Human
PATHOLOGY
VOLUME 31
October 2000
NUMBER 10
Editorial
Rodger C. Haggitt: A Biography
On June 28th of the year 2000, the world of pathology suffered a loss of inestimable magnitude. On this
day, Dr Rodger Haggitt was tragically shot to death by a
resident, who then shot himself. Dr Haggitt was only 57
at the time of his death, but his legacy of excellence in
education, research, and the practice of pathology has
deeply affected the field of medicine and pathology. Dr
Rodger Haggitt was one of the most influential gastrointestinal pathologists of our day.
Dr Haggitt was born in Detroit, Michigan, where
he lived until he was 11. Thereafter, he and his family
moved to East Tennessee, where at age 16 as a laboratory assistant in a local hospital, he was first exposed to
pathology. In this capacity, he discovered his life’s work
while helping one of the pathologists to perform an
autopsy. He continued working in the same laboratory
after school, on weekends, and during summers for the
following 6 years, and by the time he finished his undergraduate studies at East Tennessee State University,
he had performed several hundred autopsies. During
medical school at the University of Tennessee in Memphis, he helped support himself while increasing his
knowledge of pathology by doing more autopsies in the
evenings. After his first-year pathology course, he became a student prosector in the Department of Pathology and supervised and taught other medical students
in the autopsy room. Thus, by the time he started his
pathology residency at the Baptist Memorial Hospital in
Memphis, under the direction of Eric Muirhead, he
had already performed more autopsies than most pathology residents sitting for their AP boards today. He
completed his pathology training at the New England
Deaconess Hospital in Boston with Drs Shields Warren,
William Meissner, and Merle Legg.
Fresh out of residency and with a military obligation to fulfill, Dr Haggitt began his attending career at
Tripler Army Medical Center, in Honolulu, Hawaii.
Upon completing his military service, he was recruited
Copyright © 2000 by W.B. Saunders Company
doi:10.1053/hupa.2000.19981
back to Boston by Dr William Meissner and resumed his
career as one of pathology’s rising stars.
In 1977, Dr Haggitt returned to the University of
Tennessee and the Baptist Memorial Hospital, where
he was in charge of surgical pathology. In 1984, he
moved to the University of Washington in Seattle,
where he worked during the final 16 years of his illustrious career. The two major forces behind his decision
to move to Seattle were the late Chairman of Pathology
there, Dr Russell Ross, and Dr Cyrus Rubin, now Emeritus Professor of Gastroenterology and Pathology. Although Dr Rubin had himself made significant contributions to GI pathology, he served an unofficial
residency in GI pathology with Dr Haggitt, and as a
result became an attending in Pathology. The two became the very best of colleagues from that time forward, in research, teaching, and in the clinical practice
of diagnostic GI pathology, not to mention their shared
devotion for good wine, food, music, and art.
Dr Haggitt’s interest in GI pathology developed
during his residency years. Because there were no formal GI pathology fellowships at the time, he essentially
taught himself GI pathology. At about this time, the era
of gastrointestinal endoscopy with biopsy capability began, in large part due to his later colleague, Dr Cyrus
Rubin, and Dr Haggitt focused on the interpretation of
these specimens. He found that this required more
knowledge of clinical medicine than any other aspect of
pathology he had previously encountered, and he began to work closely with his gastroenterologist colleagues to gain this knowledge. He found this quite
rewarding, as the information he obtained from the
patient’s biopsy specimen, combined with the clinical
information he had gotten from the clinician, made it
possible for him to synthesize a comprehensive and
clinically meaningful diagnosis. This gave him a strong
sense of directly contributing to clinical decision making and patient care.
This desire for clinical relevance is evident when
one glances at Dr Haggitt’s CV. His numerous publications are always clinically relevant, and some have had a
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Volume 31, No. 10 (October 2000)
major influence on the practice of Gastroenterology.
An example of the latter is his study of prognostic
factors for adenocarcinoma arising in endoscopically
resected colonic adenomas. He showed that the large
majority of these lesions could be treated by endoscopic
resection alone, sparing the patient the need for a
colectomy.
Dr Haggitt has worked with some of the foremost
clinicians in the country. His collaboration with the late
Dr Warren Nugent, chief of Gastroenterology at the
Lahey Clinic, began when he was a resident and continued for over 20 years. Together, they published one
of the first long-term prospective follow-up studies of
neoplastic progression in ulcerative colitis patients and
were able to show that endoscopic surveillance reduced
the mortality from colorectal cancer in these patients.
