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http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/story/2012-04-04/worlds-oldest-doctor-dies/53997240/1?csp=34news
Leila Alice Denmark was the worlds oldest practicing pediatrician, starting pediatric residency in 1928 and finally retiring in May 2001 at the age of 103. She is is credited as co-developer of the pertussis (whooping cough) vaccine in the 1920s and 1930s.[5] For this, she was awarded the Fisher Prize in 1935. On December 10, 2011, at age 113 years 312 days, she became one of the 100 oldest people ever. At her death she was the 4th-oldest verified living person in the world and the 3rd-oldest verified living person in the United States.
She worked for over 70 years as a pediatrician. Thats what I call dedication!
^ Leila Daughtry-Denmark (1942). "Whooping cough vaccine" . Am J Dis Child 63 (3): 453466. (http://archpedi.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/summary/63/3/453)
Dr. Leila Denmark's secret: Love what you do
http://www.bizjournals.com/atlanta/stories/1998/07/27/focus2.html?page=all
Dr. Leila Denmark's secret: Love what you do
100-year-old has treated countless Atlanta families
"Dr. Leila Denmark still rises early to do what she's done every day for 70 years -- she marches to her office to hold court. A pediatrician, she sees from 15 to 25 patients a day, dispensing no-nonsense advice to panicky new mothers, prescribing antibiotics and reading the riot act to parents about their responsibilities."
"Her stamina is unbelievable. She can outwork me," said her daughter, Mary Hutcherson, who drives from her home in Athens to help her mother in Alpharetta each week.
With her steel-gray hair pulled back into a practical, yet elegant, bun, in a white doctor's coat she sewed herself, and with a shrewd twinkle in her eye, the diminutive Denmark takes charge of her beloved patients in a Forsyth County farmhouse that's even older than she is."
Even on her day off, conversation is interrupted again and again as the phone rings with questions about fevers and feeding schedules. "Wonderful," she said to one caller. "Let's get him on antibiotics."
`I don't make appointments'
Of course, she has been practicing since the Great Depression and remembers life, and death, before antibiotics. "We nursed children back to health then," she said. When a mother pulls up in an old truck with two sick children, she herds them into the office immediately. "I don't make appointments. You never know when a child's going to get sick," she explained. Another mom arrives with a son with a bleeding foot. Denmark takes it all in stride, binding wounds and soothing anxieties with kind words and an occasional joke. "You've got to have a sense of humor," she said.
The secret to her incredible longevity, she said, is simple. "Most of all, you have to love what you're doing. Anything you have to do is work. Anything you love to do is play."
The doctor inspires intense loyalty -- she has treated countless families, often three generations of them, who call themselves "Denmarkers" and wouldn't dare counter her strict admonitions about diet and child care: Don't always pick up a baby when he cries. Put him on a schedule. Never, ever raise a hand or your voice to a child.
"They learn from you," she said. "When a mother says, `What makes my children so bad?' I say, `Go look in the mirror.' Little children become like the environment they live in."
One of those avid Denmarkers is Windy Echols, about to have her sixth child. She said she was blessed when she found Denmark about 10 years ago. "She has a real heart with people with newborns," Echols said. "She'll spend an hour with you, giving advice and support. She brings sanity and common sense into the home. You have this older woman who's seen thousands of ears, noses and bottoms -- she just really brings confidence. You can call her at night or on Christmas Eve. She's been mother and grandmother to thousands."
"She is very loving and wise," agreed Paula Lewis, who went to Denmark as a child, whose children saw her and whose daughter is expecting her ninth Denmark patient. "She's like a grandmother. She has great faith and great fortitude." She laughs recalling one of the doctor's jokes. "She said, `Don't pick the crying child up. You can check to see if there's a snake in the bed, but don't pick her up.' "
Pet peeve: Parental responsibility
Despite living through two world wars, witnessing suffragettes put on tent shows to promote the vote for women in her South Georgia hometown, and seeing the age of the horse and buggy transform into a high-tech world of high anxiety, Denmark said the most significant change in her lifetime has been parents giving up responsibility for their children.
