by Jill Clendening
R. Daniel Beauchamp, MD, former chair of the Section of Surgical Sciences at Vanderbilt University Medical Center and surgeon-in-chief of Vanderbilt University Hospital, died Nov. 27 at Alive Hospice. He was 66 years old.
Dr. Beauchamp, the John Clinton Foshee Distinguished Professor of Surgery, also held an appointment as professor in the Department of Cell and Developmental Biology. He served as chair of the Section of Surgical Sciences for 17 years, from July 2001 until he stepped down from the role in July 2018 to focus on his research. He served as deputy director of Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center (VICC) from 2011 to 2019 and was appointed to the role of vice president for Cancer Center Network Affairs in 2018.
Under Dr. Beauchamp’s leadership the Section of Surgical Sciences strengthened its national reputation for innovation and advancing surgical care. During his tenure as chair, he supported expansion of the department’s research endeavors until the group reached the top 10 in funding from the National Institutes of Health.
“Dr. Beauchamp will be remembered as one of VUMC’s legendary leaders,” said Jeff Balser, MD, PhD, President and Chief Executive Officer of VUMC and Dean of Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. “Dan’s contributions were enormous, helping propel our patient care and research initiatives to new heights. A true physician and scientist, he led with compassion and was tenacious in his efforts to advance our surgical programs while contributing enormously to the world of cancer research. A champion of diversity, equity and inclusion, Dan was steadfast in his commitment to people. We will miss him greatly, and our thoughts are with his wife, Shannon, and their daughter, Bryn.”
He positioned the Section of Surgical Sciences to successfully meet the demands of a steadily increasing volume of surgical cases and ambulatory visits, as well as expanded the training efforts for future surgeons. Today, the section is home to 199 clinical and research faculty, and 118 residents and 37 fellows training in 19 specialties.
“Dr. Beauchamp’s leadership advanced our surgical programs across all areas, resulting in many of the strategic advantages of our health system,” said C. Wright Pinson, MBA, MD, Deputy Chief Executive Officer and Chief Health System Officer for VUMC. “During the 17 years that Dan led the Section of Surgical Sciences, the elements he championed expanded the scope and depth of our offerings, greatly benefiting our patients while creating superb training opportunities for many young surgeons. His legacy is one of vision and service. I express my sympathy to Shannon, Bryn, and the entire family for their loss.”
He also began a concerted and intentional effort to train and employ surgeons who better reflect the diverse population served by VUMC. Women now represent 32.9% of the section’s trainees, while approximately 20% of all trainees are either African American, Hispanic, Native American, South Asian or East Asian. Also under Dr. Beauchamp’s leadership, the number of female surgical faculty more than doubled.
“Dr. Beauchamp was a visionary leader who contributed profoundly and seamlessly in both a local and national capacity across the missions of academic surgery: patient care, science, education and administration,” said Seth Karp, MD, H. William Scott Jr. Professor of Surgery and Anesthesiology and chair of the Section of Surgical Sciences. “His legacy is our commitment to the importance of surgeons as scientists, and to training surgeon-scientists, to which he dedicated himself over a long career. His impact as a thoughtful, compassionate force cannot be overstated. This is a deep, personal loss for many at VUMC and across the country, and Dan will be dearly missed.”
Dr. Beauchamp first came to VUMC in 1987 as a postdoctoral fellow after completing his medical degree, internship and surgical residency at the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) in Galveston, Texas. He spent two years conducting basic growth factor research in the Department of Cell Biology under the direction of Harold “Hal” L. Moses, MD.
Dr. Beauchamp then returned to UTMB as an assistant professor in the departments of Surgery and Human Biological Chemistry and Genetics. During his UTMB tenure, he served as an attending faculty member for General Surgery, the Surgery Tumor Clinic, and the Surgical Intensive Care Unit. He also directed the James E. Thompson Memorial Molecular Biology Laboratory for Surgical Research.
