Cheves Smythe Distinguished Lecture

Cheves Smythe, M.D.

The Cheves Smythe Distinguished Lecture was established in 2006 to honor  Dr. Cheves Smythe, our first dean of McGovern Medical School from 1970 – 1975.  Dr. Smythe skillfully guided the School through its early years with his long-standing commitment to the fields of geriatrics and education and his exemplary standards of leadership.

Dr. Smythe was born and raised in Charleston, South Carolina, educated at Yale, and graduated from the Harvard Medical School in 1947. He was trained in internal medicine at the Boston City Hospital in Boston and Bellevue and Presbyterian Hospitals in New York. Research fellowships in the study of hepatic and renal physiology followed.   During the Korean War, he was assigned to the Naval Medical Field Research Laboratory, Camp Lejeune, in North Carolina, and was responsible for a variety of applied research ventures relative to military medicine.   After 11 years on the faculty at the Medical College of South Carolina and three years as Dean, he became Associate Director of the Association of American Medical Colleges.

He was then asked to organize McGovern Medical School at Houston in 1970 where he served until November 2011. During leaves of absence, he also served as Dean, Professor of Medicine and Chairman of the Department of Medicine at the Aga Khan University of Health Sciences in Karachi, Pakistan.

He is certified in both Internal Medicine and Geriatrics. He has been recognized as a devoted and appreciated teacher of clinical medicine, strengthening medical teaching at Lyndon Baines Johnson Hospital as well as assisting in the development of the geriatric medicine program.

An endowment has been established in Dr. Smythe’s name. Contributions should be made to :
UTHealth
Office of Development
7000 Fannin, Suite 1200
Houston, TX 77030

Past Speakers

2024

George Kuchel, M.D.
UConn Health
Recording

2023
Supriya Mohile, M.D., MS
University of Rochester

2021
Louise Aronson, M.D., MFA
University of California, San Francisco

2020
Judith Campisi, Ph.D.
The Buck Institute for Research on Aging

2019
Gerard Karsenty, M.D., Ph.D.
Columbia University

2018
Helen Blau, Ph.D.
Stanford University
Baxter Laboratory for Stem Cell Biology

2017
Lennart Mucke, M.D.
University of California, San Francisco
Gladstone Institute of Neurological Disease

2016
Linda Fried, M.D.
Columbia University
Mailman School of Public Health

2015
Carol Barnes, Ph.D.
University of Arizona
Evelyn F. McKnight Brain Institute

2014
Luis Miguel Gutierrez-Robledo, M.D., Ph.D.
Autonomous University
National Institute of Geriatrics, Mexico

2013
Thomas Rando, M.D., Ph.D.
Stanford University
Paul F. Glenn Laboratory for the Biology of Aging

2012
Charles Reynolds III, M.D.
University of Pittsburgh Medical Center
Geriatric Psychiatry

2011
David Sinclair, Ph.D.
Harvard Medical School
Paul F. Glenn Laboratories for the Biological Mechanisms of Aging

2010
Cynthia Kenyon, Ph.D.
Calico
Aging Research

2009
Douglas Mann, M.D., F.A.C.C.
Washington University
Internal Medicine, Cardiovascular Division

2008
John Morley, MB., B.CH.
Saint Louis University, St. Louis
Gateway Geriatric Center

2007
Jeffrey Cummings, M.D.,
University of Nevada, Las Vegas