Drawing from the reflective personal blog Stepping Lightly (easad.blogspot.com) and public professional records, this summary presents the life of David Easa, MD, Professor Emeritus of Pediatrics at the John A. Burns School of Medicine (JABSOM), University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. A neonatologist with over 50 years of experience, he is board-certified in Pediatrics and Neonatal-Perinatal Medicine, licensed in Hawaii (active through 2028), and long associated with Kapiʻolani Medical Center for Women and Children in Honolulu. This account was prepared by the powerful engine of the GROK AI program, prepared in full in about 10 seconds!
Chapter 1: Roots and Formative Years (1940s–1960s)
Born in Hempstead, New York, into a Christian Arab family (his mother spoke only limited English), David Easa grew up on Long Island. He graduated from West Hempstead High School in 1964. High-school friendships formed a lasting foundation: a close quartet that included Sid (the athletic “jock”), Phil and Barry Bassik (both Jewish), and himself. Barry, taller and more mature, offered protection, moral steadiness, and companionship through teenage years of sports, parties, beach outings, modest drinking, and youthful pranks—while helping keep the group clear of serious trouble. These bonds emphasized loyalty and solidarity among average students with uncertain futures. Family longevity stood out (father lived to 102; maternal grandmother to 105; oldest sister into her late 90s), later informing Easa’s own reflections on genetics, including elevated Lipoprotein(a).
Chapter 2: Medical Training and Early Career (Late 1960s–1970s)
Easa earned his MD from the University of Louisville School of Medicine in 1972. He completed a Pediatrics residency at the University of California (San Diego) Medical Center (1973–1977), followed by a neonatology fellowship under pioneering expert Dr. Louis Gluck. Early research included a 1976 multi-author case report in the Journal of Pediatrics on acquired palatal grooves in premature infants caused by prolonged endotracheal tubes (which resolved after extubation) and a 1977 solo paper on neonatal blood coagulation. In June 1977 he joined Kapiʻolani Medical Center for Women and Children and JABSOM in Honolulu as a full-time academic neonatologist. The early years were challenging: limited formal mentoring, siloed clinical versus basic-science cultures, and geographic separation between hospital sites and the Mānoa campus. These experiences later fueled his commitment to supporting junior faculty.
Chapter 3: Clinical Practice, Research, and Infrastructure Building (1970s–2010s)
Over nearly five decades, Easa combined hands-on neonatology with research and leadership. He directed the NIH-sponsored Clinical Research Center (recruited by mentor Fred Greenwood, Ph.D.), supporting hundreds of clinical studies and seed grants for junior faculty across 13 years. He contributed to the Biomedical Research Infrastructure Network (BRIN), which strengthened research capacity, helped establish a Grants Development Office and satellite research services, and laid groundwork for the ongoing IDeA Networks of Biomedical Research Excellence (INBRE).
His scholarly work focused on neonatal lung injury and surfactant therapy, retinopathy of prematurity (ROP) incidence in Hawaii, NICU infection-control practices (e.g., showing gowning did not reduce colonization rates), meconium properties, and later health disparities and translational research involving Asian and Pacific Islander populations. Notable contributions appear in high-impact journals; highly cited papers include work on KL4-surfactant efficacy, synthetic surfactant trials in extremely low-birth-weight infants, and ethnicity-obesity relationships. He also participated in clinical trials such as heliox via nasal CPAP and supplemental oxygen for prethreshold ROP. Research interests listed on his academic profile emphasize human research and health disparities.
Chapter 4: Mentorship, Promotion Support, and Emeritus Service
In his final active decade and as Professor Emeritus, Easa devoted substantial energy to career development. He assisted an estimated three dozen or more faculty members—primarily from Pediatrics and Medicine, but also other departments—in preparing Statements of Endeavors and promotion dossiers for UH Mānoa’s multi-stage process. This often involved extensive rewriting, structural guidance, and honest assessment of readiness (scholarship being a frequent gap for clinical faculty). Motivated by his own early lack of support, he found deep satisfaction in the diverse backgrounds and achievements of those he helped; success rates were high. In 2026 he published a commentary on “The Qualities of a Good Clinical Teacher” in the Hawaiʻi Journal of Health & Social Welfare, bookending his 1976–77 papers across a 50-year span and bringing personal joy. He remains listed among JABSOM Pediatrics emeritus faculty.
Chapter 5: Personal Life, Relationships, and Losses
Easa’s family life included a 25-year marriage that ended with his wife’s death at age 54; he has reflected on the absence of her guidance during their children’s marriages and the upbringing of five grandchildren. A later long-term partner shared observations of friends and life. Lifelong friendship with Barry Bassik endured across time zones and decades through calls, emails, visits, legal referrals, shared meals, and dancing; Barry’s warmth, resilience amid cardiac surgeries, and partnership with Elaine left a profound imprint. Easa mourns Barry’s recent death as the loss of his only enduring high-school friend. Other personal markers include a beloved bird named “Little” (still mourned) and a history of new cars marking life stages.
Chapter 6: Travel, Technology, Nature, and Contemplation of Aging (Later Years–2026)
In retirement Easa continues selective engagement and reflective writing. He has traveled widely, including Arctic cruises (most recently around 2026 and a decade earlier) to Svalbard, observing polar bears, walruses, whales, glaciers, and the stark human vulnerability amid harsh wilderness—drawing parallels to modern dependency on technology and the lessons of explorers like Shackleton. In 2018 he purchased a Tesla Model 3 (named “Little”); in 2026 he acquired a new pearl-white Model 3 (“2-Little”), primarily for autonomous-driving features to offset aging night vision (nyctalopia), along with a smoother ride and quieter cabin.
Near age 80 (public profiles list him around 79 with 50+ years of experience), he contemplates mortality with a physician’s realism—calculating that only a small fraction of life remains, weighing genetic risks against lifestyle and medical interventions (e.g., Repatha), and balancing gratitude for each day against the temptation to over-optimize metrics. Other posts address AI’s incomplete capture of human knowledge, dance (Blackpool Festival, 2011), and everyday observations such as doctors’ waiting rooms.
Epilogue: Stepping Lightly
David Easa’s life, as revealed through his blog and professional record, is that of a dedicated neonatologist, research infrastructure builder, and mentor who found meaning not in singular breakthroughs but in sustained clinical care, institutional capacity-building, support for the next generation, enduring friendships, and quiet reckoning with frailty and the natural world. His Hawaii medical license remains active, and as Professor Emeritus he continues to contribute to the academic community that shaped his nearly half-century career. The blog Stepping Lightly serves as a late-life ledger—recording publications spanning 50 years, technological changes, polar landscapes that humble the self, and the simple act of still writing while time remains.
No comments:
Post a Comment