Moses, who became the founding director of the Vanderbilt Cancer Center (now Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center), was instrumental in bringing Dr. Beauchamp back to VUMC in 1994 as he sought his assistance in developing the scientific and clinical programs at the new center.
Dr. Beauchamp joined the faculty of VUMC as an associate professor in the Department of Surgery in December 1994 and was named an associate professor of Cell Biology in July 1995. In 1997 he was appointed as the John L. Sawyers, M.D., Professor of Surgery and the founding division chief of a new Division of Surgical Oncology and Endocrine Surgery, which he led from 1997-2001. Dr. Beauchamp was appointed the John Clinton Foshee Distinguished Professor of Surgery and chair of the Section of Surgical Sciences, and Surgeon-in-Chief of VUMC in 2001.
Dr. Beauchamp built his clinical practice focused on surgical oncology. Until 2008, he cared for patients with a broad spectrum of malignancies, including gastrointestinal tract cancers, breast cancer, melanoma and soft tissue sarcoma. In his final years of clinical practice, Dr. Beauchamp focused on the care of breast cancer patients.
Beginning in 2014, Dr. Beauchamp served as co-leader of the Gastrointestinal Cancer Research Program at VICC. Cathy Eng, MD, joined as a co-leader of the program in 2019, and today the program has more than 30 members conducting clinical and translational research on a range of gastrointestinal cancers, with particular focus on colorectal, gastroesophageal and pancreatic cancers.
Dr. Beauchamp’s primary research activities were focused on colorectal carcinogenesis, the biology of cancer-cell invasion and metastasis, and applying DNA microarray, next-generation sequencing and proteomic technologies to identify novel molecular biomarkers and therapeutic targets in colorectal and other malignancies. He co-led one of the main projects of the Gastrointestinal Cancer Specialized Program of Research Excellence (SPORE) for 10 years, and his laboratory received continual R01 funding from the National Institutes of Health for more than 25 years.
“Over his almost 30-year faculty career at Vanderbilt, Dr. Beauchamp touched the lives of thousands of patients, colleagues and community members,” said Jennifer Pietenpol, PhD, Chief Scientific and Strategy Officer for VUMC. “He was universally hailed as a warm, devoted, caring colleague and leader. Coming to cancer research at a time when the molecular biology of growth factors was exploding, Dr. Beauchamp was set on applying the benefits of that emerging field to cancer. His laboratory made important cancer research discoveries that advanced colorectal cancer treatment. In his many leadership roles at Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center, he was a powerful example of a compassionate surgeon, brilliant scientist, and dedicated colleague, mentor and friend. Our hearts go out to his wife, Shannon, and daughter, Bryn.”
Dr. Beauchamp’s laboratory door was always open, and he trained and mentored countless junior faculty members, physician-scientist fellows, postdoctoral research fellows, graduate students and medical students in his research space.
He is also admired for his many efforts to advance opportunities for underrepresented minorities in the field of surgery.
“Dr. Beauchamp was strongly committed to broad diversity at the Medical School throughout his career at VUMC, and also in his professional life,” said George C. Hill, PhD, Levi Watkins Professor of Administration and Medical Education, and Distinguished Professor of Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology. “From my day one at the Medical School, he demonstrated support and co-chaired the first strategic planning committee. He was a strong and consistent leader for inclusion and a consistent and wonderful leader in this space.”
Dr. Beauchamp was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2012. He was active in many other national surgical and scientific organizations including the Society of University Surgeons for which he served on the Executive Council for a decade and as president in 1999. He was also a member of the American Society of Clinical Investigation, the Society for Surgical Oncology, the Association for Academic Surgeons, the Southern Surgical Association, the American Surgical Association, the Society for Surgery of the Alimentary Tract, the American Association for Cancer Research, the American Society of Clinical Oncology, the American Gastroenterology Association, the Halsted Society and the American Society for Cell Biology, among others.
His numerous awards included his selection as a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and receipt of the American Surgical Association’s prestigious Flance-Karl Award for Scientific Achievement in 2015. Dr. Beauchamp also received the Frank Boehm Award for Excellence in Teaching Continuing Medical Education at Vanderbilt University.
