The Eugene P. Pendergrass Professorship of Radiology
The Professorship was established in 1977 to honor Eugene P. Pendergrass, MD (1895–1980) for his many contributions to the field of radiology and to the University of Pennsylvania.
Dr. Pendergrass spent his distinguished career as a scientist, clinician, and teacher at the Perelman School of Medicine. After graduating from the School in 1918, he took his residency at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania and joined the faculty of the School of Medicine in 1920 as an assistant to Henry K. Pancoast, MD. Dr. Pendergrass was instrumental in the groundbreaking discoveries in X-ray technology that emerged from Penn’s radiology laboratories. In 1939, he succeeded Dr. Pancoast as Chairman of the Department of Radiology, a position he held until he became Professor Emeritus in 1961. Dr. Pendergrass accepted the appointment on the condition that the Department of Radiology is officially separate from the Department of Surgery. In 1964, he emerged from retirement to become the first Matthew J. Wilson Professor of Research Radiology. He was an active member of numerous civic and medical associations and received countless awards and honors, including the American College of Radiology Gold Medal and the Golden Plate Award from the Academy of Achievement.
Current Chairholder
Pari V. Pandharipande, MD, MPH, FACR
Pari V. Pandharipande, MD, MPH, FACR is Chair of the Department of Radiology at the Perelman School of Medicine. She was previously professor and chair of radiology at The Ohio State University (OSU) and chief of radiology services for OSU Wexner Medical Center in Columbus, OH.
After earning her medical degree at Weill Medical College of Cornell University, Dr. Pandharipande completed an internship at the New York Presbyterian Hospital-Cornell. She completed her diagnostic radiology residency at New York University Medical Center. She concurrently completed a cancer outcomes research fellowship and an abdominal imaging clinical fellowship at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH); during her fellowship, she also earned a master’s degree in public health from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
An experienced leader, Dr. Pandharipande served as associate chair of integrated imaging and imaging sciences at MGH, leading an enterprise-wide project at Mass General Brigham involving the clinical integration of the enterprise’s imaging services. At MGH, she also served as the director of the MGH Institute for Technology Assessment, a multidisciplinary health outcomes research institute. Dr. Pandharipande also leads an NIH-funded research program centered in imaging and cancer outcomes.
Dr. Pandharipande serves on the Board of Directors for the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA), where she oversees the Government Relations portfolio, and on the Advisory Board of the American College of Radiology’s Harvey L. Neiman Health Policy Institute. She also has served as Chair of the American Cancer Society’s Healthcare Outcomes, Policy, and Systems grant review committee and currently serves as a member of the NIH’s Organization and Delivery of Health Services study section. She is a past president of the Radiology Alliance for Health Services Research within the Association of Academic Radiology, and she has served on numerous local and national committees, including as a past, longtime Chair of the ACR’s Incidental Findings Committee.
Her work has earned numerous awards in recognition of her research and leadership, including the RSNA Roentgen Resident/Fellow Research Award, the Lucy Frank Squire Distinguished Resident Award from the American Association of Women in Radiology, the RSNA Honored Educator Award, election to the Academy for Radiology and Biomedical Imaging Research Council of Distinguished Investigators, and selection for participation in the Hedwig van Ameringen Executive Leadership in Academic Medicine (ELAM) program at Drexel University.
Previous Chairholders
- Stanley Baum, MD 1977–1996
- R. Nick Bryan, MD, PhD 1999–2012
- Mitchell D. Schnall MD, PhD 2012-2024