Robert Ira Lewy

Robert Ira Lewy, M.D., F.A.C.P. (born October 16, 1943) is an American doctor who has conducted research on aspirin therapy in heart disease and allergic phenomena in recipients of silicone breast implants.

Career

Lewy graduated magna cum laude in 1964 from Franklin and Marshall College in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, majoring in Biology. He was awarded the Roberts Prize in Biology, and was elected to the Phi Beta Kappa Society. He then matriculated at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. After one year, he took a leave of absence and was selected as a PhD candidate at the Princeton University Department of Graduate Studies doctoral program in Religion. There he was selected as a Woodrow Wilson scholar, and a William J. Fulbright Scholarship runner-up.

Returning to medical school, he graduated in 1971 from University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania with a Doctor of Medicine degree. His Internship was served at the Philadelphia General Hospital, now defunct, in Philadelphia, and his Residency at the Mercy Catholic Medical Center in Philadelphia. He was then selected for a National Institute of Heart, Lung and Blood grant,^[1] and began a two-year Clinical and Research Fellowship in Hematology at the Cardeza Foundation for Hematological Research of the Thomas Jefferson University of Philadelphia. His original research on the effect of aspirin on heart disease led to a period of prolific publishing in the scientific literature.^{[2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19]} He also held many hospital committee chairmanships, including Chairman, Infectious Disease and Pharmacy Review Committee of The Woman's Hospital of Texas, Chairman, Credentials Committee, Women’s Hospital of Texas and Chairman, Tissue and Therapeutics Committee, The Woman's Hospital of Texas. He holds two board certifications (board-certified by the American Board of Internal Medicine as an internist and sub-specialist as a hematologist); he is a member of the American Board of Forensic Examiners (now known as the American College of Forensic Examiners, not a recognized board, but a membership organization), and a member, American College of Rheumatology. He was accepted as a Fellow of the American College of Physicians in 1983.

Lewy practiced clinical hematology and oncology in Houston, Texas from 1979 until 2005, except for a brief period working for the Cancer Treatment Centers of America/Tulsa.^[20] During this time he was Clinical Assistant Professor of Medicine at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, and the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston. He served as a teaching physician at the St. Luke's Episcopal Hospital of Houston, where he was responsible for training interns, residents and fellows, and served the same function at the Ben Taub General Hospital in Houston on the Baylor College of Medicine Hematology service. His research on allergic aspects of silicone breast implants led to further scientific publications and book chapters during the mid-1990s as well as international scientific and governmental presentations,^[21] and peer recognition.^{[22][23][24][25]}

Silicone breast implants became a subject of much controversy in 1995, and Lewy was subpoened both as an expert witness in litigation, interviewed in the popular press and served as a court recognized expert in the Breast Implant Class Action settlement in what the New York Times referred to as a "medical rush to cash in."^[26] These implants were removed from the market by the United States Food and Drug Administration due to safety issues. Lewy's disagreement with the New York Times' characterization of the issue as a "rush to cash in" was published.^[27] In 1993, he suspended his admitting privileges to The Methodist Hospital, while retaining full privileges at his other teaching hospitals including St. Luke's Episcopal Hospital, as well as faculty appointments. The Methodist Hospital was the defendant in many breast implant cases, and the place where they were invented by Dr Frank Gerow, according to the article "Silicone City" in Texas Monthly magazine^[28] Silicone breast implants were finally rereleased after over ten years when the issues of leakage and rupture he described were corrected.

In 1997, Dr. Lewy was reprimanded and required to pay an administrative penalty of $2,000 by the Texas State Board of Medical Examiners.^[29] The board's order noted that in 1993, Lewy "was excluded from the medical staff of The Methodist Hospital for inadequate medical record keeping." The Oklahoma Board of Medical Licensure and Supervision reprimanded Dr. Lewy in 2002.^[30] He agreed to a fine from the New York State Board for Professional Medical Conduct, stemming from the Texas case, although he had never practiced in New York. State medical boards are permitted to consider issues occurring in another state as a cause to fine licensees in their own states. His license remains in good standing in Texas, California, Pennsylvania and New York, although currently they are inactive due to his retirement in 2005. He remains registered with the American Board of Medical Specialties in Internal Medicine and Hematology.

Scientific 'whistleblowers' remain subject to selective legal and administrative retaliation.^[31]

Post Career and Charitable Activities

He is a member of the Steering Committee of the Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation. In 2006 he donated over $1 million to Stuyvesant High School, his high school alma mater for the establishment of the Dr. Robert Ira Lewy Multimedia Center, to serve as the high school’s central academic research facility.^[32] In 2007 Lewy donated his personal library of 7000 books to the school ^[33] He established a proprietary family genealogy archive at the Leo Baeck Institute and is listed as a Notable Graduate of Stuyvesant High School by the school and the Stuyvesant Alumni Society for "pioneering work connecting hematology and cardiology". In 2013 he commented for the New York Times regarding his previous work on aspirin use in heart disease.^[34] and drug economics.^[35] In December 2013, New York University honored him as a member of the Society of the Torch, which "honors alumni, faculty and friends of New York University who have recognized the importance of planning their philanthropy by providing to the University" ^[36]

In late 2013 he made a bequest of $800,000 to New York University to establish the Dr Robert Ira Lewy Permanent Endowment in German Jewish History and Culture at the Skirball Department of Hebrew and Judaic Studies to establish the Dr Robert Ira Lewy Lecture Series In Jewish History and Culture and the Dr. Robert Ira Lewy Fellows In Jewish History and Culture.

References