Leslie S. Libow

Last updated
Leslie S. Libow
Born (1933-12-26) December 26, 1933 (age 87)
Brooklyn, New York
Alma materCUNY Brooklyn College ('52) Chicago Medical School ('58)

Leslie S. Libow (born December 26, 1933) is Clinical Professor of Medicine and of Geriatrics at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. He previously was Greenwall Professor of Geriatrics and Adult Development at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai from 1982 to 2011 and Chief of Medical Services at the Jewish Home and Hospital from 1982 to 2004. Libow is an authority on internal and geriatric medicine and is also known for creating the field of Geriatric Medicine in America.


Education

Pre-college education in public schools (elementary school and high school)

High school spent at James Madison High School, Brooklyn, NY

His schoolmates in the same or related years of high school with a largely East European immigrant background included: 1) United States Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg (RBG). Both Libow and RBG were active in club entitled “BOOSTERS.” 2) US Senator (Vermont) Bernie Sanders 3) US Senate Majority Leader (New York) Charles E. Schumer

After high school, he attended Brooklyn College tuition-free and in his senior year, he was elected to PHI BETA KAPPA honorary academic society.

After Brooklyn College, he went on to the Chicago Medical School, which has been renamed the Rosalind Franklin University of the Sciences. (Rosalind Franklin, PhD discovered the HELIX shape of RNA/DNA which was awarded the Nobel Prize in bio-medicine, but without Dr. Franklin's name attached to the Prize. She had so prematurely died and Nobel rules rigidly exclude a spouse if deceased. Usually, a widow is thus excluded.)

At Chicago Medical School graduation, Dr. Libow received the John J. Sheinin Presidential Award for Citizenship. He graduated from medical school “first in class” and went onward to intern at The Mount Sinai Hospital of NYC Hospital, then a one-year residency within Internal Medicine at an affiliate of Mount Sinai, Veterans Admin Hospital in Bronx, NY followed by 3 years at the NIH in a dual role of clinician and researcher, including a role in “a 20-scientist member” of a “human-ageing” ongoing research program.

After his training and research foundation were completed, Dr. Libow began his career as a practitioner. He simultaneously embraced a half-time role as chief physician at a 100-bed NYC convalescent/nursing home bed program within the confines of the 1000-bed Mt Sinai City Hospital in Elmhurst, NYC at the Elmhurst General Hospital. Dr. Libow co-directed with Roberto Viola, MD and Martin Stein, Jr. MD. Here, Libow realized that normal human aging was not taught in medical schools nor in any of the residencies of medicine, pediatrics, family medicine or internal medicine. Thus, he created a Fellowship in Geriatric Medicine. Moreover, he was able to influence the medical school's curriculum to have the Mount Sinai Medical School Students experience a full curriculum about normal aging and its interplay with developing diseases.

Three adventurous internal medical resident physicians chose to enter the first US Geriatric fellowship—though not yet approved by the American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM). Later, the ABIM approved this first US Fellowship in Geriatric medicine. Today, according to the American Geriatrics Society, there are in the USA approximately 500 Fellowships each year in Geriatric Medicine.

Dr. Libow has authored one geriatric medicine textbook, The Core of Geriatric Medicine co-authored with Fredrick Sherman, MD. He has held many university and research positions, including but not limited to: 2005 Lecturer and Visiting Professor of NYU School of Medicine. 1995 Visiting Professor at Johns Hopkins University Medical School, Baltimore, Maryland. 1989 National Institutes of Health (NIH) Committee on Pharmacology, co-chairman.


Awards and Honors

• 2013-American Medical Directors Association (AMDA) James Patee Award and lecture in “Education in Geriatrics” at their Annual Meeting. • 1986—87 American Geriatrics Society (AGS) at their annual meeting, Nascher-Manning Award for “Distinguished Achievement in the field of Geriatric Medicine” • 1980—The Gerontological Society of America-at annual meeting--The Donald P. Kent award and lecture • 1980—Alpha OMEGA Alpha –Visiting Professor University of Miami School of Medicine. • 4/80 American College of Physicians Annual meeting— “State of the Art” Lecture: “The Interface of Ethical and Clinical” • 1978-83 WHO (World Health Organization) Consultant


