Poll

Philadelphia Magazine

Top Doctors 2006

The region’s best physicians, their advice on how to ward off 12 killer diseases, and what local researchers and, well, weirdos are doing to try and cheat death

By Sandy Hingston

Our Top Doctors list, below, has always been the gold standard for those seeking the finest medical care in the Philadelphia area. This year, we’ve again teamed up with Castle Connolly Medical Ltd. to bring you the local doctors other doctors say they’d choose to tend to their family members. We’ve included a glossary of the American Board of Medical Specialties categories we use and a thorough explanation of just how Castle Connolly compiles its Top Doctors list.

Then we went a step further. We asked Castle Connolly to find us the local doctors with the strongest track records — top vote-getters in Castle Connolly’s surveys, with prestigious faculty appointments and clinical backgrounds — for each of 12 top killer diseases in the United States: heart disease, Alzheimer’s, stroke, diabetes, kidney disease, emphysema, and the six most common kinds of cancer: skin, breast, colon, prostate, pancreatic and lung. We went to these 12 extraordinary doctors and picked their brains on the latest research in their fields, the newest methods of treatment, and solid advice on how not to wind up in their offices someday. Then Bill Cramer photographed the doctors in a nod to the famous Biblical prescription: “Physician, heal thyself.”

There’s health, and then there’s health. We’re all for long life, but when we heard that a Drexel University researcher was in the race to win the famed Methuselah Prize — for the longest-living mouse on record — we couldn’t help wondering: Who’d want to live forever? So we sent writer-at-large Kathleen Fifield to find out. She turned up gene manipulators, genius professors, dwarf rodents, a “longevity hormone,” and members of the Calorie Restriction Society (big fun, eh?). Her report on local efforts to beat the Grim Reaper is here.



The List by Specialty


For a list of hospital name abbreviations, please see here.

Adolescent Medicine

Allergy & Immunology

Cardiac Electrophysiology

Cardiovascular Disease

Child & Adolescent Psychiatry

Child Neurology

Clinical Genetics

Colon & Rectal Surgery

Dermatology

Diagnostic Radiology

Endocrinology, Diabetes & Metabolism

Family Medicine

Gastroenterology

Geriatric Medicine

Geriatric Psychiatry

Gynecologic Oncology

Hand Surgery

Hematology

Infectious Disease

Internal Medicine

Maternal & Fetal Medicine

Medical Oncology

Neonatal & Perinatal Medicine

Nephrology

Neurological Surgery

Neurology

Neuroradiology

Nuclear Medicine

Obstentrics & Gynecology

Ophthalmology

Orthopaedic Surgery

Otolaryngology

Pathology

Pediatric Cardiology

Pediatric Endocrinology

Pediatric Gastroenterology

Pediatric Hematology-Oncology

Pediatric Infectious Disease

Pediatric Nephrology

Pediatric Otolaryngology

Pediatric Pulmonology

Pediatric Rheumatology

Pediatric Surgery

Pediatrics

Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation

Plastic Surgery

Psychiatry

Pulmonary Disease

Radiation Oncology

Reproductive Endocrinology

Rheumatology

Surgery

Thoracic Surgery

Urology

Vascular & Interventional Radiology

Vascular Surgery

Originally published in Philadelphia magazine, May 2006

 
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