Dr. Marvin Ament, professor emeritus in the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, will receive the lifetime achievement Harold S. Diehl Award on Sept. 19 from the University of Minnesota Medical School, where he earned his medical degree in 1963. He served as chief of UCLA’s division of pediatric gastroenterology, hepatology and nutrition for 38 years, and was named a distinguished professor of pediatrics.
The award, given by the university's Medical Alumni Society, recognizes alumni who have made outstanding contributions to their communities at the local, regional or national level through medical practice, teaching, research or other humanitarian activities. Ament, known to many as the "grandfather of pediatric gastroenterology," pioneered the use of fiber-optic endoscopy for children, home parenteral nutrition for both adults and children, and gastroenterology motility studies. He has trained 120 practicing and academic pediatric gastroenterologists nationally and internationally. He currently serves as chief of gastroenterology at Children’s Hospital of Central California.
