W. Edwin Dodson

W. Edwin Dodson, M.D. is the Associate Vice Chancellor and Associate Dean for Medical School Admissions and Financial Aid and for Continuing Medical Education and Professor of Pediatrics and Neurology at Washington University School of Medicine. In addition to his work as an administrator and educator, he also works as a consultant on the development of new treatments for epilepsy in children.

Professional titles, however, do not do justice to the lifetime of service exhibited by Ed. For thirty years, he has dedicated himself to the prevention of child abuse in St. Louis. This commitment began when as assistant professor of pediatrics and neurology, Ed invited community, medical and children’s services leaders to a series of meetings to discuss the high incidence of child maltreatment being reported by children’s hospitals. As a result of these meetings, Ed became the first president of a new organization, the St. Louis Child Abuse Network. His involvement in the issue has led to the institution of new programs to prevent abuse, increased state funding for prevention programs and increased distribution of funds to local agencies.

Ed is also an active volunteer on behalf of people affected by epilepsy, serving the Epilepsy Foundation in both local and national capacities. While chair of the national Education Committee, his influence led to the development and distribution of educational materials for emergency and primary care physicians to treat nonstop convulsions, the most dangerous and feared type of seizure.

As president, Ed helped the Epilepsy Foundation to reorganize itself so that local chapters were empowered to do more meaningful work, while also initiating the Epilepsy Gene Discovery Project, an online project to discover the genes that cause epilepsy.

Ed’s nominator, Will Ross, M.D., summarizes Dodson’s character in this way, “I know Ed to be energetic, compassionate, selfless and a generous friend and volunteer whose hard work in the prevention of child abuse and in the treatment of epilepsy in St. Louis and on a national level has been a positive force in the lives of many.”