Patricia Era Bath (November 4, 1942 – May 30, 2019) was an African American ophthalmologist and humanitarian, known for championing a community-focused approach to eye care and for innovations in cataract surgery. She became the first woman to lead a postgraduate training program in ophthalmology, and the first woman elected to the honorary staff of the UCLA Medical Center. Bath was the first African-American to serve as a resident in ophthalmology at New York University. She was also the first African-American woman to serve on staff as a surgeon at the UCLA Medical Center.
Born in New York City, Bath received a National Science Foundation scholarship as a high school student to study the metabolic behavior of cancer. She graduated from Hunter College in 1964 with a degree in chemistry, and enrolled in Howard University College of Medicine in Washington, DC. She organized a contingent of students to provide services to the Poor People's Campaign in 1968. After graduation, she returned to New York to intern at Harlem Hospital Center, where she began research on eye diseases. She was an ophthalmology resident at New York University from 1970 to 1973, and then a fellow at Columbia University for one year. In 1974 she joined the faculty of the Jules Stein Eye Institute, making her the first female ophthalmology professor at the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles.
Bath's research showed that blindness, especially caused by glaucoma, was more prevalent among Black Americans than the general population. In 1976, she co-founded the nonprofit American Institute for the Prevention of Blindness in Washington, D.C., to advance a program of "community ophthalmology" that would expand the availability of treatment for, education about, and prevention of eye diseases to medically underserved populations.
In the 1980s, Bath's development of the laserphaco probe led to safer and more precise cataract surgery. With the device, she became the first African-American woman doctor to receive a patent for a medical purpose.
Born in 1942 in Harlem, New York, Patricia Bath was the daughter of Rupert and Gladys Bath. Her father was an immigrant from Trinidad, a newspaper columnist, a merchant seaman, and the first black man to work for the New York City Subway as a motorman. Her father inspired her love for culture and encouraged her to explore different cultures. Her mother was descended from African slaves and Cherokee Native Americans.
Throughout her childhood, Bath was often told by her parents to "never settle for less than [her] best" and was encouraged by their support of her education. Her mother, encouraging her dreams and love of science, had bought her first chemistry set when she was 12. By the time she had reached high school, Bath was already a National Science Foundation Scholar. This led to her cancer research earning a front-page feature in the New York Times. Patricia and her brother attended Charles Evans Hughes High School, where both students excelled in science and math.
Inspired by the French Nobel Peace Prize laureate Albert Schweitzer's work in medicine, Bath applied for and won a National Science Foundation Scholarship while attending high school; this led her to a research project at Yeshiva University and Harlem Hospital Center studying connections between cancer, nutrition, and stress. In this summer program, led by Rabbi Moses D. Tendler, Bath studied the effects of streptomycin residue on bacteria. Through this, she was able to conclude that cancer itself was a catabolic disease and tumor growth was a symptom. She had also discovered a mathematical equation that could be used to predict cancer cell growth. The head of the research program realized the significance of her findings and published them in a scientific paper. Her discoveries were also shared at the International Fifth Congress of Nutrition in the fall of 1960.
In 1960, at the age of eighteen, Bath won a Merit Award from Mademoiselle magazine for her contribution to the project.
Bath received her Bachelor of Arts in chemistry from Manhattan's Hunter College in 1964. She then relocated to Washington, D.C., to attend Howard University College of Medicine. Her first year at Howard coincided with the Civil Rights Act of 1964. She co-founded the Student National Medical Association and became its first woman president in 1965. At Howard, she was awarded a Children's Bureau National Government Fellowship Award to do research in Belgrade, Yugoslavia, in the summer of 1967, where her research focused on pediatric surgery. The highlight of the award ceremony was the meeting with Earl Warren, Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, at the U.S. Embassy in Belgrade. Bath graduated with honors from Howard University College of Medicine in 1968. She was awarded the Edwin Watson Prize for Excellence in Ophthalmology by her mentor, Lois A. Young.
The assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968 spurred Bath to join the Poor People's Campaign. She organized and led Howard University medical students in providing volunteer healthcare services to the Campaign's encampment at Resurrection City in the summer of 1968.
Bath returned to her Harlem community and interned at Harlem Hospital Center, which had just become affiliated with Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons. During her internship, she observed large proportions of blind patients at Harlem Hospital in comparison to patients at the Columbia University Eye Clinic. Before beginning her ophthalmology residency study at NYU in 1970, Bath was awarded a one-year fellowship from Columbia University to study and contribute to eye care services at Harlem Hospital. She began collecting data on blindness and visual impairment at Harlem Hospital, which did not have any ophthalmologists on staff. Her data and passion for improvement persuaded her professors from Columbia to begin operating on blind patients, without charge, at Harlem Hospital Center. Bath was proud to be on the Columbia team that performed the first eye surgery at Harlem Hospital in November 1969.
Bath completed her residency in ophthalmology at New York University from 1970 to 1973, the first African American to do so. She gave birth to her daughter, Eraka, in 1972.
After completing her residency at New York University, Bath began a corneal fellowship program at Columbia University, which focused on corneal transplantation and keratoprosthesis surgery (1973 to 1974). While a fellow, she was recruited by both the UCLA Jules Stein Eye Institute and Charles R. Drew University to co-found an ophthalmology residency program at Martin Luther King Jr. Hospital. She then began her career in Los Angeles, becoming the first woman ophthalmologist on the medical school faculty at the Jules Stein Eye Institute at UCLA. When asked who her mentor was, Bath responded that her relationship with family physician Cecil Marquez inspired her to pursue this specific career. She was appointed assistant chief of the King-Drew-UCLA Ophthalmology Residency Program in 1974 and was appointed chief in 1983.
At both institutions, Bath rose to the rank of associate professor. At UCLA, she founded the Ophthalmic Assistant Training Program (OATP) in 1978. The graduates of the OATP serve as key personnel providing screening, health education, and support for blindness prevention strategies.
While at UCLA Jules Stein Eye Institute, Bath established the Keratoprosthesis Program to provide advanced surgical treatment for blind patients. The program continues today as the KPRO, and thousands of patients have had their eyesight restored with this innovative technology. Based on her research and achievements with keratoprosthesis, Bath was chosen to lead the first national keratoprosthesis study in 1983.
In 1983, Bath was appointed Chair of the KING-DREW-UCLA Ophthalmology Residency Program, becoming the first woman in the US to head an ophthalmology residency program.
While at UCLA, Bath wanted to pursue research but was denied grants and resources by the National Institutes of Health and the National Eye Institute. It was then that she had decided to look further for the best laboratories in the world, to support her plans for innovation in the world of ophthalmology. In 1986, Bath elected to take a sabbatical from clinical and administrative responsibilities and concentrate on research. She resigned her position as chair of ophthalmology and followed her research pursuits as visiting professor at centers of excellence in France, England, and Germany. In France, she served as a visiting professor at the Rothschild Eye Institute of Paris with Director Daniele Aron-Rosa. In England, she served as a visiting professor with Professor David C. Emmony at the Loughborough University of Technology. In Germany, she served as a visiting professor at the Free University of Berlin and the laser medical center.