In Memoriam: Jeannie Zuk, RN, PhD

David Polaner MD

Those of us who do clinical research know that there are certain individuals without whom our studies would be simply impossible to perform. Of course, our research assistants are among those valued partners, but research coordinators and statisticians contribute to these investigations at an even higher level, and are integral to the planning, design, conduct, writing and analysis of the studies that we conceive.

Last week, I and my colleagues were deeply saddened to learn of the sudden and untimely passing of Jeannie Zuk, who served as research coordinator for many of my studies, and, in particular, was the research coordinator and major driving force in the last 15 years of the Pediatric Regional Anesthesia Network (PRAN). Jeannie was an invaluable member of our steering committee both from an organizational standpoint, but also helped set the research agenda and focus of PRAN’s next stage. She was a constant in our efforts to rewrite our database platform, an exceedingly difficult process beset by numerous problems that have finally been overcome just in the past 6 months, and in no small part due to her persistence. None of us who have clinical anesthesia commitments could possibly have kept things together in the way she did. Her insights and deep knowledge of patient focused outcomes research and techniques have helped build and bring to fruition numerous studies in pediatric anesthesia and surgery.

Jeannie received her BS from the University of San Francisco and her MA and PhD from the University of Colorado, and spent much of her career there in the departments of Anesthesia and Surgery at Children’s Hospital Colorado. For the last several years she worked for PRAN and with other pediatric anesthesia outcomes research groups throughout the country. She never gave anything less than full commitment and excellence in her work and expected the same in return from her colleagues. Her professional legacy is reflected in the superb quality and unimpeachable integrity of her work that continues to influence pediatric anesthesia and surgical practice. She was a very private person, and despite working together for almost two decades I never had the good fortune to meet her family. She leaves behind her husband and two children (both holding PhD’s, of course!). She was expecting her first grandchild this summer. May her memory be a blessing.