WALTHAM – Dr. Louis Fazen, III, a Sturbridge resident, pediatrician and member for four decades on the faculty of the UMass Chan Medical School, has been honored by the Massachusetts Medical Society (MMS) with its 2022 Henry Ingersoll Bowditch Award for
Excellence in Public Health.
One of the Medical Society’s most prestigious awards, the Ingersoll Bowditch award is bestowed annually to a Massachusetts physician who demonstrates creativity, commendable citizenship, initiative, innovation and leadership in the public health and advocacy
fields.
Over his entire career, Dr. Fazen has been committed to advocating for public health. He began as a commissioned officer in the US Public Health Service where he served in the Indian Health Service (IHS) and continued to travel to multiple remote IHS
locations for over forty years. At the global level he promoted public health programs in Afghanistan, Guatemala and Zimbabwe, which spawned his founding of the Global Health Committee at the MMS.
At the local level he served for a decade as Chairman of the Board of Health in Southborough and recently he was elected to the Board of Health in Sturbridge. Recognizing his public health expertise, Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker appointed Fazen to
state advisory committees and commissions on lead poisoning and Lyme disease. His public health activism has been highlighted in “The Doctor-Activist,” a book edited by Dr. Ellen Bassuk.
The MMS has been fortunate as Dr. Fazen brought his talents as Chairman of the Public Health Committee and as a member of the MMS and Alliance Charitable Foundation, where he advocates for public health funding across the Commonwealth.
“As a past president of MMS I can attest to the positive impact (Fazen) has had on public health issues through his calm, even-handed, evidence-based leadership of the MMS Public Health Committee,” Dr. Dennis Dimitri said. “I would add that it was clear
to me even 40 years ago that Lou had a strong commitment to incorporating into his teaching of residents and students the precepts of public health that impacted on the etiology of why a pediatric patient would end up requiring in-hospital care, and
what would need to be addressed in order to avoid re-hospitalization in the future. Those issues were not yet labeled as ‘social determinants of health,’ but Lou had already figured out that they had an impact that we needed to address in the care
of our patients.”
Currently, Fazen continues his public service on the Board of Directors of the Old Sturbridge Village Public Charter School and as Secretary of the Board of the Public Health Museum in Tewksbury, Massachusetts.
Fazen is a graduate of Northwestern University and Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Fazen resides in Sturbridge with his wife, N. Lynn Eckhert, MD, DrPH
The Massachusetts Medical Society (MMS) is the statewide professional association for physicians and medical students, supporting 25,000 members. We are dedicated to educating and advocating for the physicians of Massachusetts and patients locally and nationally. A leadership voice in health care, the MMS contributes physician and patient perspectives to influence health-related legislation at the state and federal levels, works in support of public health, provides expert advice on physician practice management, and addresses issues of physician well-being. Under the auspices of the NEJM Group, the MMS extends our mission globally by advancing medical knowledge from research to patient care through the New England Journal of Medicine, NEJM Catalyst, and the NEJM Journal Watch family of specialty publications, and through our education products for health care professionals: NEJM Knowledge+, NEJM Resident 360, and our accredited and comprehensive continuing medical education programs.
