Sylvester Sanfilippo, Date of Birth, Date of Death
TweetSylvester Sanfilippo
American pediatrician
Date of Birth: 01-Jan-1926
Date of Death: 02-May-2013
Profession: military officer
Nationality: United States
Zodiac Sign: Capricorn 
About Sylvester Sanfilippo
- Sylvester Sanfilippo (January 1, 1926 – May 2, 2013) was a pediatrician from Edina, Minnesota, who first described a mucopolysaccharide storage disease which bears his name.
- Sanfilippo was born in Rochester, New York.
- After graduating from the University of Rochester in 1947, he moved to Salt Lake City to pursue postgraduate studies.
- There he received a Master of Science degree in Biochemistry and earned his medical degree in 1955.
- He acquired his pediatric training at the University of Minnesota, interrupted by a two-year stint as a pediatrician in the United States Navy Medical Corps in Portsmouth and Norfolk, Virginia.
- In 1960 Sanfilippo was awarded a postdoctoral research fellowship and began a comprehensive study of children with mucopolysaccharide storage disease at the University of Minnesota.
- The investigative approach combined the chemical measurement and identification of urinary acid mucopolysaccharides with a thorough clinical evaluation of each patient.
- The work of Sanfilippo and his colleagues described eight mentally challenged children with mucopolysacchariduria of a single compound, heparitin sulfate.
- In contrast, their thirteen patients with Hunter–Hurler syndrome showed mucopolysacchariduria of two compounds, heparitin sulfate and chondroitin sulfate B.
- The majority of the heparitin sulfate excretors had a normal or near-normal facial appearance and displayed mild to slight somatic and radiographic manifestations in comparison with their Hunter–Hurler counterparts, who showed more severe involvement.
- These observations indicated the existence of a new inborn error of the mucopolysaccharide metabolism.
- Sanfilippo presented the results of the study at the annual American Pediatric Society Meeting in May 1963, and published a report later that year. He entered the private practice of Pediatrics in April 1962, but continued his research at the University of Minnesota for several more years.
- During his practice years he participated in regional health care planning and published a perinatal mortality review study (1976).
- Sanfilippo enjoyed his teaching experiences with medical students and physicians-in-training.
- He retired from private practice in June 1988.Sanfilippo died on May 2, 2013, aged 87.
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