Philip Sunshine, MD, a “founding practitioner of neonatology,” died April 5 at 94, according to an obituary published by Stanford Medicine.
Dr. Sunshine began his career at Stanford (Calif.) Medicine in 1956 as a medical resident, according to a Stanford obituary. After completing residencies in pediatrics and gastroenterology, he was hired as a faculty member at the system. He went to serve as chief of pediatrics at University of Southern California and Children’s Hospital Los Angeles for several years in the 1980s before returning to Stanford. Dr. Sunshine continued to care for premature babies until he retired in 2022 at 92.
Dr. Sunshine started his career in neonatology, before the field existed. In the 1950s, more than half of premature infants died. Over the decades, said the obituary, Dr. Sunshine contributed to significant advances in newborn care, including developing protocols to put preemies on ventilators, provide them nutrition, welcoming parents to infants’ bedsides in the NICU, and bringing obstetric and newborn care under one roof.
He is survived by his wife, five children and nine grandchildren.
