The Franklin Payne Associate Professor of Pathology in Obstetrics & Gynecology

Franklin Payne

The chair was established in 2014 when the value of the endowment for the Franklin Payne Professorship of Obstetrics and Gynecology had increased sufficiently to support a second professorship. The chair honors Franklin Payne, MD (1899–1891) for his contributions as Chairman of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology and supports research in the area of gynecologic oncology.

Dr. Payne was an honors graduate of the Perelman School of Medicine Class of 1925 and spent over 30 years of his distinguished career at Penn Medicine. He was appointed William Goodell Professor of Gynecology in 1941 and became Chairman of the Department in 1950, a position he held until 1964. Under Dr. Payne’s leadership, the Department developed a highly regarded practice in general obstetrics that served the Philadelphia community and was a superior source for the training of physicians and staff specializing in the field.


 

Ronny DrapkinCurrent Chairholder
Ronny Drapkin, MD, PhD

Ronny Drapkin, MD, PhD is Director of the Penn Ovarian Cancer Research Center at the Perelman School of Medicine. He also directs the Gynecologic Cancer Research Program at the Basser Center for BRCA. The Drapkin laboratory focuses on understanding the genetic, molecular, and physiological factors that drive the development of cancer, with a special focus on gynecologic malignancies.

Dr. Drapkin received his medical and graduate doctoral degrees from Rutgers University Biomedical and Health Sciences MD-PhD program. He completed his clinical training at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital as a resident and fellow in anatomic pathology and his post-doctoral research training at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. He was on the Harvard Medical School faculty before joining the University of Pennsylvania faculty in 2015. He is a distinguished alumnus of the Rutgers graduate school program and is an elected member of the American Society of Clinical Investigation.