Diamond, Louis Klein

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DIAMOND, LOUIS KLEIN

DIAMOND, LOUIS KLEIN (1902–1999), U.S. hematologist. Diamond was born near Kishinev, Ukraine, and immigrated to New York City at the age of two. He graduated from Harvard Medical School, Boston (1927), where he progressed to professor of pediatrics (1967). He was medical director of the new U.S. National Blood Program for blood transfusion (1948–50). After retirement from Harvard (1968) he remained professionally active first at the University of California, San Francisco, and then at the University of California, Los Angeles Medical School into his nineties. Diamond was one of the founders of pediatric hematology. With Kenneth Blackfan he clarified the clinical manifestations and treatment of rhesus incompatibility disease in the newborn, and they described an unrelated form of congenital anemia named after them. He was a world-renowned clinician and teacher.

[Michael Denman (2nd ed.)]