A Message from Our Chair

Welcome to the inaugural Dartmouth Pediatrics alumni newsletter. I’m proud to share with you updates on the great things going on in the Department of Pediatrics at the Geisel School of Medicine and Dartmouth Health Children’s, which may have been called Dartmouth Medical School and Children’s Hospital at Dartmouth (CHaD) when you were here.

This year, we are celebrating 50 years of neonatology at Dartmouth and in New Hampshire. As you will read inside, we created—and still maintain—the first neonatal intensive care unit in the state: the Intensive Care Nursery at the Children’s Hospital at Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center (CHaD). Just as we have always done, we also support perinatal care at smaller hospitals all around our region. Now we augment that with telemedicine, or TeleICN. While that’s a recent innovation, we continue to make sure that it, and all of our care, is patient- and family-centered, for which Dartmouth Neonatology has been a national and international leader.

In addition to celebrating the past, we highlight Dartmouth Pediatrics’ contributions to state-of-the-art vaccinology. Not only did Peter Wright, D ’64, MD ’75, collaborate with Geisel researchers who made a landmark discovery that contributed to the rapid development of the mRNA coronavirus vaccine, but he also continues to conduct studies exploring how new vaccines exploiting mucosal immunity can help stop transmission of the virus. Learn more in this newsletter about how our experience and expertise position Dartmouth to lead in the next era of vaccine science.

In this first issue we also recognize the passing of three special members of our Dartmouth Pediatrics family.

Vaccinologist Sam Katz, D ’48, MD ’50, HON ’98, and neonatologist Bill Edwards, MD, RES ’77, FEL ’78, both made significant contributions to their fields, and we are forever grateful for their pursuit of excellence. Jackie Thayer, LPN, cared for patients, families, and us as health professionals, throughout her 50 years of service as a pediatric nurse at DHMC and the former Mary Hitchcock Memorial Hospital. To honor her memory, Jackie’s nursing colleagues created a scholarship fund that will help medical assistants and licensed nursing assistants earn their licensed practical nursing certification.

I enjoyed meeting some of you at the Pediatric Academic Societies’ Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C. I hope to meet more of you at future meetings and when you visit the campuses here at Dartmouth. In the meantime, please be on the lookout for the next newsletter, as there is so much more to tell.

Keith Loud, MD, MSc, RES ’00 Chair, Department of Pediatrics, Geisel School of Medicine

Dartmouth Health Children’s Physician-in-Chief

Join Us in Washington, D.C.

We look forward to hosting an alumni reception during the American Academy of Pediatrics National Conference and Exhibition in Washington, D.C., in October. We invite you, our Dartmouth Pediatrics community, to join us to reconnect and celebrate our collective accomplishments. Keep an eye out for a formal invitation with details in the coming months.

childrens.dartmouth-health.org