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Plantrician Project Luminary Award
Recipients
Each year the Plantrician Project recognizes a Luminary who has worked to advance whole food, plant-based nutrition as the foundation of disease prevention, suspension and reversal.
2024 Recipient Joel Fuhrman, MD
2023 Recipient John McDougall, MD
2022 Recipient Brenda Davis, RD
2021 Deferred Due to Global Pandemic
2020 Deferred Due to Global Pandemic
2019 Recipient Neal Barnard, MD, FACC
2018 Recipient Hans Diehl, DrHSc, MPH, FACN
2017 Recipient Michael Klaper, MD
2016 Recipient Dean Ornish, MD
2015 Recipient Caldwell Esselstyn, Jr., MD
2014 Recipient T. Colin Campbell, PhD
2023 Recipient: John McDougall, MD
In recognition of your unwavering vision, passionate commitment to education, novel research, tireless advocacy, tenacious defense, and inspirational leadership in the advancement of whole food, plant-based nutrition as the foundation for disease prevention, suspension, and reversal.
John McDougall, MD, is a physician, speaker, and best-selling author who teaches the importance of a whole food, starch-based diet in order to halt, reverse and heal chronic disease. Dr. McDougall is co-founder of the McDougall Program alongside his wife, Mary McDougall – the original whole-food plant-based vegan and creator of thousands of low fat, oil-free, vegan recipes.
Dr. McDougall is the author of 13 national best-sellers including one of the top vegan books on Amazon, The Starch Solution, and a clinical instructor for four medical schools in the United States. Dr. John McDougall, Mary McDougall and Jim Ahrens are co-founders of Dr. McDougall’s Right Foods, which offers convenient food products. The McDougall Program has helped thousands eliminate unnecessary medications while reversing and healing serious health problems for over 35 years. The McDougall program centers on a diet of 90% starchy plant foods—including whole grains and whole-grain products—and 10% of a wide assortment of vegetables and fruit.
Dr. John McDougall was part of the Great Nutrition Debate 2000 presented by the USDA.
2022 Recipient: Brenda Davis, RD
In recognition of your unwavering pursuit of truth, persuasive communication, pioneering dietary concepts and inspiring message of compassion in the advancement of whole-food, plant-based nutrition as the foundation for disease prevention, suspension and reversal.
Brenda Davis, registered dietitian, is a leader in her field and an internationally acclaimed speaker. She has worked as a public health nutritionist, clinical nutrition specialist, nutrition consultant and academic nutrition instructor. Brenda is the lead dietitian in a diabetes research project in Majuro, Marshall Islands. She is a featured speaker at nutrition, medical and health conferences throughout the world.
As a prolific nutrition and health writer, Brenda has authored/co-authored 12 books with nearly a million copies in print in 15 languages. Her most recent works include Nourish: The Definitive Plant-based Nutrition Guide for Families (Shah and Davis, 2020), Kick Diabetes Essentials (Davis, 2019), The Kick Diabetes Cookbook (Davis and Melina, 2018), Becoming Vegan: Comprehensive Edition (Davis and Melina, 2014) and Becoming Vegan: Express Edition (Davis and Melina, 2013). Nourish won gold in the 2020 Nautilus Book Awards and was also a Canada Book Award winner. Becoming Vegan: Comprehensive Edition won a 2014 REAL Best of 2014 Book Award and Becoming Vegan: Express Edition won the Canada Book Award and was a finalist and received honorable mention in the Forward Book of the Year Award. Becoming Vegan: Comprehensive and Express Editions have also received a star rating by the American Library Association as the “go-to books” on plant-based nutrition.
Brenda is a past chair of the Vegetarian Nutrition Dietetic Practice Group of the American Dietetic Association. In 2007, she was inducted into the Vegetarian Hall of Fame. Located in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, Brenda is married to Paul Davis, has two grown children and two grandchildren.
