Eduardo Marvez-Valls, doctor and educator Submitted by N.O.V.A. September 2006 Times Picayune 09-19-2006 ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://usgwarchives.net/la/lafiles.htm ************************************************ Dr. Eduardo Marvez-Valls, an emergency medicine doctor and teacher who was celebrated equally for his professional skill and for the passion he brought to his work, died Saturday of AIDS-related complications at his New Orleans home. He was 52. Dr. Marvez-Valls, who worked in Charity Hospital's emergency room for more than two decades, "was one of the truly great physicians that I have ever known," said Dr. Keith Van Meter, head of Louisiana State University's emergency medicine section at Charity. Although Dr. Marvez-Valls was renowned for his diagnostic expertise, patients were devoted to him because he took time to sit down with them and their families to explain diagnoses and treatment, Van Meter said. "He was always a strong patient advocate," said Dr. John Hunt, head of the trauma surgery program at the LSU Health Sciences Center. He didn't give up easily, Van Meter said, citing the case of a young woman suffering from acute carbon monoxide poisoning who had been brought to Charity after several days in a rural hospital. "Everyone had given up hope," Van Meter said. "He looked after her and arranged her care and followed her. . . . By not giving up on her, by tending to some of her rehabilitative care, she actually became surprisingly functional, despite all the injury to her brain." After Hurricane Katrina closed Charity, Dr. Marvez-Valls practiced in temporary emergency rooms at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center, the former Lord & Taylor department store and a tent complex near LSU's medical school. He kept working until a week before his death, Van Meter said. To eliminate the possibility of infecting patients with the human immunodeficiency virus, Dr. Marvez-Valls had restricted his practice for the past 15 years, ruling out procedures such as suturing and putting in intravenous lines. But he was able to conduct physical examinations and make diagnoses, even in his last days at work, Van Meter said. "As sick as he was, he was very, very astute," he said. A native of San Juan, Puerto Rico, Dr. Marvez-Valls earned undergraduate and medical degrees from the University of Puerto Rico. He came to New Orleans in 1980 for his residency and stayed, except for a short stint in 1985 in the emergency room at King Faisal Hospital and Research Center in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Besides treating patients, Dr. Marvez-Valls taught emergency medicine at LSU's medical school. He was in charge of graduate education in that specialty, and he recruited potential residents. "Because he was one of the interviewers, he helped us get a large application rate," Van Meter said. The medical school's alumni association has named him an honorary alumnus, and an emergency medicine professorship bearing his name will be established, said Dr. Russell Klein, associate dean for alumni affairs. It is being underwritten by Van Meter and his wife, Mary Van Meter. "We were going to dedicate the professorship in his honor," Klein said. "Now it'll be in his memory." Dr. Marvez-Valls was a founding member of the Krewe of Barkus, which sponsors an annual parade of costumed people and their pets through the French Quarter. Survivors include his companion, Robert Ripley; his mother, Zenaida Valls of San Juan; a brother, José Marvez of San Juan; and a sister, Lourdes Marvez of Orlando, Fla. A memorial service will be held Thursday at 6 p.m. at the Capital One Pavilion in Woldenberg Park.