During his career, Dr. Beauchamp served on the editorial boards of the Journal of Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition, the Journal of Surgical Research, Surgery, the Journal of the American College of Surgeons, Surgery, the American Journal of Surgery, Contemporary Surgery, and the Annals of Surgical Oncology.
He gave invited presentations throughout the United States and around the world. He authored more than 160 peer-reviewed publications, in addition to many book chapters, reviews and commentary articles. Dr. Beauchamp served as an associate editor for the “Sabiston Textbook of Surgery” since 1998, a project he enjoyed working on with editor-in-chief, Courtney Townsend Jr., MD, professor and Robertson-Poth Distinguished Chair in General Surgery at UTMB. Townsend had been Beauchamp’s mentor since his first clinical clerkship in surgery while a medical student at UTMB.
Dr. Beauchamp’s many institutional administrative responsibilities at VUMC included serving as chair of the Perioperative Enterprise Committee and co-leading the Perioperative Executive Leadership Committee. He also served on the VICC Executive Committee, the VICC Research Enterprise Steering Committee, the Vanderbilt Medical Group Executive Committee, the Medical School Executive Committee, the Clinical Enterprise Group, and the Surgical Critical Care Steering Committee.
Dr. Beauchamp is survived by his wife, Shannon; his daughter, Bryn Beauchamp (Brian Gibson); his father, Joe “Bud” Beauchamp; and his brother, Joe Beauchamp. He is preceded in death by his mother, Georgia Lee Holland.
Details on a memorial for Dr. Beauchamp will be announced at a later date.
Section of Surgical Sciences professional biography for R. Daniel Beauchamp, MD
R. Daniel Beauchamp, M.D., the John Clinton Foshee Distinguished Professor of Surgery and Cell and Developmental Biology at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Chair of the Section of Surgical Sciences (2001-18), and Surgeon-in-Chief at Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC) (2001-18), died on November 27, 2022. He was 66.
A native of Texas, Dr. Beauchamp completed his undergraduate education at Texas Tech University in Lubbock in 1978. He earned his medical degree in 1982 and completed his general surgery residency in 1987, both at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston. Following residency, he trained under Harold L. Moses, M.D. in the Department of Cell Biology at Vanderbilt University where he began to study mechanisms of tumorigenesis, a field to which he would make important contributions for 35 years. Dr. Beauchamp returned to UTMB as Assistant Professor in Surgery and was recruited back to Vanderbilt in 1994 to join the Department of Surgery as the first Chief of the Division of Surgical Oncology and Endocrine Surgery. In 1997, he was named the John L. Sawyers, M.D. Professor of Surgery. From 1999-2001, he served as the Director of Surgical Research in the Section of Surgical Sciences. In 2001, he was named the Foshee Distinguished Professor of Surgery, Surgeon-in-Chief at Vanderbilt University Hospital, and Chair of the Section of Surgical Sciences.
Over his 17-year tenure as Chair, the Section of Surgical Sciences dramatically expanded its clinical, research and educational accomplishments. Under his guidance, support, and leadership, the faculty grew from 86 to 159, the clinical services grew rapidly, and the transplant and trauma programs became among the busiest in the country. Advanced techniques were developed across a range of clinical specialties including fetal and pediatric, vascular and endovascular, oncologic, cardiac, thoracic, urologic, plastic, oral and maxillofacial, and general surgery. The Section supported a meaningful presence and leadership in global surgery. In the research arena, Dr. Beauchamp supported work in basic science and translational science, clinical trials, and important investigations in patient-reported outcomes. This led to the Section achieving distinction as one of the top ten in surgery for funding from the National Institutes of Health. Over this time, the residency increased from 106 to 137 trainees, and became one of the most sought after in the United States with its residents going on to important careers in academic surgery.
