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Description
Major topics covered:
- Cancer Prevention in Boston
- History of the College of Surgeons in Boston
- Facilities at the Baker Estate in the 1940s
- Development of biostatics coding and card system for epidemiology
- Cancer Statistics in Texas
Identifier
MacDonaldE_01_20000519
Publication Date
5-19-2000
Publisher
The Historical Resources Center, Research Medical Library, The University of Texas Cancer Center
City
Houston, Texas
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.
Topics Covered
University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, UT MD Anderson Cancer Center, University of Texas System. M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, M.D. Anderson Hospital and Tumor Institute at Houston, University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, M.D. Anderson Hospital and Tumor Institute
Disciplines
History of Science, Technology, and Medicine | Oncology | Oral History
Recommended Citation
MacDonald, Eleanor and Marchiafava, Louis J. PhD, "Eleanor MacDonald, Oral History Interview, May 19, 2000" (2000). Interview Sessions. 225.
https://openworks.mdanderson.org/mchv_interviewsessions/225
Conditions Governing Access
Open
About the Interview
Abstract
Eleanor MacDonald talks with Louis Marchifava about her early life and education in New England; her early career in the Cancer Division in the American College of Surgeons; her recruitment and subsequent work at the University of Texas MD Anderson Hospital and Tumor Institute; her work in developing the biostatistics coding in the early years of the institution; and her relationship with various physicians and luminaries of the Texas Medical Center.
Biographical Note
Eleanor MacDonald was born on March 4, 1906 in Sommerville, Massachusetts to Angus and Catherine MacDonald. She attended and graduated Radcliffe College in 1928. At Harvard Medical School, she studied under E. Bidwell Wilson which led to her eventual appointment as the Epidemiologist to Boston’s State Cancer Program. Her work there lead to the publishing of her seminal work “The Incidence and Survival in Cancer” in the New England Journal of Medicine in 1948. Her work in New England caught the attention of Dr. R. Lee Clark who recruited her to be the head of the newly created Department of Epidemiology at the University of Texas MD Anderson Hospital and Tumor Institute. During her tenure she developed a 200-code method for transcribing patient charts that provided statistical information to M. D. Anderson’s physicians and researchers. She retired from the institution in 1982 and had been serving as professor emeritus since 1974. She was among the first female scientists inducted into the Texas Medical Center Hall of Fame. She passed away in Houston, Texas on July 26, 2007.