Dr. John I. Gallin, who served as director of the NIH Clinical Center from 1994–2017, passed away on October 10, 2024. He often referred to the Clinical Center as the “House of Hope,” and he fostered and championed its partnership with patients.
“Our patients are partners in medical discovery,” he once wrote of the Clinical Center. “Our commitment to them is to marshal medical and scientific expertise, resources, and care in the search for answers. In a research setting, one patient’s answers often generate new avenues for medical advancements that ultimately help others.”
Gallin’s career spanned more than 50 years, he served as the tenth, and longest-serving, director of the NIH Clinical Center from 1994–2017. He also served as the NIH associate director for clinical research and chief scientific officer of the NIH Clinical Center. He retired from federal service in March 25, 2023.
His tenure at the Clinical Center brought many innovations, including the expansion of the hospital’s Hatfield Building in 2003/2004, the establishment of a Department of Bioethics, the initiation of the Bench to Bedside Awards to foster laboratory and clinical collaborations and the development of a clinical research training curriculum, which today reaches over 25,000 students in 168 countries every year.
Gallin also established the Clinical Center’s Patient Advisory Group in 1998 to elicit patient feedback in a forum open to all patients and their families. Partnering with Clinical Center nurses, Gallin worked with the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health, which provided funding to build the NIH Edmond J. Safra Family Lodge. Opened in 2005, the lodge offers free, on-campus accommodations for families and loved ones of adult patients who are receiving care at the NIH Clinical Center.
Dr. Brad Wood, director of the NIH Center for Interventional Oncologyand chief of the Interventional Radiology Section at the NIH Clinical Center, remembers Gallin as an extraordinarily impactful mentor for many Clinical Center staff and described him as his “mentor-in- chief.”
“He is an impactful and visionary man,” Wood wrote in an email to CC colleagues upon hearing the news of Gallin’s passing. “I say ‘is’ and not ‘was’, because he is the Clinical Center, he is the face of what NIH aspires to attain, and he embodied the best and the brightest. A life well- lived. A mission accomplished.”
NIH Director Dr. Monica Bertagnolli said, “John left an incredible legacy that lives on in the important work at the NIH Clinical Center and in generations of clinician-scientists.”
To read more from Dr. Monica Bertagnolli, NIH Director, please visit: https://www.nih.gov/about-nih/who-we-are/nih-director/statements/nih-mourns-loss-john-i-gallin-md-longest-serving-director-nih-clinical-center
-Yvonne Hylton