News Coverage
Rick Pedersen; Journal Staff Writer
The Edmonton Journal
Pioneer eye surgeon Gimbel gets position at California university
The surgeon-pioneer of Alberta's private clinic system has been appointed chair of ophthalmology at California's Loma Linda University.
Eye surgeon Howard Gimbel confirmed Friday he has accepted the prestigious appointment at the medical school he graduated from 40 years ago.
Alberta's best known cataract surgeon, Gimbel stressed the importance of the religious values he learned at Loma Linda and two other Seventh-day Adventist schools.
Now he hopes to pass those values and a lifetime of experience to a new generation of medical students.
"Teaching is a passion of mine," he said in a telephone interview after a speaking engagement at the University of Iowa. "I think the character of a teacher is more important in a student's life than the subject they teach."
Born in Calgary 68 years ago, Gimbel grew up on a farm near Beiseker and attended the Canadian University College high school in Lacombe, the first of three Seventh-day Adventist schools he attended.
He studied physics at Walla Walla University College in Washington State then medicine at Loma Linda. Then he returned to Alberta, where his innovative approach to cataract day surgery influenced the development of Alberta's growing private clinic sector. In recent years, Gimbel family companies opened laser surgery clinics around the world.
Gimbel said Friday he will not leave Alberta.
Initially, he will spend one week a month at Loma Linda and do much of his work by telephone and the Internet, from his home and office in Calgary.
Dr. Brian Bull, Loma Linda's dean of medicine, first met Gimbel when they were medical students together in the late 1950s.
"He is an internationally recognized ophthalmologist. He is viewed as one of the most knowledgeable experts in the field of cataract surgery," Bull said.