February 4, 2008
Maverick Ruth Lawrence wins Athena Award
Ruth Lawrence (left) accepting the Athena Award in January. “People have always asked what my business is,” she said at the awards luncheon. “I used to tell them babies. Now I tell them children. If you’re interested in a safe investment in today’s world, they’re one of the surest.”
Ruth Lawrence, professor of pediatrics, and obstetrics
and gynecology, was named the winner of the 22nd annual Athena Award at a
special luncheon at the Rochester Riverside Convention Center in January.
The award, an international program with more than
3,000 recipients was established in 1982. Introduced to Rochester in 1987
by the Women’s Council of The Rochester Business Alliance, the
program celebrates women of achievement in the community, noting their
professional excellence and community service, and their active and
generous assistance in helping other women develop professional excellence
and leadership skills.
Lawrence is a pediatrician and neonatologist at
Golisano Children’s Hospital at Strong and the medical director of
the Ruth A. Lawrence Poison and Drug Information (formerly the Finger Lakes
Regional Poison and Drug Information Center).
Lawrence is renowned as a global expert on
breastfeeding medicine. Her first edition of Breastfeeding: A Guide for the Medical Profession published in 1980 has become the gold-standard for the
scientific understanding of human lactation and clinical breastfeeding
practices. The text is in its sixth edition and has been translated into
Spanish and Japanese.
In 1995, Lawrence met with the Pontifical Academy of
Sciences, seeking a Catholic endorsement of breastfeeding from Pope John
Paul II. She was successful—the Vatican embraced the cause with enthusiasm,
encouraging mothers of the world to pursue the option as often as
possible. In 2005, Lawrence became the editor (and creator) of Breastfeeding Medicine, a
scientific journal that publishes quarterly.
Lawrence also helped to create Rochester’s first
neonatal and pediatric intensive care units, as well as the poison and drug
information center (housed in the Medical Center) that now bears her name.
The center is the second-oldest in the nation and the first to serve the
hard of hearing. She also helped found Life Line, a predecessor to
today’s 911 system, and guided the Health Association of Rochester
and Monroe County for more than a decade.
A board member both at Our Lady of Mercy High School
and the Girl Scouts of Monroe County, Lawrence actively champions young
women and urges them to pursue their dreams. The first woman in
Yale’s medical residency program, and a mother of nine, it’s
clear that she pursued hers. Today, she continues to share wisdom with
female students and physicians as the founder of Women in Science,
Dentistry and Medicine, a committee that sponsors events, mixers and
lectures of special interest to women at the Medical Center. The group also
championed the creation of a child care center nearby the medical center,
effectively recruiting KinderCare to locate across the street on Crittenden
Boulevard.
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