The first recipient of the Daniel K. Podolsky Professorship in Medicine, William Crowley, Jr., is a leader in the field of endocrinology. Crowley’s significant scientific accomplishments include pioneering the use of gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) analogues in humans to treat children with precocious puberty. This standard of therapy using GnRH agonist-induced pituitary desensitization is now used extensively in prostate cancer, endometriosis and uterine fibrosis. Crowley also applied this therapy to induce ovulation in infertile women and complete sexual maturation and fertility in men with isolated GnRH deficiencies.
An HMS professor of medicine, Crowley is also director of the Harvard Reproductive Endocrine Sciences Center, director of clinical research and chief of the reproductive endocrine unit at Massachusetts General Hospital. He is the former director of the HMS Center of Excellence in Reproductive Endocrinology, one of 12 U.S. Centers of Excellence funded by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.
On top of his scientific achievements, Crowley and the endocrine unit have trained more than 75 physician-scientists, two-thirds of whom were women. Two of his trainees have gone on to be elected president of the Endocrine Society and four have served on the Endocrine Society Council.
Crowley has been the recipient of numerous awards for his scientific and mentoring endeavors. In 2001, Crowley became the first male to be awarded Mentor of the Year by Women in Endocrinology. He served as president of the Endocrine Society. He has also received the Fred Conrad Koch Award, the Endocrine Society’s highest scientific honor. Additionally, in 2007, Crowley was awarded the Ipsen Foundation International Prize for Endocrine Research, the highest international endocrine research award.
Crowley is the founder and past chair of the Clinical Research Forum. This leading group of 60 academic health centers focuses on building national clinical research enterprises. Collectively they account for more than 75 percent of the NIH’s extramural research budget and are the nation’s translational research engine, taking basic research advances and turning them into more effective and safer therapies for human illness.
This professorship was supported by a gift from an anonymous donor to honor Daniel K. Podolsky, current president of the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, previous Mallinckrodt Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, chief of gastroenterology at Massachusetts General Hospital, and chief Academic Officer of Partners HealthCare System.
