Abstract of Recording

The interview topics include Dr. Turino’s childhood, college and medical school years, and the research he did after medical school (Class of 1948), in particular, his Korean War service working at the National Research Council where his team created Dextran, a substitute for plasma. He describes his fellowship experiences that started in a cardiopulmonary laboratory, to focus on cardio function, but led to studying lung function. Significant mentions include a fellowship with the NY Heart Association, and his time as an investigator for the City of New York. A collaboration with Ines Mandl, PhD, whose special interest is the elastic tissue of the body, led to investigating mechanisms of lung injury, and this lead to studying alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency, and desmosine and isodesmosine as biomarkers in COPD.

Dr. Turino relates how he established the James P. Mara Center for Lung Disease, how he became the first John H. Keating Professor of Medicine at the St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center (SLR), and his efforts to make SLR a top tier research hospital. He discusses several of the outstanding researchers he recruited to SLR, and his work with several professional organizations. Of particular interest are his accounts of fund raising with American Lung Association and his involvement with the start of promoting asthma research, as well as his current clinical trials with the hyaluronan as a potential therapy for alpha-1 antitrypsin patients.

He touches on family life, wife and children, and their directions in life early in the interview and his recreational choices later in the conversation.  Dr. Braun asks his opinion on the merger of St. Luke’s and Roosevelt Hospitals, and his vision for the future of medical science.

Significant names or topics mentioned in the interview include: Dr. André Frédéric Cournand; Dr. Dickinson W. Richard; Alfred Fishman; Karl Meyer, MD, PhD; Ines Mandl, PhD; James P. Mara Center for Lung Disease; Jahar Bhattacharya MD, DPhil; Alan Rozanski, MD; David J. Volsky, PhD; Seymour Lieberman; Yong Y. Lin, PhD; AIDS/HIV; American Thoracic Society; Shuren Ma, PhD; hyaluronan; hyaluronic acid; Jerome Cantor; Matrix Therapeutics; Medical Science Institute; Dr. Arthur J. Antenucci.

Transcript of Gerard M. Turino, MD, interview, INT 0167

Audio-Video recording of Interview with Gerard M. Turino, MD, INT 0167

Biographical Sketch

Native New Yorker Gerard M. Turino attended Princeton University, and then Columbia University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons (currently Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons) graduating with the Class of 1948. After graduating, he interned at Bellevue Hospital, where he became acquainted with Dr. André F. Cournand and Dr. Dickinson W. Richard. He considers this the most transforming time in his life.  He served his residency at the Yale School of Medicine, during which time the Korean Conflict began.  Turino fulfilled his war service obligation at the National Research Council (a part of the National Academy of Sciences), on a team researching the creation of a substitute for plasma.  The team developed a product, Dextran, a plasma volume expander, which is still in use today.  After the war, Turino became Chief Resident at Bellevue Hospital on the Columbia University service, and then completed a cardiopulmonary fellowship. However, circumstances made it a pulmonary fellowship that introduced him to alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency and eventually to chronic obstructive lung disease.

Dr. Turino came to St. Luke’s-Roosevelt in 1983 as the first chairperson of the newly merged Department of Medicine, leaving Columbia University where he was a Professor of Medicine in the Medical School and an Attending Physician in the Hospital.  In 1998, he became the founding director of the James P. Mara Center for Lung Disease. The center has focused on lung matrix structure and cellular enzyme injury in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) including alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency (AATD) emphysema. 

Dr. Turino was the first to hold the John H. Keating, Sr. Professor of Medicine chair at Columbia P&S. He has served in many professional organizations including being president of the New York Heart Association, and the American Thoracic Society and as founding chairperson of the COPD Foundation. He was a J. Burns Amberson Lecturer and received the Edward Livingston Trudeau Medal for Research, Teaching and Clinical Care from the American Thoracic Society. Throughout his career, he served as a consultant to the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute.

Curriculum Vitae of Gerard M. Turino, MD