The Edward Rose, MD and Elizabeth Kirk Rose, MD Professorship

Edward RoseElizabeth Kirk RoseEstablished by trust gifts, the Professorship honors Edward Rose, MD, and Elizabeth Kirk Rose, MD for their extraordinary contributions to medicine. Both Drs. Rose were alumni of the Perelman School; they met at their medical alma mater where he was an endocrinologist and she was completing her training in pediatrics.

Dr. Edward Rose (1898–1987) of the Class of 1921 became known worldwide for the diagnosis and treatment of disorders of the thyroid gland, despite gradually losing his sight soon after joining the faculty of the Perelman School in 1925. Among his recognitions, he won the Lindback Award for Outstanding Teaching and was elected President of the Philadelphia Endocrine Society.

Dr. Elizabeth Kirk Rose (1901–2008) of the Class of 1926 was a champion of women’s health care and of the women providing it. Among her accomplishments, she headed the Division of Maternal and Child Health at the Philadelphia Department of Public Health from 1950 to 1956. She then joined the Perelman School as a Professor in the Department of Community Health, where she helped lay the groundwork for involving medical students and residents in community-based learning and outreach. The gatherings she started for female medical students and alumnae continue today as the Perelman School of Medicine’s annual Elizabeth Kirk Rose Women in Medicine event.

Both Drs. Rose retired in 1974 and were granted emeritus status. In 1983 they were jointly awarded Penn Medicine’s highest alumni honor, the Distinguished Graduate Award, for their contributions to medicine. In 1993 Dr. Elizabeth Kirk Rose was awarded the Distinguished Daughter of Pennsylvania Award for her leadership and contributions to the state.

 

Marylyn RitchieCurrent Chairholder
Marylyn Ritchie, PhD, FACMI

Dr. Marylyn D. Ritchie is a Professor (tenured) of Genetics and Director of the Institute for Biomedical Informatics at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.  She is also Co-Director of the Penn Center for Precision Medicine, Co-Director of the Penn Medicine BioBank, and Vice President of Research Informatics at the University of Pennsylvania Health System.  Dr. Ritchie is an expert in translational bioinformatics, with a focus on developing, applying, and disseminating algorithms, methods, and tools integrating electronic health records (EHR) with genomics. Dr. Ritchie has over 20 years of experience in translational bioinformatics and has authored over 375 publications (H-index 89). Dr. Ritchie was appointed as a Fellow of the American College of Medical Informatics (ACMI) in 2020. Dr. Ritchie was elected as a member of the National Academy of Medicine in 2021; she is being recognized “for paradigm-changing research demonstrating the utility of electronic health records for identifying clinical diseases or phenotypes that can be integrated with genomic data from biobanks for genomic medicine discovery and implementation science.” Dr. Ritchie holds a PhD from Vanderbilt University in Statistical Genetics, an M.S. from Vanderbilt University in Applied Statistics, and a B.S. in Biology from the University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown. Dr. Ritchie is also the host of two podcasts: she co-hosts The Biomedical Informatics Roundtable podcast with Dr. Jason Moore and she is the solo host of The CALM Podcast: Combining Academia and Life with Marylyn.

Previous Chairholders

  • Jason H. Moore, PhD 2015–2022