James Harris Penoff (1936-) was born in Richmond, Kentucky. He earned his undergraduate degree from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, in 1954, and graduated from The Ohio State University College of Medicine in 1962. He interned at the United States Army’s Brooke General Hospital in San Antonia, Texas, followed by post graduate training in general surgery and plastic surgery. His medical practice was conducted at the Straub Clinic and Hospital in Honolulu, Hawaii, from December 1971 through July 2009.
As a physician he was particularly involved in the treatment of burn patients and melanoma. The burn unit that Dr. Penoff established at Straub in 1983 was the only burn treatment facility in Hawaii at that time. He was also an instructor in advance burn life support and designed databases to track burn and melanoma patients across Hawaii. Later in his career Dr. Penoff was part of the team that implemented the Epic electronic medical record system across multiple facilities. He was a member of the American College of Surgeons, American Society of Plastic and Surgeons, American Society of Aesthetic and Plastic Surgery, Hawaii Plastic Surgery Society, and the American Burn Association.
The James H. Penoff, MD, FACS Papers (1 box) are comprised of two notebooks in which Dr. Penoff took notes for his Medicine, Junior and Senior Surgery classes while attending The Ohio State University College of Medicine in the early 1960s. Entries in the notebooks are handwritten in ink. Each entry is dated and titled with the subject of the lecture and frequently the name of an Ohio State physician presenting on that topic. The notebooks are accompanied by Dr. Penoff’s curriculum vitae.
The collection is open to the public and is available for viewing in the Medical Heritage Center. Materials do not circulate and must be used in the supervised reading room. Restrictions, including copyright, may exist and some materials may be too fragile to photocopy or digitize. The MHC charges for duplication services, which must be performed by staff.
[Identification of item], James H. Penoff, MD, FACS Papers, SPEC.202605.PENOFF, Medical Heritage Center, Health Sciences Library, The Ohio State University.