Two medical conditions are named after him, Dubowitz syndrome, a rare genetic disorder characterized by microcephaly, growth retardation and a characteristic facial appearance of unknown genetic cause; and Dubowitz disease, a particular form of spinal muscular atrophy, a severe neuromuscular disorder affecting mainly infants and children.
Dubowitz married Lilly Magdalena Suzanne née Sebők in July 1960, who was also a paediatrician.[8][9] They had four children, all boys, David born 1963, Michael born 1964, Gerald born 1965, and Daniel born 1969.[4]
Career
Dubowitz started his clinical career in 1954, after graduating in medicine, as a resident in medicine and surgery at Groote Schuur Hospital, for the standard 6 months period in each specialisation.[3] Dubowitz started his UK clinical career in 1958 with 3 week locum position at Queen Mary's Hospital where he saw his first case of Muscular dystrophy in two wards of patients, he became a paediatric resident[5] a subject where he been involved in clinical and research aspects of muscle diseases ever since.[3] He remained at this position for two years before becoming a lecturer and a houseman for a year as a clinical pathologist at the National Hospital for Nervous Diseases, later called National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, performing muscle biopsies. An interest in research followed, studying for an MD thesis on muscular dystrophy in childhood, in 1960 at the University of Sheffield, where he would eventually stay for the next 13 years.[10][5]Ronald Illingworth was Dubowitz's professor at Sheffield.[3] Between 1961 and 1965, he was employed as a senior lecturer in child health, and Senior House Officer in hospital and was promoted to Dr.phil at the University of Sheffield. The thesis was based on Dubowitz's pioneering histochemical studies and sponsored by Professor Everson Pearse, on developing and diseased muscle.[5] He continued in that position for another two years before being promoted to a reader in Child Health and Developmental Neurology, at Sheffield, a position Dubowitz held until 1972.[3] In 1973, Dubowitz applied and received the Chair of Paediatrics and Neonatal Medicine at the Postgraduate Medical School of Hammersmith Hospital, now part of Imperial College London.[3][5] A large number of researchers followed Dubowitz to the unit, which eventually became the Jerry Lewis Muscle Research Lab, after the building was funded by the Muscular Dystrophy Association. Jerry Lewis actually came an open the unit.[3]
The syndrome that eventually became the Dubowitz syndrome was first described in 1965. Dubowitz held a clinic in cystic fibrosis and noticed
a baby girl born at full term at Jessop Hospital who weighed around 3 to 4lbs. Dubowitz commented that the baby had an unusually shaped face, recessive and it’s an unusual face, with odd ears and a particular nose, and doesn’t quite fit in and the mother commented that her previous child had a similar shaped face. Dubowitz being interested in the case, through his cystic fibrosis clinic, researched all the different face shapes within syndromes of dwarfism and found that none matched. Dubowitz decided to write a Case report, that was published in the British Journal of Genetics. Then geneticist, John M. Opitz, noticed a similar case in a baby girl in Germany, and published an identical case. Opitz stated that they had identical features, and could almost be sister. From that point on the condition eventually became the Dubowitz syndrome.[15]
World Muscle Society
The idea for the World Muscle Society began in 1995, when Dubowitz discussed the formation of a new society with the pediatrician Luciano Merlini, principally due to the quickening of medical advances in the field and it was felt that the interval between the 4-year meetings of the World Federation of Neurology was too long. Dubowitz felt that a new multidisciplinary society was needed that would meet frequently and focus more on the current research community rather than established figures in the medical community. Dubowitz further discussed the proposal with Italian pediatrician Giovanni Nigro and later with the French pediatrician George Serratrice in Marseille while travelling.
The name World Muscle Society was finally chosen as it was the most easily recognisable name. The society was legally established in London. Dubowitz wrote to 60 potential members asking the following two questions:
do you think there is a need a for a new international muscle society to arrange more frequent interdisciplinary meetings; and would you be able to attend a foundation meeting of the new society in London on Sunday 4th June, 1995?
15 people replied and attended the first meeting in London on Sunday 4 June 1995.[16]
