Robert W. Wilmott, M.D., undertook his medical training at a place very much like Cardinal Glennon Children’s Hospital. “Pediatrics was taught well, so everyone ended up wanting to be a pediatrician,” said Wilmott, the new pediatrician-in-chief at Glennon. Wilmott said he was attracted to Cardinal Glennon and St. Louis University School of Medicine, where he is chairman of pediatrics, because of its balance of patient care, medical education and clinical research. “This program has a fine reputation for clinical care and training and is very well-regarded in the community. We have exceptionally high patient satisfaction scores. We have the most highly-rated medical student clerkship in the medical school – the students enjoy it so much they all end up wanting to become pediatricians,” he said. Wilmott also looks forward to expanding his staff’s clinical research programs. “That is where we discover new treatments that eventually will improve the lives of the children we serve, so I’m planning to develop a clinical research center based at Glennon for pediatrics.” Wilmott graduated from University College of London in his native England then came to the U.S. for training at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, where he was an assistant chief resident. He returned to London’s Hospital for Sick Children, where he met a lovely young pediatric intensive care nurse whose mother was English and whose father was a U.S. Army officer stationed in Germany. “Cathryn had gone to England for her nursing education because she had English relatives. She was talking about coming to the states for further nursing training and I was thinking about coming back to pursue an academic career, so we seemed to be on similar paths,” Wilmott said. “We would talk on the breaks about visits and various experiences we had in common, and then we started dating. We were married in 1981, and on January 1, 1982, we left for the United States to start our new careers.” The Wilmotts have four daughters: Jenny, 18; Francesca, 17; Gina, 11; and Annabelle, 9. Jenny stayed behind in Ohio when the family moved to St. Louis. She is a freshman at Miami University. Wilmott served as a pulmonologist at the University of Pennsylvania and Wayne State University School of Medicine. Prior to accepting his new position at Glennon, he was professor of pediatrics and director of the Division of Pulmonary Medicine, Allergy and Clinical Immunology at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine and Children’s Hospital Medical Center in Cincinnati. Wilmott succeeded Glennon’s previous chief pediatrician, C. George Ray, M.D., who retired at the end of 2000. Wilmott had heard much about Cardinal Glennon at his previous position. Three members of his staff in Cincinnati were former Glennon residents. A former Glennon chief resident, Jim Acton, M.D., was appointed interim director of the hospital’s cystic fibrosis center after Wilmott came to St. Louis.
“I enjoy the clinical diversity of pediatrics, and I really enjoy the patients, their spontaneity and honesty and openness. I enjoy the fact that once children are treated, they usually have full recoveries and go onto normal lives, unencumbered by ongoing problems. I also enjoy working with pediatricians, who I have found to be a warm, nurturing group of people.” While working to expand research activities at Glennon, Wilmott also plans to continue his own research, which has focused on means of preventing the lung infections and inflammation that affects children with cystic fibrosis. A number of exciting developments face pediatrics in the near future, Wilmott said.
Genetics research will bring new treatments and new issues to medicine, he said. “So far we have just seen the tip of the iceberg. There is going to be much more development in genetics, which will bring up issues of the ethics of screening and what to do with this information.” He also sees great improvements in cardiology, with new, non-surgical treatments for some heart problems. Other heart conditions may become treatable through catheterization or even procedures using robotic devices. “One area that we are planning to develop is our fetal program for diagnosis of congenital heart disease prior to delivery so the baby can be delivered safely, right into the hands of a pediatric cardiologist who will be able to perform the appropriate procedure,” he said. “Fetal surgery is another emerging area. There are certain problems that are much more amenable to repair prior to delivery of the baby.” Wilmott said he was interested in becoming chairman of a pediatrics department because it offered “the opportunity to develop pediatrics across the full spectrum. I’ve developed several programs in pediatric pulmonary medicine and also in pediatric allergy and immunology. I discovered that I like creating change and building programs, and was interested in attempting to do the same thing at the departmental level.” After Wilmott moved into his new office at Glennon on September 1, he held a strategic planning retreat with members of his medical staff. “There is a high level of enthusiasm for developing ambitious plans,” he said. “We have good support from (hospital President) Doug Ries, Cardinal Glennon and SSM, the medical school and Dean (Patricia) Monteleone. This is an exciting time with all the construction that is going on. There will be a process of steady expansion based on the opportunities and resources that we have.” “This is a good time to be here.”
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“He is taking care of many of the patients who were mine. It is a small
world,” said Wilmott, who plans to reserve one afternoon a week to see
patients in Glennon’s pulmonology division. “I would like to follow my own
group of cystic fibrosis patients so I can stay in touch clinically and
get to know the doctors in the community,” he said.
New federal laws will require increased testing of drugs administered
to children. Previously most testing of new drugs has focused on adults.
