Surgical professor honored with lifetime achievement award

A leading professor of surgery at the University of Florida College of Medicine has been honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award for his dedication to surgical care throughout his 25-year career at UF.

Edward M. Copeland III, M.D., the Edward R. Woodward distinguished professor of surgery, accepted the award in front of his friends and colleagues during the college's Research Day awards dinner in April, marking a poignant end to his storied tenure at UF. He will retire July 3.

"You're often never king or queen in your own castle," Copeland said. "For your own institution to honor you is truly the greatest honor you can receive."

Copeland's career in Gainesville began in 1982 when he was named professor and chairman of the department of surgery, a position he said he accepted because he would be moving into a then brand-new Shands hospital with a small yet talented staff of surgical faculty members.

"Ted Copeland is a masterful clinician and the quintessential role model for the academic surgeon," said Edward R. Block, M.D., chairman of the department of medicine. "He served with great distinction as chair of the department of surgery for 21 years and during those years created a national reputation for the department of surgery at UF."

Through the years, Copeland watched once-fledgling surgical programs evolve into world-class centers for medical care. When he came to UF, the only transplant services offered at the hospital were for kidneys. Today, he said the program has expanded to include transplants for almost any organ in the body.

"Over the past 25 years here at UF, we have had world-class faculty members," Copeland said. "I am not sure we, collectively, give ourselves appropriate credit for our collective excellence. Were the same faculty members at Duke, Harvard or Michigan, we would have been touted as the one of the best institutions in the nation. Many people don't realize that."

Throughout his career, Copeland gained recognition for his contributions to advances in breast cancer surgery and treatment, including the evaluation of a frozen section analysis test that quickly determines whether surgeons have removed an entire tumor before a patient leaves the hospital, significantly reducing the need for additional procedures. While Copeland named training residents and serving as interim dean in 1996 among his most satisfying experiences, he was also director of the UF Shands Cancer Center and president of UF Physicians, and this year served as the president of the American College of Surgeons.

"As someone who has been a leader and mentor for his entire career, this award is a most fitting honor on the eve of his retirement," said William G. Cance, M.D., professor and chairman of the department of surgery. "His vast roles as a leader of national organizations speak to the great respect colleagues across the world have for Dr. Copeland."

After graduating from the Cornell University Medical School in 1963, Copeland traveled to the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, where he completed his surgical residency. In the early '70s, he earned a Bronze Star for his service in Vietnam and became an assistant professor of surgery at the University of Texas Medical School at Houston and the M.D. Anderson Hospital and Tumor Institute.

"My legacy is in the people I influenced during their formative years," he said. "More than anything, I'll miss patient contact. My personality is such that I thought I did a good job of helping people through difficult times in their lives."