Lois Jovanovič, MD, MACE, passed away 18 September 2018, in Santa Barbara, CA. Dr. Jovanovič’s courageous and relentless fight to teach the world how to care for women with diabetes led to a global improvement in outcomes for both women with diabetes and their babies.
Dr. Jovanovič earned a bachelor’s degree in biology from Columbia University, followed by a master’s degree in Hebrew Literature from the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York. She went on to receive her medical degree from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York, and then completed her residency and fellowship in Internal Medicine, Endocrinology and Metabolism at the New York Hospital – Cornell University Medical College.
Dr. Jovanovič’s key contributions to the field of diabetes include:
Demonstrating that women with diabetes have the same chance of having a healthy baby as women without diabetes if they maintain normoglycemia before and throughout pregnancy
Work with the original Glucose-Controlled Insulin Infusion System (Biostator®) in labor and delivery, a prototype for current work on the artificial pancreas
Creating a Pocket Doc insulin dosage calculator in the 1980s
Coinvestigator of the Diabetes In Early Pregnancy study and the Diabetes Control and Complications Trial
Coinvestigator of the NIH/JDRF funded Artificial Pancreas Project
CoInvestigator of the multinational CONCEPTt Trial
Dr. Jovanovič’s numerous honors, awards, appointments, and publications of over 500 articles in the fields of diabetes, metabolism, nutrition, obstetrics and gynecology, perinatology, and engineering of a glucose-controlled insulin delivery device. She was an internationally acclaimed speaker and has presented her research at congresses throughout the world.
Dr. Jovanovič joined Sansum Diabetes Research Institute in 1986, serving as its Chief Executive Officer and Chief Scientific Officer from 1996 to 2013. Under her leadership, the Institute became a center of excellence for diabetes and pregnancy, continuous glucose monitoring, and artificial pancreas technology.