2019 Recipient: Neal Barnard, MD, FACC
In recognition of your invaluable scientific contribution through scholarly research; pioneering work in public policy that continues to shape numerous national initiatives and key legislative decisions; selfless leadership and compassionate service; and the creative development of practical resources that have transformed people around the world.
Neal D. Barnard, M.D., F.A.C.C., is a physician, clinical researcher, author, and an adjunct associate professor of medicine at the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences.
In 1985, Dr. Barnard established the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine to promote preventive medicine, conduct clinical research,
and advocate for higher ethical standards in research. The Physicians Committee also provides direct medical care through its subsidiary, Barnard Medical Center. Dr. Barnard works with patients with diabetes, obesity, and other chronic conditions in clinical research studies aiming to improve the prevention and treatment of these health problems.
Dr. Barnard’s articles have appeared in the Journal of the American Medical Association, the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, the American Journal of Medicine, the Journal of the American Dietetic Association, Scientific American, the American Journal of Cardiology, Obstetrics & Gynecology, Lancet Oncology, Preventive Medicine, and in many other scientific and medical journals. He is the editor-in-chief of the Nutrition Guide for Clinicians and the author of 18 books for lay audiences.
In 2015, Dr. Barnard was named a fellow of the American College of Cardiology, and he received the American College of Lifestyle Medicine’s Trailblazer Award in 2016. He is an active member of the Medical Society of the District of Columbia, the American Medical Association, and other organizations working to improve health and medical care.
Growing up in Fargo, N.D., his extended family includes both doctors and cattle ranchers, two groups that are increasingly butting heads over America’s health policies. Dr. Barnard’s scientific approach aims to shed new light on these important issues.
2018 Recipient: Hans Diehl, DrHSc, MPH, FACN
In recognition of your extraordinary passion, selfless service, bright light of truth, and the transformative CHIP program that have contributed to the advancement of whole food, plant-based nutrition as the foundation of disease prevention, suspension and reversal.
Chosen as “One of America’s 20 Super-Heroes of the Health Movement” (Vegetarian Times), Dr. Hans Diehl is the founder of the Lifestyle Medicine Institute in Loma Linda and a Clinical Professor of Preventive Medicine at the School of Medicine of Loma Linda University, Loma Linda, CA.
Offering more than 30 years of leadership in the emerging field of Lifestyle Medicine, his pioneering efforts as an epidemiologically trained lifestyle interventionist with the Complete Health Improvement Project (CHIP) and its more than 60,000 graduates have consistently shown how simple lifestyle changes can prevent, arrest, and facilitate the reversal of many of our largely lifestyle related chronic diseases. The clinical results of his research (including two Randomized Clinical CHIP Trials) have been published in more than 25 peer-reviewed medical journals.
His books Health Power, Dynamic Health, and Dynamic Living (co-authored with Aileen Ludington), have over two million copies in 19 languages in circulation.
He earned his doctorate in Health Science and an MPH in Public Health Nutrition from Loma Linda University. Prior to founding the Lifestyle Medicine Institute 25 years ago, Hans worked for the Pritikin Longevity Center, UCLA and the National Institute of Health.
2017 Recipient: Michael Klaper, MD
In recognition of your unwavering dedication, exemplary patient care, sage wisdom, and humble leadership in the advancement of whole food, plant-based nutrition as the foundation of disease prevention, suspension, and reversal.
Dr. Klaper, is a gifted clinician, internationally recognized teacher, and sought-after speaker on diet and health. He has practiced medicine for more than 40 years and is a leading educator in applied plant-based nutrition and integrative medicine. He is also the author of a successful book on cholesterol-free nutrition, as well as numerous DVDs and Videos on Demand and a series of “Healthy YOU Webinars.” A source of inspiration advocating plant-based diets and the end of animal cruelty worldwide, Dr. Klaper contributed to the making of two PBS television programs Food for Thought and the award-winning Diet for a New America movie based on the book of the same name. Dr. Michael Klaper teaches that “Health Comes From Healthy Living” and is dedicated to the healing and flourishing of all living beings and our planet.
