User:RebeccaGreen/Pattie W. Van Hook

Pattie Jean Warren Van Hook (1927 – December 8, 1992) was a professor of family medicine at the Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center in Shreveport, Louisiana, and the first woman president of the Louisiana State Medical Society,  concluding her term shortly before her sudden death in Nashville, Tennessee.

Biography
Van Hook was born in Shreveport, graduated from C.E. Byrd High School in 1945, from the Centenary College of Louisiana in 1949, and from the Louisiana State University School of Medicine in 1952. She then did an internship at Charity Hospital, New Orleans, followed by a residency in radiology at Veterans Hospital, New Orleans. In 1968, she was appointed part-time to the Department of Preventive Medicine and Public Health at the LSU Medical School in Shreveport.

At the time of her death, she was associate professor of family medicine, assistant dean for student affairs and director of the occupational health clinic at the LSU Medical School in Shreveport. She was the first woman president of the Shreveport Medical Society. She was for many years director of the Caddo/Shreveport Health Department. She was a former associate medical director for American Telephone and Telegraph in Shreveport.

Her interests and expertise extended across several fields: preventive medicine, public health, sexually transmitted infections, medical education, minority-group health care, drug abuse intervention, occupational medicine, and awareness of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome. She helped establish courses in schools about communicable diseases including STIs, and was instrumental in establishing the Mooretown Project, designed to address sanitary, health and environmental issues in a declining neighbourhood.

Personal life
Van Hook was married to Robert Eugene Van Hook, D.D.S. (1929-1986), with whom she had a daughter and son (both also physicians). Her memorial services at the Noel Methodist Church were conducted by clergy from Protestant, Catholic and Jewish faiths. She is interred in the section "Daughters of the Cross" at Forest Park Cemetery in Shreveport.

Awards and recognition
Van Hook featured in a documentary film about the Mooretown Project, which was used for Peace Corps training. In 1993, the Louisiana State Medical Society named her a member of the society's hall of fame, and bestowed on her their Distinguished Service Award. The Shreveport Medical Society also awarded her a posthumous Distinguished Service Award. In 1989, she received the "Brotherhood and Humanity Award" from the National Conference of Christians and Jews. The LSU School of Medicine at Shreveport offers the Pattie W. Van Hook, M.D. Memorial Award, in recognition of her contributions to the professional and educational fields of medicine.

Van Hook's papers were deposited in the archives of Louisiana State University in Shreveport.