It's her pet peeve. "Children are not getting parental guidance, and it's wrecking this nation. Parenting has gone out of style," she said.
When the Medical College of Augusta admissions officers told her in 1924 there were no openings, they hadn't bargained on this tiny woman's huge determination. She talked to them at great length. They met that night. She enrolled the next day.
Asked whether she was treated any differently because of her gender, she said not a bit. "It was beautiful. Nobody bothered me at all."
After becoming the first intern at the fledgling Egleston Children's Hospital and a stint at Children's Hospital in Philadelphia, Denmark hung out her shingle in Virginia-Highland, then the countryside, five miles outside Atlanta.
As it got more crowded, she and her husband, John Eustace Denmark, an executive with the Federal Reserve Bank, moved to Sandy Springs. Metro Atlanta encroached again, and they retreated to Forsyth County. Her husband died in 1990.
"After Daddy died, she sat around for two weeks. She couldn't take it anymore and went back to work," Mary recalled. "She does not tolerate boredom at all."
Along the way, Denmark helped develop the whooping cough vaccine, won countless awards and citations, and volunteered a day's work every week for 56 years at the Central Presbyterian Clinic in Atlanta to give needed care to poor people.
She recalled one family she helped. "The family was so poor they picked up coal along the railroad tracks to heat their home. But that mother raised the most wonderful kids. It's not poverty that's harming our children. It's parental neglect," she said, returning to her favorite gripe.
Of her longtime loving marriage -- she wed Mr. Denmark 72 hours after she got her medical degree in 1928 -- she said, "I listened carefully to what he said and did as I pleased. He listened carefully to what I said and did as he pleased. I loved the mountains and camping. Mr. Denmark liked to camp at the Waldorf. Yes, it's been a lot of fun living."
Her advice to young people: "Never do anything or say anything that one day you'll want to forget."
Leila Alice Denmark was the worlds oldest practicing pediatrician, starting pediatric residency in 1928 and finally retiring in May 2001 at the age of 103. She is is credited as co-developer of the pertussis (whooping cough) vaccine in the 1920s and 1930s.[5] For this, she was awarded the Fisher Prize in 1935. On December 10, 2011, at age 113 years 312 days, she became one of the 100 oldest people ever. At her death she was the 4th-oldest verified living person in the world and the 3rd-oldest verified living person in the United States.
She worked for over 70 years as a pediatrician. Thats what I call dedication!
^ Leila Daughtry-Denmark (1942). "Whooping cough vaccine" . Am J Dis Child 63 (3): 453466. (http://archpedi.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/summary/63/3/453)
Dr. Leila Denmark's secret: Love what you do
http://www.bizjournals.com/atlanta/stories/1998/07/27/focus2.html?page=all
Dr. Leila Denmark's secret: Love what you do
100-year-old has treated countless Atlanta families
"Dr. Leila Denmark still rises early to do what she's done every day for 70 years -- she marches to her office to hold court. A pediatrician, she sees from 15 to 25 patients a day, dispensing no-nonsense advice to panicky new mothers, prescribing antibiotics and reading the riot act to parents about their responsibilities."
"Her stamina is unbelievable. She can outwork me," said her daughter, Mary Hutcherson, who drives from her home in Athens to help her mother in Alpharetta each week.
With her steel-gray hair pulled back into a practical, yet elegant, bun, in a white doctor's coat she sewed herself, and with a shrewd twinkle in her eye, the diminutive Denmark takes charge of her beloved patients in a Forsyth County farmhouse that's even older than she is."
Even on her day off, conversation is interrupted again and again as the phone rings with questions about fevers and feeding schedules. "Wonderful," she said to one caller. "Let's get him on antibiotics."
