Giants of Radiation Oncology: Isadore Lampe, MD, PhD

Among the many giants who have been crucial in shaping the history of radiation oncology in the United States, Isadore Lampe, MD, PhD, has played a pivotal role. His portrait graces the walls of the Department of Radiation Oncology at the University of Michigan, which he led from 1939 to 1974. His legacy lives on more than 40 years after his passing.

Isadore Lampe’s story begins, as many great stories do, with his birth on November 16, 1906, in London, England. His parents were Anna Tamarkin and Joseph Lampkovitz, Jewish immigrants originally from Russia and Poland respectively. He was only four months old when he immigrated to the U.S. with his mother to join his father who had come over previously.

He grew up in Cleveland, Ohio, and in high school was a member of the track team and played tuba in the school band. He graduated with honors in 1923. His undergraduate studies were completed at Adelbert College in Cleveland, one of three predecessors to today’s College of Arts and Sciences at Case Western Reserve University, where he received his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1927 and was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa. He was subsequently accepted into the School of Medicine of Western Reserve University. Childhood friends had nicknamed him “Lampy” and during this period, he legally changed his name to Lampe. Because of health issues he was forced to repeat his second year of medical school and ultimately graduated in 1931, with honors, and membership in Alpha Omega Alpha Honor Society.

Dr. Lampe’s entry into therapeutic radiology was fortuitous. Few institutions in the U.S. at the time offered exclusive or comprehensive training in the field. During his internship in Toledo, he met John Thomas Murphy, MD, director of the Department of Radiology, who would become his mentor. Dr. Murphy influenced him to focus his training on radiation therapy. Thanks to Dr. Murphy’s personal effort, Dr. Lampe was given a position of “assistant resident” in the Department of Radiology at the University of Michigan, under the chairmanship of Fred Jenner Hodges, MD. The residency program at Michigan was in general radiology, but Dr. Hodges was anxious to build on therapeutic radiology advances and encouraged Dr. Lampe to concentrate in that area. Dr. Lampe quickly moved up the department ranks to instructor and research instructor within three years. By virtue of his fastidiousness and interest in statistics, he was appointed as a part-time statistician in the Medical Records Division and went on to establish the Medical Statistics Division at Michigan. His coding system became a national model among tumor registries.

In 1938, Dr. Lampe completed his residency and PhD in Roentgenology at the university, where his doctoral dissertation included observations about the relative biological effectiveness of neutrons compared with photons, an area of interest for which he spent six months at the new cyclotron facility at Berkely. He later used the cyclotron developed by the Michigan physics group for additional research.

Despite residency training primarily in general radiology, Dr. Lampe became an autodidact in radiation therapy. In 1939, he was appointed full professor and assumed leadership of the Division of Radiotherapy within the Department of Radiology, a position he would hold for 35 years. He was devoted to the best interest of every patient being treated in the department and liked to check each patient’s setup himself every day. In addition to his clinical work, he taught courses in radiobiology, authored chapters in textbooks, kept current with world literature, organized joint Pathology-Radiation Therapy Symposia, and conducted studies and published on a wide range of clinically relevant topics including medulloblastoma, head and neck cancers, radioactive isotope treatment, endometrial cancers, and 137Cs teletherapy, among others. He continued to make many significant contributions to radiation oncology literature which helped establish him as a leader in the field. Perhaps a small measure of Dr. Lampe’s impact can be gleaned by the homage paid to him by his chief Dr. Hodges in 1968 who stated that, “He has become a clinical radiation therapist of outstanding capabilities, based upon rigorous, unrelenting hard work, and complete devotion to this branch of the medical profession.” His distinguished friend and peer Juan del Regato, MD, said of him “…the disciplines of which he has become a recognized master, to gain international respect as a true philosopher of therapeutic radiology.”

Foremost among American-trained radiotherapists, Dr. Lampe helped train a generation of University of Michigan radiology residents in therapeutic radiology during their six to nine month rotation with him. He worked to impart his superb clinical skills to his trainees, becoming known as a strict but gentle disciplinarian, and training them to be excellent physicians of upstanding scientific and personal integrity. Many of his trainees acquired a great respect for the field. Several went on to specialize in radiotherapy and achieved remarkable personal accomplishments. Among his illustrious trainees were Robert Parker, MD, Philip Rubin, MD, FASTRO, Malcolm Bagshaw, MD, FASTRO, and Seymour Levitt, MD, DSc, FASTRO.

In 1958, Dr. Lampe became one of the founding members of the American Club of Therapeutic Radiologists, the predecessor of ASTRO, of which he was elected president from 1962-1963. He was awarded the ASTRO Gold Medal in 1979, and that same year, received Michigan’s Distinguished Teaching Service and Research Award.

In 1943, Dr. Lampe met and married his wife Rae Ethel White with whom he had two sons, William, born in 1945 who became a lawyer, and Matthew, born in 1951 who became a psychologist. He was generally frugal, except when it came to his love of photography and imported sports cars.

Late in life Dr. Lampe developed chronic lymphocytic leukemia. While traveling to receive a transfusion he was in an automobile accident on icy roads. He died on January 26, 1982, of injuries sustained in that accident. His legacy has been continued at The University of Michigan Department of Radiation Oncology with the establishment of an endowed chair in his name which is held by the chair of the department.