay in the New York Times detailing her experience with cancer diagnosis and treatment while continuing to practice as a physician.

FACULTY

Carole Marcus, MBBCh, an international leader in pediatric sleep medicine; Nov. 19. A professor of Pediatrics at the Perelman School of Medicine and Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, Marcus was director of the Sleep Center at CHOP. Marcus grew up in South Africa and obtained her medical degree at the University of the Witwatersrand. She completed residency training at SUNY, Brooklyn and fellowship training at the Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles. She was a member of the faculty at Johns Hopkins from 1991 to 2003 and was then recruited to CHOP and Penn. As a clinician, clinical investigator, and educator, she impacted countless patients through her unique clinical expertise and her high impact patient-oriented research. She worked closely with colleagues at Penn as associate director of the Institute for Translational Medicine and Therapeutics. Marcus held virtually every leadership position in pediatric sleep medicine during her abbreviated career and received numerous awards, including the William C. Dement Academic Achievement Award in Sleep Medicine.

Emile Mohler III, MD, a leader in vascular medicine; Oct. 13. Mohler was a professor of Medicine and founding director of the University of Pennsylvania Vascular Medicine program. Mohler graduated with honors from Boston College in 1983. He studied physiology and earned his medical degree from Georgetown University, where he also performed his residency in Internal Medicine. Mohler performed his Cardiovascular Fellowship training at Indiana University Medical Center. Mohler was recruited to Penn in 1996. Mohler led multiple important clinical trials determining the efficacy of exercise programs, cholesterol lowering agents and novel therapies, including stem cells and genes encoding angiogenic factors, in patients with symptomatic peripheral artery disease. Mohler was an internationally recognized leader in academic vascular medicine. He authored over 250 manuscripts seven books. He was a fellow of the American Heart Association, American College of Cardiology, the American College of Physicians and Society for Vascular Medicine. Throughout his tenure at Penn, Mohler served as the “go-to” consultant for patients with complex presentations of vascular disease and was also recognized as an exceptionally gifted and committed teacher. Many of his trainees went on to lead major academic programs. Mohler’s medical memoir was published in Vascular Medicine in October 2017.

George E. Ruff, MD. See class of 1952.

Alan Schreiber, MD, leading immune-hematologist; Oct. 2. During his more than four decades at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, Schreiber served as assistant dean for research and chair of the Graduate Group in Immunology. He attended Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx on full scholarship and completed his residency at the University of North Carolina. During subsequent training at the NIH and at the Robert Bent Brigham Hospital of Harvard University, he developed a love of immunology. He was recruited to become one of the original members of Penn’s Hematology-Oncology division. He became an internationally recognized immuno-hematologist, making seminal contributions to our understanding of antibody mediated clearance of red blood cells and platelets by Fc Receptors on macrophages. Schreiber trained numerous physicians who have embarked on successful independent careers. One of his two daughters, Courtney, is an associate professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Penn.