Donald Pinkel, MD, the founding medical director of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, died March 9 at the age of 95.
Dr. Pinkel served St. Jude from 1961 to 1973, where he made medical history by creating an effective therapy for acute lymphoblastic leukemia. The approach is still used at St. Jude, which now has a 94 percent survival rate for the condition. He also created a program to address malnutrition in local infants and children, which led to the creation of the federally funded Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children.
Throughout his career, Dr. Pinkel received the Albert Lasker Medical Research Award, the Charles F. Kettering Prize for Cancer Research, the Pollin Prize for Pediatric Research and many other national and international awards. He was inducted into the Tennessee Health Care Hall of Fame in 2017.
"Dr. Pinkel dared to dream big," said James Downing, MD, St. Jude president and CEO, who holds the Donald Pinkel Endowed Chair of Pediatric Cancer Treatment. "We owe a tremendous debt of gratitude to him. It’s because of what he accomplished, because of his leadership, because of the people he recruited to St. Jude, that we exist today."