The first Alton Ochsner Award Relating Smoking and Disease was presented in 1986. Three decades later, this award continues to focus attention on the biologic and pathophysiologic effects of tobacco smoke as a major cause of preventable lethal diseases.1,2 For 31 years, the recipients of the award have demonstrated a multiplicity of biologic effects produced by tobacco smoke and its contents on the lungs, cardiovascular organs, and other target organs. These effects promote a variety of adverse neoplastic and other disease responses that can ultimately lead to death (Table 1). We now know that secondhand tobacco smoke also produces organ damage.3 Further, deaths among smokers have been determined to be associated with causes that are not currently attributed to smoking.4
Other Diseases, Disease Mechanisms, and Consequences Initiated by Tobacco Smoking and Related Concepts Promoted By Investigations Recognized by the Alton Ochsner Award Relating Smoking and Disease
The precise underlying mechanisms promoting tobacco-related deaths remain, as yet, incompletely identified and understood. However, the achievements of the recipients of the Ochsner award have contributed to our understanding that prolonged tobacco consumption is a major etiologic entity that promotes one or more of a multiplicity of severe target organ diseases responsible for preventable deaths worldwide (Table 2).
Recipients of The Alton Ochsner Award Relating Smoking and Disease
THE AWARD AND SELECTION COMMITTEE
The Alton Ochsner Award Relating Smoking and Disease is a $15,000 prize presented to 1-3 honorees along with a medallion and plaque at the annual meeting of the American Public Health Association. The 2017 award will be presented in Atlanta, GA, on November 4-8, 2017. The American Public Health Association was chosen for its large membership and long-standing dedication to public health.
The award is named in honor of Doctor Alton Ochsner, a founder of the Ochsner Clinic in New Orleans, LA. In 1939, Doctor Ochsner, along with Doctor Michael DeBakey, published “Primary Pulmonary Malignancy: Treatment by Total Pneumonectomy; Analysis of 79 Collected Cases and Presentation of 7 Personal Cases” with the observation, “In our opinion the increase in smoking with the universal custom of inhaling is probably a responsible factor [for the increase in pulmonary carcinoma], as the inhaled smoke, constantly repeated over a long period of time, undoubtedly is a source of chronic irritation to the bronchial mucosa.” Doctor Ochsner is widely credited with exposing the link between smoking and lung cancer.
Each year, the Ochsner Clinic Foundation invites the deans and major department chairs of American, Canadian, and other schools of medicine and all Veterans Affairs hospitals to nominate 1-3 investigators for the award. All nominations are made by a knowledgeable individual and at least 2 supporting physicians or scientists with expertise in the basic and clinical sciences, including epidemiology.
The original selection committee for the award included Doctor Claude Lenfant, Director of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute of the National Institutes of Health; Doctor Eugene Braunwald, Harvard University; Doctor Michael DeBakey, Professor of Surgery, Baylor University;1 Doctor Shevert Frazier, Harvard University and former Director of the National Institute of Mental Health; Doctor William B. Kannel, Director of the Framingham Heart Study; Doctor Rosalyn Yalow, Nobel Laureate and Senior Medical Investigator, Veterans Administration; Doctor George Porter, President of Ochsner Clinic Foundation; and Doctor Edward D. Frohlich, Vice President of Education and Research, Ochsner Clinic Foundation.
The committee's current membership includes Robert W. Anderson, MD, The David C. Sabiston, Jr., Professor and Chairman Emeritus, Duke University Medical Center; Robert M. Carey, MD, MACP, Professor of Medicine, Dean Emeritus, University of Virginia School of Medicine; Aram V. Chobanian, MD, President Emeritus, Dean Emeritus, Professor of Medicine, Boston University; John T. Cole, MD, Vice Chairman, Medical Specialties, Ochsner Medical Center; Elizabeth T. H. Fontham, DrPH, Founding Dean and Professor Emeritus, School of Public Health, Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center; Edward D. Frohlich, MD, Alton Ochsner Distinguished Scientist, Ochsner Clinic Foundation; William A. McDade, MD, PhD, Executive Vice President, Chief Academic Officer, Ochsner Clinic Foundation; and Richard N. Re, MD, Scientific Director, Ochsner Clinic Foundation.
FUTURE PLANS
During the past 3 decades, we have come to much better understand the effects of long-term smoking. We have learned much concerning the myriad biologic effects initiated by constituents of tobacco smoke. The recipients of the Alton Ochsner Award Relating Smoking and Disease have clearly demonstrated a large number of deadly consequences in addition to pulmonary and cardiovascular diseases. We will continue to present this award to stimulate the generation of scientific information, promote understanding of the tobacco scourge, and deliver the important message to the media and general public that tobacco smoking produces fatalities.
- © Academic Division of Ochsner Clinic Foundation 2017
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