`I don't make appointments'
Of course, she has been practicing since the Great Depression and remembers life, and death, before antibiotics. "We nursed children back to health then," she said. When a mother pulls up in an old truck with two sick children, she herds them into the office immediately. "I don't make appointments. You never know when a child's going to get sick," she explained. Another mom arrives with a son with a bleeding foot. Denmark takes it all in stride, binding wounds and soothing anxieties with kind words and an occasional joke. "You've got to have a sense of humor," she said.
The secret to her incredible longevity, she said, is simple. "Most of all, you have to love what you're doing. Anything you have to do is work. Anything you love to do is play."
The doctor inspires intense loyalty -- she has treated countless families, often three generations of them, who call themselves "Denmarkers" and wouldn't dare counter her strict admonitions about diet and child care: Don't always pick up a baby when he cries. Put him on a schedule. Never, ever raise a hand or your voice to a child.
"They learn from you," she said. "When a mother says, `What makes my children so bad?' I say, `Go look in the mirror.' Little children become like the environment they live in."
One of those avid Denmarkers is Windy Echols, about to have her sixth child. She said she was blessed when she found Denmark about 10 years ago. "She has a real heart with people with newborns," Echols said. "She'll spend an hour with you, giving advice and support. She brings sanity and common sense into the home. You have this older woman who's seen thousands of ears, noses and bottoms -- she just really brings confidence. You can call her at night or on Christmas Eve. She's been mother and grandmother to thousands."
"She is very loving and wise," agreed Paula Lewis, who went to Denmark as a child, whose children saw her and whose daughter is expecting her ninth Denmark patient. "She's like a grandmother. She has great faith and great fortitude." She laughs recalling one of the doctor's jokes. "She said, `Don't pick the crying child up. You can check to see if there's a snake in the bed, but don't pick her up.' "
Pet peeve: Parental responsibility
Despite living through two world wars, witnessing suffragettes put on tent shows to promote the vote for women in her South Georgia hometown, and seeing the age of the horse and buggy transform into a high-tech world of high anxiety, Denmark said the most significant change in her lifetime has been parents giving up responsibility for their children.
It's her pet peeve. "Children are not getting parental guidance, and it's wrecking this nation. Parenting has gone out of style," she said.
When the Medical College of Augusta admissions officers told her in 1924 there were no openings, they hadn't bargained on this tiny woman's huge determination. She talked to them at great length. They met that night. She enrolled the next day.
Asked whether she was treated any differently because of her gender, she said not a bit. "It was beautiful. Nobody bothered me at all."
After becoming the first intern at the fledgling Egleston Children's Hospital and a stint at Children's Hospital in Philadelphia, Denmark hung out her shingle in Virginia-Highland, then the countryside, five miles outside Atlanta.
As it got more crowded, she and her husband, John Eustace Denmark, an executive with the Federal Reserve Bank, moved to Sandy Springs. Metro Atlanta encroached again, and they retreated to Forsyth County. Her husband died in 1990.
"After Daddy died, she sat around for two weeks. She couldn't take it anymore and went back to work," Mary recalled. "She does not tolerate boredom at all."
Along the way, Denmark helped develop the whooping cough vaccine, won countless awards and citations, and volunteered a day's work every week for 56 years at the Central Presbyterian Clinic in Atlanta to give needed care to poor people.
She recalled one family she helped. "The family was so poor they picked up coal along the railroad tracks to heat their home. But that mother raised the most wonderful kids. It's not poverty that's harming our children. It's parental neglect," she said, returning to her favorite gripe.
Of her longtime loving marriage -- she wed Mr. Denmark 72 hours after she got her medical degree in 1928 -- she said, "I listened carefully to what he said and did as I pleased. He listened carefully to what I said and did as he pleased. I loved the mountains and camping. Mr. Denmark liked to camp at the Waldorf. Yes, it's been a lot of fun living."
Her advice to young people: "Never do anything or say anything that one day you'll want to forget."