Academic and Institutional Appointments

2004-2021 Clinical Professor at Mount Sinai School of Medicine (Medicine and Geriatrics) 2004-2015 Distinguished Clinical Professor Jewish Home Lifecare 1982-2004 Chief of Medical Services and Senior Vice President for Medical Affairs—Jewish Home and Hospital for Aged of New York 1982-Present Mount Sinai School of Medicine 1965-Present Attending Physician at Mount Sinai Hospital Professional Societies—Role as volunteer in academic activities 1998-Present American Medical Directors Association—Editorial Board of Journal. 1984-87 American College of Physicians (ACP)—Representative of the American Geriatrics Society to Council of Medical Societies of the ACP. 1970-87 American College of Physicians Member of Committee on Ageing and Chronic Care 1981-82 NIH Search Committee for Director of the NIA: National Institute Of Aging: Chosen T. Franklin Williams, MD. 1980 American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM) Retreat Presentation: “The Design and Place of Geriatric Medicine Training within Internal Medicine” residency and Fellowship Level. Sun Valley, ID 1976-77 Gerontological Society of America, chairman, Clinical Medicine section 1972-75 International Gerontological Association, chairman, Clinical Medicine Section for USA


Miscellaneous Grants

2008 Parkinson's disease Research Program—The Zicklin Family Fund 2006-2008 Leir Charitable Trust Foundation 2006-2007 $ 200,000.00 2001-2005 Leir Charitable Trust (3,700,000.00 / 5 years) Project: To link early clinical evidence of Parkinson's disease with brain autopsy findings and to study the dementia of Parkinson's disease as it relates to Alzheimer's disease. Co-Principal Investigator with Warren Olanow, MD 1991-94 Commonwealth Fund (1,700,000.00 / 3 years) Minimizing restraint use in US nursing Homes. Co-Principal Investigator with Richard Neufeld, MD To study the impact of a “method to reduce nursing home use of restraints,” embracing 16 US nursing homes widely dispersed across the USA. 1989-92 Schimper Foundation—Program on Ethics in Long Term Care (100,000) 1989 Center on Ethics in Long Term Care (300,000.00) 1988 Brookdale Foundation Program on Bioengineering for the Elderly (50,000.00) 1983 UJA-Brookdale Foundation Development of Rehabilitation Program/ Jewish Home and Hospital (150,000.00) 1976-78 Kronish Foundation (25,000.00) Establishment of the role of the Physician Assistant (P.A.) in health care of the elderly 1977-78 Jewish Institute for Geriatric Care (JIGC) HEW Office of Human Development Devising Curriculum, syllabus and teaching materials in Geriatric Medicine for use by medical schools through the publishing of The Core Of Geriatric Medicine: A Guide for Students and Practitioners by Libow and Sherman. Mosby Inc., 1980. 6,000 copies published.


Special Articles

1997 Publication of the Harvard Risk Management Foundation “Ensuring patient safety from care site to care site.” Fall 1997 pp. 13–14. Editorships 1999-2021 Journal of the American Medical Directors Association (JAMDA) 1983-2020 Editorial Board “Geriatrics” Peer-reviewed Publications: 101 articles and available Below are selected articles by Leslie S. Libow, MD Libow LS. “Ebola and Age: We May Be Missing a Critical Biological Aspect of the Ebola Infection.” J Am Geriatr Soc. 2015 Nov; 63(11):2440-1. doi: 10.1111/jgs.13809. PMID: 26603082.

Libow LS. “Geriatrics in the United States--baby boomers' boon?” N Engl J Med. 2005 Feb 24;352(8):750-2. doi: 10.1056/NEJMp048140. PMID: 15728805.

“Long Term Care for the Frail Elderly,” N Engl J Med 2000 Mar; 16:342(11); 832–4. Libow LS, Neufeld RR, Olson E, Breuer B, Starer P. “Sequential outbreak of influenza A and B in a nursing home: efficacy of vaccine and amantadine.” J Am Geriatr Soc. 1996 Oct;44(10):1153-7. doi: 10.1111/j.1532-5415.1996.tb01363.x. PMID: 8855992.

Libow LS, Olson E, Neufeld RR, Martico-Greenfield T, Meyers H, Gordon N, Barnett P. “Ethics rounds at the nursing home: an alternative to an ethics committee.” J Am Geriatr Soc. 1992 Jan;40(1):95-7. doi: 10.1111/j.1532-5415.1992.tb01836.x. PMID: 1727855.

Libow LS. “From Nascher to now. Seventy-five years of United States geriatrics.” J Am Geriatr Soc. 1990 Jan;38(1):79-83. doi: 10.1111/j.1532-5415.1990.tb01603.x. PMID: 2404057.



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