At VUMC, Dr. Beauchamp’s clinical practice focused on surgical oncology, including gastrointestinal tract cancers, breast cancer, melanoma, and soft tissue sarcoma. In 2008, with increasing leadership and scientific roles both locally and nationally, he narrowed his practice to the care of breast cancer patients.
One of the finest surgeon-scientists of his generation, Dr. Beauchamp’s laboratory received continuous NIH funding for over 25 years. His primary area of research was colorectal carcinogenesis, the biology of cancer cell invasion and metastasis, and the identification of novel molecular biomarkers and therapeutic targets in colorectal and other alimentary tract malignancies. His work applied DNA microarray and proteomic technology to identify novel biomarkers and therapeutic targets in human colorectal cancer. He used molecular genetics and cell biological approaches to examine mechanistic questions in cancer biology in both cell culture and mouse models. Dr. Beauchamp authored over 160 peer-reviewed publications, numerous book chapters and reviews, and presented his work across the world. He achievements were recognized by his election to the National Academy of Medicine, American Society for Clinical Investigation, and as a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Sciences. In 2015, he received the prestigious Flance-Karl Award for Scientific Achievement from the American Surgical Association. He continued to be productive even very recently, with an important publication identifying the role of SMAD4 in colitis-associated carcinoma.
Both locally and nationally, a significant aspect of Dr. Beauchamp’s legacy will be the importance of the development of surgeon-scientists, for which he was an archetype. He trained and mentored dozens of residents and over 55 research fellows and students. Many have gone on to significant research careers. He imbued the Surgical Services at Vanderbilt with an understanding of the necessity of surgeons performing research and supported this with great energy and personal commitment.
Dr. Beauchamp provided essential service and leadership to national surgical and scientific organizations. He was a member of the Society of University Surgeons, where he served as President-Elect (1998-99) and President (1999-2000) and on the Executive Council for 10 years. He was a member of the American Society of Clinical Investigation, the Society for Surgical Oncology, the Association for Academic Surgeons, the Southern Surgical Association, the American Surgical Association, the Society for Surgery of the Alimentary Tract, the American Association for Cancer Research, the American Society of Clinical Oncology, the American Gastroenterology Association, the Halsted Society, the Surgical Biology Club, and the American Society for Cell Biology. He served on the NIH GMA2 and GCMB Study Sections as a regular member and was a member of the NIH CSR College of Reviewers.
Dr. Beauchamp performed editorial service for a number of high impact surgical publications, including as Associate Editor for the Sabiston Textbook of Surgery, 16th-21st editions, and served on the Editorial Boards of Surgery, the Journal of Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition, the Journal of Surgical Research, the Journal of the American College of Surgeons, the American Journal of Surgery, Contemporary Surgery, and the Annals of Surgical Oncology.
At the local level, Dr. Beauchamp was an indefatigable and respected voice. His major roles in the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center included Deputy Director (2011-19), Co-Director of the GI oncology program (2014-22), and Director of the GI SPORE development research program (2017-22). He served on numerous institutional committees including the Perioperative Enterprise Committee, Perioperative Executive Committee, VICC Executive Committee, Vanderbilt Medical Group Executive Committee, Medical School Executive Committee, Clinical Enterprise Group, and Surgical Critical Care Steering Committee. He served as President of the Nashville Surgical Society (2004-05) and in leadership roles with the Tennessee Chapter of The American College of Surgeons including Vice President (2013-14), President-Elect (2014) and President (2014-15).
At his core, Dr. Beauchamp was a kind-hearted, compassionate, and deeply committed soul and the consummate academic surgeon. He demonstrated tireless commitment and achieved seminal contributions to academic surgery and each of its missions. He made everyone around him better and developed a culture of excellence in multiple domains that will endure.
Dr. Beauchamp is survived by his wife, Shannon; his daughter, Bryn Beauchamp (Brian Gibson); his father, Joe “Bud” Beauchamp; and his brother, Joe Beauchamp. He is preceded in death by his mother, Georgia Lee Holland.