Dr. Klaper graduated from the University of Illinois College of Medicine in Chicago (1972), served a medical internship at Vancouver General Hospital in British Columbia, Canada with additional training in surgery, anesthesiology, and orthopedics at the University of British Columbia Hospitals in Vancouver and in obstetrics at the University of California Hospitals in San Francisco.
As Dr. Klaper’s medical career progressed, he began to realize (true to what science is bearing out today) that many of the diseases his patients presented – clogged arteries (atherosclerosis), high blood pressure (hypertension), obesity, adult onset diabetes, and even some forms of arthritis, asthma, and other significant illnesses – were made worse or actually caused by the high sugar, high fat, high salt, overly processed Standard American Diet (S.A.D.). Dr. Klaper resolutely believes that proper nutrition (through a whole food, plant-based diet) and a balanced lifestyle are essential for health and, in many cases, can make the difference between healing an illness or merely treating its symptoms.
In addition to his clinical practice and private consultations with patients, Dr. Klaper is a passionate and devoted educator of physicians and other healthcare professionals about the importance of nutrition in clinical practice. Dr. Michael Klaper served as the Director of the non-profit Institute of Nutrition Education and Research from 1992 through 2015, during which time he conducted a study focusing on people who ate a completely plant-based (vegan) diet. Dr. Klaper was also a member of the Nutrition Task Force of the American Medical Student Association, and served as an advisor to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) project on nutrition for long-term space colonists on the moon and Mars.
For over ten years, Dr. Klaper hosted a popular medical information radio program Sounds of Healing on WPFW in Washington, DC and KAOI 1110 AM on Maui, Hawaii.
Dr. Michael Klaper practiced acute care medicine in New Zealand for three years and currently serves on the staff of the TrueNorth Health Center in Santa Rosa, California, a nutritionally-based medical clinic specializing in therapeutic fasting and health improvement through a whole-food, plant-based diet.
He also serves on the Advisory Board for Naked Food Magazine.
2016 Recipient: Dean Ornish, MD
In recognition of your pioneering research, dedicated teaching, distinguished leadership and steadfast commitment in the advancement of whole food, plant-based nutrition as the foundation for disease prevention, suspension and reversal.
The founder and president of the non-profit Preventive Medicine Research Institute, Dr. Ornish is Clinical Professor of Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco. He received his MD from the Baylor College of Medicine, was a clinical fellow in medicine at Harvard Medical School, and completed an internship and residency in internal medicine at the Massachusetts General Hospital. Dean earned a BA in Humanities summa cum laude from the University of Texas in Austin, where he gave the baccalaureate address.
For over 36 years, Dr. Ornish has directed clinical research demonstrating, for the first time, that comprehensive lifestyle changes may begin to reverse even severe coronary heart disease, without drugs or surgery. Recently, Medicare agreed to provide coverage for this program, the first time that Medicare has covered a program of comprehensive lifestyle changes. He directed the first randomized controlled trial demonstrating that comprehensive lifestyle changes may stop or reverse the progression of early-stage prostate cancer. His current research showed that comprehensive lifestyle changes affect gene expression, “turning on” disease-preventing genes and “turning off” genes that promote cancer and heart disease, as well as the first study showing that these lifestyle changes reverse aging by lengthening telomeres, the ends of our chromosomes which control aging (in collaboration with Dr. Elizabeth Blackburn, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine in 2009).
He is the author of six books, all national bestsellers, including: Dr. Dean Ornish’s Program for Reversing Heart Disease; Eat More, Weigh Less; Love & Survival; and his most recent book, The Spectrum.
2015 Recipient: Caldwell Esselstyn, Jr., MD
In recognition of your extraordinary vision, groundbreaking research, noble service, diplomatic leadership in the advancement of whole food, plant-based nutrition as the foundation of disease prevention, suspension, and reversal.
Dr. Esselstyn received his B.A. from Yale University and his M.D. from Case Western Reserve University. In 1956, pulling the No. 6 oar as a member of the victorious United States rowing team, he was awarded a gold medal at the Olympic Games. He was trained as a surgeon at the Cleveland Clinic and at St. George’s Hospital in London. In 1968, as an Army surgeon in Vietnam, he was awarded the Bronze Star.
