Dr. Leigh Grossman

Grossman

In her 26 years at the University of Virginia, she has served as consultant and lecturer for the Pan American Health Organization in Washington, DC and Chile, and for Project Hope and for the King Faisal Hospital in Saudi Arabia.  Her international experience includes growing up in India, service with the Peace Corps, nine years of medical service work in Haiti, and 26 years directing the pediatric resident International Medicine Elective with sites in India, Thailand, Kenya, Cambodia, Costa Rica, Peru, Ecuador and Guatemala. 

Dr. Grossman’s clinical work at the University of Virginia is devoted to the care of hospitalized children and her research is aimed at preventing hospital acquired infections in critically ill newborns and children.  She developed the first Home Visit Program that has become an integral part of the Pediatric residency experience.

After graduating from the Medical College of Pennsylvania in 1975, Dr. Grossman completed her internship and residency in pediatrics, a three-year infectious disease fellowship and a two-year intensive care fellowship at the University of Virginia.  In 1981, she joined the Pediatric faculty there and has been a Full Professor of Pediatrics since 1993 and Chief of the Division of Pediatric Infectious Disease since 1999.  For the past four years, Dr. Grossman has also served as Vice Provost of International Affairs.

Dr. Grossman’s many honors include the McLemore Birdsong Award, the Virginia State Council of Higher Education Outstanding Faculty Teaching Award and the Arnold P. Gold Foundation Humanism in Medicine Award.

An important footnote:

Dr. Leigh Grossman’s son, Jeff Donowitz, is currently a 5th term medical student at SGU.  They have worked together in a rural medical clinic in Haiti for the past seven years and with his own interest in international health, he has organized the new SGU organization Students for Global Health.

Published on 2/4/08