While he was in the Army at Tripler, Dr Haggitt worked
with Drs Larry Johnson, the Chief of Gastroenterology,
and Tom DeMeester, a thoracic surgeon, to establish
esophageal 24-hour pH monitoring as the gold standard for the study of gastroesophageal reflux disease.
In 1978, he and his colleagues at the Deaconess Hospital published a landmark study in which they documented that dysplasia was the precursor of adenocarcinoma in Barrett’s esophagus and suggested that its
detection by endoscopic biopsy could be used to help
control the risk of dying from cancer in these patients.
Dr Haggitt continued his close collaboration with
clinicians when he joined the faculty at the University
of Washington. The ability to collaborate with outstanding basic scientists there added a new dimension to his
research capabilities and interests. He continued his
prospective studies on neoplastic progression in both
Barrett’s esophagus and ulcerative colitis, now with a
multidisciplinary research team including Drs Cyrus
Rubin, Peter Rabinovitch, Teri Brentnall, Mary Bronner, and others. At the time of his death, he served as
the principal investigator on an NIH-funded R01 grant
on ulcerative colitis and was an investigator on several
other federal grants. In addition to his work on premalignant lesions in the GI tract, Dr Haggitt worked with
Dr Michael Kimmey and his colleagues in their pioneering work on the pathologic correlates of endoscopic ultrasound images.
At heart, Dr Haggitt considered himself a “gut”
oriented GI pathologist, but he has made several important contributions to hepatic pathology, as well.
These include the first American description of nonalcoholic steatohepatitis, and with the surgeon James
Williams at the University of Tennessee, the implementation of protocol hepatic allograft biopsies, first in
canines and then in humans. These protocol biopsies
are now standard practice in many transplant centers
and have saved countless lives by preventing over immunosuppression. He and Dr Williams also authored
the first description of functional cholestasis in hepatic
allografts.
Dr Haggitt was a dedicated and generous mentor
to a generation of pathology residents and fellows. He
also actively participated in postgraduate pathology education, where his efforts have had a great impact on
the practice of pathology. Through his activities with
the American Society of Clinical Pathologists, he taught
more practicing pathologists and had more influence
on the practice of GI pathology than any other single
person working with that organization.
Dr Haggitt served as the youngest ever ASCP Anatomic Pathology Council member and was its chairman.
He received the Distinguished Service Award of the
ASCP’s Commission on Continuing Education in 1989.
He served the United States and Canadian Academy of
Pathology as a member and subsequently moderator of
the evening GI Specialty Panel, as a faculty person for
summer Diagnostic Pathology courses, as a member of
the Abstract Review Board, and as a member of the
Council and on the nominating committee. He served
on the Anatomic Pathology Test Committee of the
American Board of Pathology for 7 years.
Dr Haggitt was an invited speaker at numerous
Gastroenterology and Pathology meetings and was honored with a number of named lectureships, including
the Shields Warren Memorial Lecture of the New England Society of Pathologists, the David H. Sun Memorial Lecture of the American College of Gastroenterology, and the Professor CFA Culling Lecture for the
National Society of Histotechnology. He was selected to
represent the New England Deaconess Hospital at the
symposium honoring the 150th anniversary of the Harvard Medical School in 1998 and received the Medal of
the Swedish Society of Physicians in 1999.
Dr Haggitt leaves behind a loving and devoted family. They include his beautiful and intelligent wife, Mary
Jane, herself a talented pathologist, and their charming
children, Kathryn, Scott, and Libby, now all married and
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parenting his grandchildren, Kate (born after Dr Haggitt’s passing but not before he saw her ultrasound picture), Hanna, Jordan, and Connor. Dr Haggitt also leaves
behind his brothers, Mark and John Haggitt, and his sister
Susan Woody and mother, Eldora Haggitt.
In closing, Dr Haggitt’s personal qualities deserve
mentioning. To those who have been fortunate enough
to work with him and to come to know him, he was a
private and quiet man, but one with a delightful sense
of humor, a love for things of beauty, a kind heart, and
an ever humble perspective. We will miss you Rodger,
beyond all telling.
MARY P. BRONNER, MD
CYRUS E. RUBIN, MD
Departments of Pathology & Medicine
University of Washington
Seattle, WA
Rodger Haggitt, MD, in Memoriam
Rodger Haggitt played a key role in the development of
Human Pathology as a senior member of the editorial board
since 1988. He helped to define the policies and set the standards for the Journal. He not only reviewed more than his fair
share of manuscripts but often served as a referee, applying his
tremendous breadth of knowledge, experience, and innate sense
of fairness in resolving problematic issues. Human Pathology would be a far lesser publication were it not for the
contributions of Rodger Haggitt.
Fred Gorstein, Editor
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