- Email: [email protected]
Jeanne Allen Smith
Obituary
Jeanne Allen Smith Harlem-based haematologist who helped establish US screening guidelines for sickle-cell disease. She was born in New York, NY, USA, and died after a stroke on Nov 11, 2006, in Lewisboro, NY, USA, aged 75 years. For more than three decades starting in the 1970s, Jeanne Allen Smith was a leading figure in US efforts to combat sickle-cell disease. Colleagues remember her kind and determined personality that helped patients in her Harlem clinic and contributed to policy developments at a national level. “You could almost feel the energy that came off her as she talked about sickle-cell patients”, remembers Clarice Reid, former chief of the sickle-cell disease branch and director of the blood division of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The two first met in 1973 when Smith was co-director of the Harlem Comprehensive Sickle Cell Program, “and I was immediately impressed with her tenacity and relentless efforts”, Reid recalls. From the 1970s to the 1990s, Smith was involved in many initiatives funded by the US Department of Health and Human Services. She served on working groups, task forces, and planning and oversight committees for many trials, for example. She also led several studies financed by the NIH while maintaining a busy clinical load. “She moved comfortably between different roles, depending on what she thought was most likely at that time to make something happen”, remembers Lennette J Benjamin, clinical director of the comprehensive sickle-cell centre at Montefiore 100
Medical Center, New York, and professor of medicine at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Bronx, NY. “She didn’t want to just be on a panel or a committee, but really to make sure that whatever they were working on came to fruition.” Her expertise and her willingness to state her own mind, clearly and analytically, earned the respect of her peers. “I used to say, Jeanne’s going to be on this panel, you’d better get ready”, Reid remembers with a laugh. “She was not one who just agreed to go along to get along.” Beginning in the 1970s, Smith was also co-principal investigator on a study that followed sickle-cell patients from infancy into adulthood, monitoring nutrition, growth, development, and clinical complications. In 1993, she co-chaired a national panel that recommended all newborn babies be screened for sickle-cell anaemia, irrespective of race. She told reporters at the time that although the disorder was most prevalent in black people, many children who need treatment would be missed if screening was limited to African-Americans. “Sickle-cell disease can and does occur in almost all racial and ethnic groups”, she said. The guidelines were adopted widely. Smith was born in Manhattan, and earned her medical degree from New York University in 1957. In 1968 she took a position at Harlem Hospital, where she worked until her retirement in 2002. From 1984 to 1987 she was president of the hospital’s medical board. She was a clear-headed and compassionate clinician, remembers her friend and colleague Doris Wethers, retired professor of clinical paediatrics at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons. “She was an excellent clinician who was very thoughtful and analytical but also empathetic”, she said. Smith served for many years on the Sickle Cell Disease Advisory Committee of the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute. Katharine B Harris, administrator of the New York State Genetic and Sickle Cell Disease Programs, who worked with her for 15 years remembers her concern for and dedication to her patients. “She also had a wicked sense of humour and loved to tell jokes and stories”, she recalls. Smith was an avid bridge player and a great traveller. Free evenings would often find her at the opera, attending performances at the Classical Theatre of Harlem or praising down-to-earth literature at her regular book club. She was also devoted to her family, and over the years many in the sickle-cell community got to know her mother, who would sometimes accompany her to conferences. Her husband, Russell F Smith Jr, died in 1983. Smith is survived by two sons, Russell F Smith III and David Smith, five grandchildren, and five great-grandchildren.
Stephen Pincock [email protected]
www.thelancet.com Vol 369 January 13, 2007
Jeanne Allen Smith Harlem-based haematologist who helped establish US screening guidelines for sickle-cell disease. She was born in New York, NY, USA, and died after a stroke on Nov 11, 2006, in Lewisboro, NY, USA, aged 75 years. For more than three decades starting in the 1970s, Jeanne Allen Smith was a leading figure in US efforts to combat sickle-cell disease. Colleagues remember her kind and determined personality that helped patients in her Harlem clinic and contributed to policy developments at a national level. “You could almost feel the energy that came off her as she talked about sickle-cell patients”, remembers Clarice Reid, former chief of the sickle-cell disease branch and director of the blood division of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The two first met in 1973 when Smith was co-director of the Harlem Comprehensive Sickle Cell Program, “and I was immediately impressed with her tenacity and relentless efforts”, Reid recalls. From the 1970s to the 1990s, Smith was involved in many initiatives funded by the US Department of Health and Human Services. She served on working groups, task forces, and planning and oversight committees for many trials, for example. She also led several studies financed by the NIH while maintaining a busy clinical load. “She moved comfortably between different roles, depending on what she thought was most likely at that time to make something happen”, remembers Lennette J Benjamin, clinical director of the comprehensive sickle-cell centre at Montefiore 100
Medical Center, New York, and professor of medicine at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Bronx, NY. “She didn’t want to just be on a panel or a committee, but really to make sure that whatever they were working on came to fruition.” Her expertise and her willingness to state her own mind, clearly and analytically, earned the respect of her peers. “I used to say, Jeanne’s going to be on this panel, you’d better get ready”, Reid remembers with a laugh. “She was not one who just agreed to go along to get along.” Beginning in the 1970s, Smith was also co-principal investigator on a study that followed sickle-cell patients from infancy into adulthood, monitoring nutrition, growth, development, and clinical complications. In 1993, she co-chaired a national panel that recommended all newborn babies be screened for sickle-cell anaemia, irrespective of race. She told reporters at the time that although the disorder was most prevalent in black people, many children who need treatment would be missed if screening was limited to African-Americans. “Sickle-cell disease can and does occur in almost all racial and ethnic groups”, she said. The guidelines were adopted widely. Smith was born in Manhattan, and earned her medical degree from New York University in 1957. In 1968 she took a position at Harlem Hospital, where she worked until her retirement in 2002. From 1984 to 1987 she was president of the hospital’s medical board. She was a clear-headed and compassionate clinician, remembers her friend and colleague Doris Wethers, retired professor of clinical paediatrics at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons. “She was an excellent clinician who was very thoughtful and analytical but also empathetic”, she said. Smith served for many years on the Sickle Cell Disease Advisory Committee of the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute. Katharine B Harris, administrator of the New York State Genetic and Sickle Cell Disease Programs, who worked with her for 15 years remembers her concern for and dedication to her patients. “She also had a wicked sense of humour and loved to tell jokes and stories”, she recalls. Smith was an avid bridge player and a great traveller. Free evenings would often find her at the opera, attending performances at the Classical Theatre of Harlem or praising down-to-earth literature at her regular book club. She was also devoted to her family, and over the years many in the sickle-cell community got to know her mother, who would sometimes accompany her to conferences. Her husband, Russell F Smith Jr, died in 1983. Smith is survived by two sons, Russell F Smith III and David Smith, five grandchildren, and five great-grandchildren.
Stephen Pincock [email protected]
www.thelancet.com Vol 369 January 13, 2007