Robert M. Blizzard (June 20, 1924 July 22, 2018) was an American

pediatric endocrinologist Pediatric endocrinology (British: Paediatric) is a medical subspecialty dealing with disorders of the endocrine glands, such as variations of physical growth and sexual development in childhood, diabetes and many more. By age, pediatric endocrinol ...

and a founding member of the Lawson Wilkins Pediatric Endocrine Society.

Life and career

Blizzard was born in East St. Louis, Illinois, and raised in Greenville, Illinois. He attended

Northwestern University Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston, Illinois. Founded in 1851, Northwestern is the oldest chartered university in Illinois and is ranked among the most prestigious academic institutions in the world. Charte ...

, interrupting his undergraduate studies to serve in the United States Army for three years during the Second World War. He later returned and graduated from the Feinberg School of Medicine in 1952. He completed his pediatric residency at the Raymond Blank Children's Hospital in

Des Moines, Iowa Des Moines () is the capital and the most populous city in the U.S. state of Iowa. It is also the county seat of Polk County. A small part of the city extends into Warren County. It was incorporated on September 22, 1851, as Fort Des Moines, ...

, followed by a fellowship in the subspecialty of pediatric endocrinology at

Johns Hopkins Hospital The Johns Hopkins Hospital (JHH) is the teaching hospital and biomedical research facility of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, located in Baltimore, Maryland, U.S. It was founded in 1889 using money from a bequest of over $7 million (1873 mo ...

under the mentorship of

Lawson Wilkins Lawson Wilkins (1894-1963) was a pioneering pediatric endocrinologist. He is known along with John Money for pioneering surgeries for visibly intersex newborns. Honors *Borden Award, American Academy of Pediatrics (1953) *Amory Prize, American Aca ...

. After a three-year period at Columbus Children's Hospital, he returned to Johns Hopkins in 1960 to take over from Wilkins as the co-director of pediatric endocrinology with

Claude Migeon Claude Jean Migeon (1923 – March 4, 2018) was a French pediatric endocrinologist who spent the majority of his career at the Johns Hopkins Hospital. Early life Migeon was born in 1923 in Lievin, France, to Andre Migeon, a printer, and Pauline D ...

. In 1974, he moved to the

University of Virginia School of Medicine The University of Virginia School of Medicine (UVA SoM) is the graduate medical school of the University of Virginia. The school's facilities are on the University of Virginia grounds adjacent to Academical Village in Charlottesville, Virginia. ...

as chair of pediatrics, a position which he held until 1987. He retired in 1993 and died in

Charlottesville, Virginia Charlottesville, colloquially known as C'ville, is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia. It is the county seat of Albemarle County, which surrounds the city, though the two are separate legal entities. It is named after Queen Ch ...

, in 2018.

Research and legacy

Blizzard was an early proponent of growth hormone therapy in children with

growth hormone deficiency Growth hormone deficiency (GHD), or human growth hormone deficiency, is a medical condition resulting from not enough growth hormone (GH). Generally the most noticeable symptom is that an individual attains a short height. Newborns may also presen ...

; his ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'' obituary said that he "liked to say that he had helped add 11 miles of height to the United States population" through growth hormone therapy. He advocated for a formalized process for sourcing human growth hormone from cadaver

pituitary gland In vertebrate anatomy, the pituitary gland, or hypophysis, is an endocrine gland, about the size of a chickpea and weighing, on average, in humans. It is a protrusion off the bottom of the hypothalamus at the base of the brain. The ...

s, and in 1961 he co-founded the National Pituitary Agency, a branch of the

National Institutes of Health The National Institutes of Health, commonly referred to as NIH (with each letter pronounced individually), is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in the late ...

. In 1978 he conducted one of the first trials of growth hormone use in adults, wondering about its anti-aging effects, but did not find any benefits. He proposed the theory of "psychosocial dwarfism" after reporting on a reversible form of hypopituitarism seen in children who had endured severe emotional stress, and established a program in Virginia in which school nurses measured children's heights as a screening tool for domestic abuse. He gave his name to Johanson–Blizzard syndrome, which was first described by Blizzard and Ann J. Johanson in 1971.

Honors and awards

* 1994: Outstanding Leadership in Endocrinology Award (

Endocrine Society The Endocrine Society is a professional, international medical organization in the field of endocrinology and metabolism, founded in 1916 as The Association for the Study of Internal Secretions. The official name of the organization was changed ...

) * 2004: Lifetime Achievement Award (Human Growth Foundation) * 2006: Judson J. Van Wyk Award (Pediatric Endocrine Society)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Blizzard, Robert M. 1924 births 2018 deaths American pediatric endocrinologists Johns Hopkins Hospital physicians People from East St. Louis, Illinois Physicians from Illinois Military personnel from Illinois Feinberg School of Medicine alumni University of Virginia School of Medicine faculty