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‘Gold standard’ of pediatricians retires
LIBERTY
Dr. Kurt J. Wegner, considered by his peers the “gold standard” of pediatricians in the Mahoning Valley for half a century, is calling it a career.
Arriving in the Youngstown area in 1956, he became a driving force in pediatrics at the former Tod Children’s Hospital and at St. Elizabeth Health Center and lastly at Akron Children’s Hospital Mahoning Valley, from which he will retire Dec. 31.
“I have enjoyed being a pediatrician. I’ve always felt I was blessed by choosing something I like to do and working with people and kids. The trip was great, but it’s time,” said Dr. Wegner, who will be 85 in January.
Born in Berlin, Germany, in 1927, his family fled their homeland when he was 12 and settled in Washington Heights, a predominantly Jewish community in New York City.
Though never in a concentration camp, he saw the discrimination against Jews after Hitler came into power and considers himself a Holocaust survivor.
His parents and brother and all his relatives on his father’s side of the family escaped, but a number of his mother’s relatives died in concentration camps, said Dr. Wegner, a member of Rodef Sholom Temple in Youngstown.
He said he realized when he was a junior at Bronx High School of Science, a New York City magnet public school, that he wanted to become a doctor.
“I liked science and helping people, and I was not interested in getting into business and making a lot of money,” he said.
There are a lot of non-monetary rewards to being a physician, such as the enjoyment and satisfaction of healing and taking care of peoples’ needs when they really need help, he said.
After graduating from Bronx High in 1944, earning his medical degree and completing his residency, he came to Youngstown in 1956.
He is board certified in four areas: pediatrics, family practice, sub-board neonatal-perinatal medicine and clinical genetics, in which he has been involved the last 20 years.
As a pediatrician he never has delivered a baby, but he has taken care of thousands of children.
“I can’t go to the supermarket without running into a child who is a patient or whose parents or grandparents were my patients,” he said.
Working in medicine with patients and in a teaching capacity for more than 50 years has given him a perspective on medicine ranging from a time when most doctors were in private practice, some still making house calls, to the age of computers and huge advances technologically and scientifically in medicine.
“Computers changed everything. I’ve been seeing difficult illnesses since 1969, but no one can know everything. Computers make researching and diagnoses much faster,” he said.
In 1971, he was hired by St. Elizabeth where he started the newborn intensive care unit and taught interns. Six years later he went to Tod Children’s where he stayed until it closed in 2007.
“We had spent so much time building it up,” Dr. Wegner said sadly with a shake of his head reflecting on the Tod closing.
While at Tod Children’s, he got involved in genetic medicine, partially because of advice from his late wife, Dr. Margot Wegner, a psychiatric social worker.
“She told me there would come a time when you don’t want to get up at 2 a.m. any more to see patients, and she was right,” he said.
As a geneticist, Dr. Wegner sees patients, many undiagnosed, who have chronic problems, such as birth defects, developmental problems or unusual appearance, which may be hereditary.
“I make a diagnosis and tell my patients what caused the condition, if possible. I give them the prognosis for the future, what can be done for treatment, and the risk of recurrence of the condition if they have more children,” Dr. Wegner said.
“One thing that is different in genetics from other specialities: We don’t tell patients what to do. We make the situation as clear as we can and allow them to make their own decisions,” he said.
But he was firm with his residents at Tod Children’s, said Dr. Louis Brine Jr. He called Dr. Wegner his mentor and the “gold standard” for pediatric medicine in the area.
“Failure was not an option,” said Dr. Brine, a pediatrician with Akron Children’s Hospital Mahoning Valley General Pediatrics Group who was in private practice in the Boardman area for 28 years.
“Dr. Wegner was really more like a father figure,” said Dr. Brine who was a resident under Dr. Wegner’s tutelage at Tod Children’s.
Dr. Wegner always stressed that the patient was first above everything else in our lives and made it very clear that is how we should do medicine,” Dr. Brine said.
He was very stern but also very giving and caring for residents and nurses, said Dr. Brine.
“We didn’t dare enter Tod Children’s, didn’t dare approach morning rounds, without knowing previous and current laboratories for every patient we were to see,” Dr. Brine recalled. “He may have dressed you down one day, but if you needed extra time and support, he was there to catch and support you the next day. The criticism was about being the best physician that you could be.”
Also, “He didn’t believe training stopped after residency but continued until the day you stop practicing medicine. He is truly amazing, and his absence in the medical community will not go unnoticed,” Dr. Brine said.
Preparing for eventual retirement, Dr. Wegner, while at Tod Children’s, asked his good friend and chairman of the pediatrics department, Dr. Robert Felter, to tell him when it was time to quit, but he left the area.
Dr. Wegner collaborated closely with Dr. Wilfred Dodgson for many years working together at Tod Children’s.
“I think I’m still doing the job, but there will come a time when I can’t. I know there will be days when I will regret leaving, but I wanted to go out on my own terms while I was still meeting my own standards,” he said.