During his association with the Cleveland Clinic, which began in1968, Dr. Esselstyn served as president of the Staff and as a member of the Board of Governors. He chaired the Clinic’s Breast Cancer Task Force and headed its Section of Thyroid and Parathyroid Surgery.
In 1991, Dr. Esselstyn served as president of the American Association of Endocrine Surgeons, That same year he organized the first National Conference on the Elimination of Coronary Artery Disease. In 1997, he chaired a follow-up conference, the Summit on Cholesterol and Coronary Disease, which brought together more than 500 physicians and health-care workers. In April, 2005, Dr. Esselstyn became the first recipient of the Benjamin Spock Award for Compassion in Medicine. He received the Distinguished Alumnus Award from the Cleveland Clinic Alumni Association in 2009. In September 2010, he received the Greater Cleveland Sports Hall of Fame Award. Dr. Esselstyn received the 2013 Deerfield Academy Alumni Association Heritage Award In Recognition of Outstanding Achievement & Service, and the 2013 Yale University GEORGE H.W. BUSH ’48 LIFETIME OF LEADERSHIP AWARD.
His scientific publications number over 150, “The Best Doctors in America” 1994-1995 published by Woodward and White cites Dr. Esselstyn’s surgical expertise in the categories of endocrine and breast disease. In 1995, he published his bench mark long-term nutritional research arresting and reversing coronary artery disease in severely ill patients. That same study was updated at 12 years and reviewed beyond twenty years in his book, Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease, making it one of the longest longitudinal studies of its type. Dr. Esselstyn and his wife, Ann Crile Esselstyn, have followed a plant-based diet for more than 26 years. Dr. Esselstyn presently directs the cardiovascular prevention and reversal program at The Cleveland Clinic Wellness Institute and serves on the Medical and Expert Advisory Board for the International Plant-based Nutrition Healthcare Conference. The Esselstyns have four children and ten grandchildren.
2014 Recipient: T. Colin Campbell, PhD
In recognition of your exceptional contribution, vision, leadership and research in the advancement of whole food, plant-based nutrition as the foundation of disease prevention, suspension and reversal.
Having trained at Cornell (M.S., Ph.D.) and MIT (Research Associate) in nutrition, biochemistry and toxicology, Dr. Campbell spent 10 years on the faculty of Virginia Tech’s Department of Biochemistry and Nutrition before returning to the Division of Nutritional Sciences at Cornell in 1975 where he presently holds his Endowed Chair (now Emeritus), as the Jacob Gould Schurman Professor Emeritus of Nutritional Biochemistry.
His principal scientific interests, which began with his graduate training in the late 1950’s, have been on the effects of nutritional status on long term health, particularly on the causation of cancer. He has conducted original research both in laboratory experiments and in large-scale human studies; has received over 70 grant-years of peer-reviewed research funding (mostly NIH), has served on several grant review panels of multiple funding agencies, and has authored over 300 research papers. He has served on many national and international expert committees with mandates to develop food and health policy positions. He is the recipient of several awards, both in research and in citizenship.
Since publication of The China Study in 2005 that he co-authored with his son, Tom (MD, family practice), he has given more than 500 lectures both in the U.S. and abroad. More recently, he published Whole (May, 2013), as well as a new smaller book, Low Carb Fraud (Feb 2014). The very successful 2011 documentary movie, Forks Over Knives features his work and that of his colleague, Caldwell Esselstyn, MD.
Dr. Campbell founded the T Colin Campbell Center for Nutrition Studies, which is now headed by his son, Tom Campbell, MD. The Center, in partnership with the Cornell University, offers a highly successful online course in “Plant-Based Nutrition.”
About the Plantrician Project Luminary Award
The actual award presented to the doctors is original fine art by The Plantrician Project’s Official Artist, Kerry Schroeder of Austin, Texas.
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