Robert George Dluhy, MD, a devoted physician, humanitarian, and academic scientist passed away peacefully on May 25, 2022, in Boston, Ma. He was 85.
Born in Passaic, N.J., son of the late Leona Fila and John George Dluhy, he earned his BA degree in biology from Princeton University, graduating Phi Beta Kappa and Magna Cum Laude. He received his medical and research training at Harvard Medical School, graduating in 1962, followed by his internal medicine residency at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital, currently known as Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and his clinical and research fellowship in endocrinology under Dr. George W. Thorn (1962-1970). His training was interrupted for two years while he served as a physician in the U.S. Army in Germany.
Beyond knowledge and critical thinking, Bob taught fellows and students how to be caring humanitarians and analytical, compassionate physicians, an example that he set in his clinical practice. Ultimately, he never forgot that outstanding patient care is the centerpiece of medicine and healing.
Following his fellowship, Bob joined the faculty in the Endocrine Division at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital and Harvard Medical School, where he spent his entire 52-year academic career. He rose through the ranks to become a professor of medicine in 1998 and served as the associate chief and clinical director of the Endocrine Division for nearly 30 years. Bob Dluhy was a physician’s physician, a naturalist, a creative scientist, and a civil rights leader. Throughout his life, he was governed by a relentless desire to advance health and well-being.
While Bob was among the last general endocrinologists at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, his research career was quite specifically focused on genetics and the adrenal gland. Over two-thirds of his 146 peer-reviewed publications were related to these areas. His interest in genetics began shortly after he became a faculty member, co-authoring an article in 1975 that described a new genetically determined hemoglobin — hemoglobin Cranston. As was true for many of Bob’s scientific achievements, this report was the product of his brilliant skills as a clinician, recognizing a unique clinical feature, and developing collaborations and resources to identify the cause.
This approach to research is best illustrated by his contributions to understanding of glucocorticoid-remedial aldosteronism (GRA). In the early 1990s, several patients in a family that had this unique, rare form of hypertension and hyperaldosteronism were referred to Bob. At the time, he was the director of the Endocrine Division’s fellowship program. One of his mentees was Richard Lifton, MD, PhD, a skilled molecular biologist. Together, they discovered the genetic basis of this rare disease. Their publication in Science in 1992 in many respects launched the field of the genetic underpinnings of hormonal mechanisms of hypertension to which Bob made substantial contributions over the next 20 years.
His passion to uncover and elucidate crucial knowledge allowed Bob to refine diagnostic tools that examine the adrenal gland, improving the accuracy and specificity of such tools in the process. Most critically, Bob Dluhy had a remarkable and incalculable impact on the health outcomes of these patients and all those under his care.
In the 1980s, Bob wrote a series of publications that provided the fundamental basis for how aldosterone is normally regulated in humans and how its dysregulation in several endocrine diseases contributes to their pathophysiology. His passion to uncover and elucidate crucial knowledge allowed Bob to refine diagnostic tools that examine the adrenal gland, improving the accuracy and specificity of such tools in the process. Most critically, Bob Dluhy had a remarkable and incalculable impact on the health outcomes of these patients and all those under his care.
The countless fellows and students whom Bob mentored invariably considered him their friend, colleague, and role model. His memorable traits are reflected in those whom he taught and are appreciated not only by his mentees but by the patients they treat and the colleagues with whom they work. While director of the Endocrinology Training Program, he developed a travel and resource fund for the fellows through donations from many grateful patients. For nearly 30 years, he served as chair of the Financial Aid Committee at Harvard Medical School where he strongly advocated for new programs to reduce medical student debt. In many regards, this work was the foundation and genesis for diversity and inclusion before the development of such formal policies at the medical school. Additionally, he used his roles as associate editor at The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism (1985 – 2000), associate editor at The New England Journal of Medicine (2001-2014), and section editor at Current Opinion in Endocrinology (2001-2020) to help educate these trainees in the art and science of medical writing and its importance in the advancement of clinical excellence.
Humor was an inextricable part of Bob’s character, shown most playfully at the December division parties, one year even playing the role of a member of the guitar-playing “Roaches” — a spoof on the Beatles. Beyond knowledge and critical thinking, Bob taught fellows and students how to be caring humanitarians and analytical, compassionate physicians, an example that he set in his clinical practice. Ultimately, he never forgot that outstanding patient care is the centerpiece of medicine and healing.
For his many contributions, Bob received numerous public honors, including but not limited to the Hoechst Marion Roussel Hypertension Mentor Award from the Council for High Blood Pressure of the American Heart Association (1997); an inaugural membership in the Academy at Harvard Medical School; the Distinguished Physician Award of the Endocrine Society in 2014; and the Special Faculty Prize for Sustained Excellence in Teaching by the Program in Medical Education at Harvard Medical School in 2016. As Bob often said, the reward that meant the most was seeing the growth and development of those he had the privilege to mentor and care for over the years.
After Bob retired from his administrative responsibilities at Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, he continued to maintain a meaningful clinical practice and became engaged in another area: work in civil rights to further health equity in the United States. He often stated that he viewed the people of this country collectively as his patients, under a broad theoretical framework. In 2015, Bob and his daughter, Leonore, began creating the first bill to establish a statutory right to emergency medical care for persons in police contact. In 2019, they founded the Medical Civil Rights Initiative to support and to develop this act and a subsequent legislative endeavor, which would establish similar rights and duties for those presumed innocent who are detained in carceral institutions. Under their leadership, their first effort, entitled the Medical Civil Rights Act, was filed in multiple states and currently is awaiting state and federal passage. In 2021, they published a Perspective in The New England Journal of Medicine about the clinical implications of the statutory gap that this bill seeks to resolve. Just days before his death, Bob spoke with impacted families who had suffered the deaths of family members during police contact, and they expressed their profound gratitude for the life-sustaining impact that this bill would have. So that lives will not continue to be lost, he would wish that this nation supports the passage of these landmark acts. In his final chapter, he is remembered by many as a visionary and a civil rights leader.
Bob Dluhy was a physician’s physician, a naturalist, a creative scientist, and a civil rights leader. Throughout his life, he was governed by a relentless desire to advance health and well-being.
Bob’s life was enriched by his love for his family, music, travel, and the natural beauty of the world. June 11, 2022, would have marked his 60th wedding anniversary, and he valued every moment with his wife, Deborah Haigh Dluhy, and daughter, Leonore Alexandra Dluhy. He declared the coast of Maine to be both his home and his solace. He routinely fed the birds and tended to the wildlife, and he loved to walk his dogs on Higgins Beach in Scarborough and in the Two Lights State Park in Cape Elizabeth. His spirit remains embedded forever in nature and in the lives that he so lovingly touched and fostered.
There will be a celebration of Bob’s life held on May 12, 2023, at 4 PM in the Memorial Church on the Harvard University campus.
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