Celebrating Senior Champions
Grand Champion - Neil M. Resnick, MD
Thomas Detre Professor and Chief of the Division of Geriatric Medicine and Gerontology
Associate Director of the Aging Institute of UPMC Senior Services and the University of Pittsburgh
Director, John A. Hartford Center of Excellence in Geriatrics
Neil Resnick, MD has devoted his career to caring for older adults, investigating their illnesses, and teaching others to do the same.
After receiving his MD from Stanford, Dr. Resnick trained at Harvard and spent 15 years on its faculty. There he established the Division of Gerontology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and created the nation’s first Continence Center.
In 1999, he moved to the University of Pittsburgh and UPMC. In addition to building the Division of Geriatrics, he launched the Aging Institute to leverage the university and health system’s aging expertise. Pitt is now one of the country’s top funded programs in aging research. It’s also designated a Geriatrics Center of Excellence by the Hartford Foundation and is consistently ranked among the nation’s best in geriatrics by US News and World Report.
Dr. Resnick’s own research has led not only to discovery of a new cause of incontinence but also to a paradigm shift that created new therapeutic approaches, these evolved into new federal and World Health Organization guidelines for all incontinent adults. A similar approach facilitated his contributions to research into other geriatric conditions, including osteoporosis, falls, and delirium. Now he and his colleagues are working to re-engineer geriatric care, not only to improve it but to make it more feasible and, hopefully, to embed it into daily routine so that it can be delivered automatically and reliably. In 2012, Medicare selected Dr. Resnick for its elite Innovation Advisors Program.
Lessons from his research enabled him to develop geriatric modules for primary care providers, co-edit a leading geriatrics text, and help national urological and gynecological organizations develop training curricula in geriatrics.
Dr. Resnick’s efforts have been honored by awards from the NIH, the American Geriatrics Society, the Society for General Internal Medicine, the American Urological Association, and the International Continence Society. In 2003, the Simon Foundation,--one of the world’s largest organizations for incontinent individuals--awarded him its first John Humpal award for “outstanding dedication to people with incontinence and the relentless pursuit of knowledge to find a cure.” He has also been included in “Best Doctors in America” ever since its first edition.