The John H. Glick, MD Professorship in Cancer Research

John H. GlickThe chair was established in 2016 when additional gifts and the growth in the value of the endowment for the John H. Glick, MD Abramson Cancer Center Director's Professorship created funding to support an additional chair. The John H. Glick, MD Professorship in Cancer Research is awarded to a leader in scientific discovery.

In 2021, after nearly five decades of unsurpassed leadership and impact at Penn Medicine, John H. Glick, MD, Professor of Medicine and the Madlyn & Leonard Abramson Professor of Clinical Oncology, retired.

Dr. Glick joined the Penn faculty in 1974 as the Ann B. Young Assistant Professor, after completing fellowships at the National Cancer Institute and Stanford. Over the course of a distinguished career spent entirely at Penn, he has touched the lives of countless thousands of patients and been a guiding force through a transformational era of cancer care. The breadth and depth of his legacy impact every corner of our enterprise — from establishing the medical oncology program as a young physician, to guiding the Abramson Cancer Center to national preeminence and leading it longer than any other Director (1985 – 2006), to wide-ranging contributions as a researcher, teacher and mentor, fundraiser, talent recruiter, role model, and champion of professionalism.

In all these roles, Dr. Glick has been first and foremost a master clinician. His compassion and clinical insight drove the development of integrated cancer clinical care at Penn Medicine, including the development of psychosocial and nutritional counseling services that led to establishment of the Patient and Family Services Program. His clinical acumen and focus on keeping patients’ lives and their needs at the heart of every treatment goal has had broad impact, leading in 2013 to establishment of the Penn Medicine Academy of Master Clinicians to promote and perpetuate clinical excellence in all specialties across our institution.

In addition to his formative leadership of the ACC, Dr. Glick also played an instrumental role in the creation of the Roberts Proton Therapy Center, which was established with a pivotal naming gift from Wharton alumnus the late Ralph J. Roberts and wife Suzanne, his son Brian L. Roberts, and Brian’s wife Aileen. Dr. Glick became a driving force in philanthropy at Penn Medicine, culminating in his role as Vice President and Associate Dean for Resource Development. Since 1985, he helped to raise over $600 million for Penn Medicine and the ACC, establishing many centers in partnership with grateful patient philanthropists, including the Rena Rowan Breast Center and the Thalheimer Cardio-Oncology Center and significant funding for the Ruth and Raymond Perelman Center for Advanced Medicine. His focus on recruiting top talent has had an equally lasting imprint on Penn Medicine. Over the years, he has chaired the search committees for half of the current clinical department chairs at the Perelman School of Medicine.

As a clinician-scholar, Dr. Glick’s research has mapped standards of care for breast cancer and lymphomas. He pioneered the integration of adjuvant chemotherapy and definitive breast radiotherapy for early-stage breast cancer and chaired the pivotal 1985 NCI Consensus Conference on Adjuvant Chemotherapy for Breast Cancer. He subsequently chaired consecutive St. Galen International Consensus Panels for Treatment of Primary Breast Cancer (1988-2011). In 2000 a landmark clinical study published in the NEJM on the role of bone marrow transplant for advanced breast cancer transformed the standard of practice. Dr. Glick also conducted pivotal Phase III randomized trials in Hodgkin’s and Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. His research, which was continuously funded by NIH 1974-2006, has appeared in 165 peer-reviewed publications and 28 chapters and books.

In addition to his impactful research and institutional leadership, Dr. Glick has been a legendary teacher and role model. He has trained and mentored several generations of medical students, residents, and fellows. Three of his fellows went on to become Directors of NCI-designated Cancer Centers – an accomplishment that speaks for itself.


Current Chairholder

The John H. Glick, MD Professorship in Cancer Research is currently open.

Previous Chairholders

  • Caryn Lerman, PhD 2016–2019