Introducing Lawrence J. Cheskin, MD, former fellow of the Section of Digestive Diseases in Yale Department of Internal Medicine. Cheskin completed training in 1986.
Where are you now?
I live in Ellicott City, Maryland and work at George Mason University College of Public Health in the department of Nutrition and Food Studies. I also see patients seeking weight loss at the Johns Hopkins Healthful Eating, Activity and Weight Program as an adjunct professor in the Division of Gastroenterology at the School of Medicine. When I assumed the position of Department Director at George Mason in 2019, the JHHEAW program succeeded the Johns Hopkins Weight Management Center that I had founded and directed since 1990. At home, my wife Dr. Lisa Davis and I started the Burleigh Manor Animal Sanctuary in 2012, a large-animal rescue. We have rescued abandoned or abused horses, mules, donkeys, a cow, sheep, goats, pigs, turkeys, chickens, and, most recently, 2 ducks left at the entrance to our farm in a laundry basket (no note, but a bag of food was included.)
What do you love about your career?
The opportunity to engage in a nice mix of teaching, clinical and community research, patient care, and program building.
How did Yale prepare you for your career?
Yale Internal Medicine exposed me to an impressively broad range of people and ways of thinking, as well as instilling in me the confidence that I could accomplish anything that I set out to do with the knowledge and skills necessary.
What is your fondest memory?
Dr. Howard Spiro at weekly GI Grand Rounds–education as entertainment!
What surprised you most about your field/area of expertise?
While starting out as a traditional academic gastroenterologist, culminating in directing the Division of Digestive Diseases and the GI fellowship program at Johns Hopkins Bayview, I was able to expand into the increasingly important field of obesity medicine, which I like to say is a branch of gastroenterology since it involves what we put into our GI tracts!
If you could say anything to your younger self, what would you say?
Open up to new experiences.
One piece of advice you will never forget?
Keep trying!
What’s a fun fact about you?
I would get up every 2 hours though the night to bottle feed Lambert, our lamb whose mother rejected him. He was in a Pack n’ Play on my side of our bed so my wife could get some sleep. He is a nicely rounded adult sheep now, but still would prefer my bottle feeding if offered!
The DIM spotlight is a feature as part of the DIM Digest, highlighting alumni, former trainees, and faculty of the Department of Internal Medicine.