The Nature of Pseudoarthrosis

Abstract

Anthony F. DePalma (Fig. 1) was born in Philadelphia in 1904 of emigrant parents. He was educated in the public schools of Philadelphia and had his first introduction to medicine during his third year of high school when he suffered second-degree bums while working on his car. After attending the University of Maryland, he entered Jefferson Medical College from which he graduated in 1929. After an internship at the Philadelphia General Hospital and a year of general surgical practice, he began a preceptorship with Harold Smith, a protégé of Russell A. Hibbs, at the New Jersey Orthopedic Hospital in Orange, New Jersey. He was certified by the American Board of Orthopaedic Surgery in 1939. During World War II, he was assigned for duty with the marines at Panis Island, and later served on a hospital ship in the South Pacific. After discharge from the army, he joined the staff of the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery at the Jefferson Medical College, and, in 1950, became head of the department, a position he held until his retirement 20 years later. It was at this time that he performed his work on the knee, the shoulder, and the intervertebral disk. He was a charter member of the Association of Bone and Joint Surgeons, and, in 195 1, he was called on to serve as the first editor of Clinical Orthopaedics; he was succeeded by Marshall R. Urist in 1966. Retirement from the Jefferson Medical College at 65 in 1971 left him still full of energy and enthusiasm, and he accepted the task of developing an orthopedic program at the New Jersey College of Medicine in Newark, New Jersey. After five years, the program was well established and Dr. DePalma retired again to Pompano Beach, Florida. The paper selected as The Classic article for this Symposium, “The Nature of Pseudoarthrosis,” was written by Dr. DePalma in collaboration with Richard H. Rothman, his student and successor as James Edwards Professor of Orthopaedic Surgery at Jefferson Medical College.