Dr. Charles J. McCabe, inspired generations of medical students

Harvard Medical School devised a new prize to recognize Dr. Charles J. McCabe's enduring contributions.

On the cusp of becoming cardiac surgeon, illness handed Dr. Charles J. McCabe a different calling, and from the moment he turned to teaching, he never worked another day.

"He used to say to our daughter, 'If you do something you love, you never have to go to work,' " Rose McCabe said of her husband.

Said Dr. William S. Coleman, his best friend, "I don't think Charlie ever went to work in his life because he truly loved teaching."

Students who were the beneficiaries of that devotion returned the affection, nominating him year after year for teaching honors at Massachusetts General Hospital, where surgical residents asked that the faculty award be named for him, and at Harvard Medical School, which devised a new prize to recognize his enduring contributions.

At Mass. General, his professional home since his first day as an intern in 1974, Dr. McCabe died Monday of complications from melanoma that had metastasized. He was 60 and lived in Boston.

"He became the quintessential teacher of surgery at Harvard Medical School for 30 years," said Dr. Andrew L. Warshaw, chief of surgery at MGH.

Daniel Federman, a professor of medicine and former dean for alumni relations and clinical teaching at Harvard Medical School, called Dr. McCabe "the spokesman for surgical excellence in his teaching of students and residents," and said the school created the special faculty prize for sustained excellence in teaching for Dr. McCabe two years ago because he won or was nominated for awards so often.

"He was, in my opinion, one of the greatest teachers of medical students that I've seen during my career, and the greatest teacher in surgery," said Dr. W. Gerald Austen, surgeon in chief emeritus at Mass. General.

And yet this was not the work that lay ahead when Dr. McCabe arrived in Boston and became chief surgical resident at MGH.

"Charlie was simply the best - he was the best intern, the best resident," said Coleman, who met Dr. McCabe when they were interns at Mass. General and is now a cardiothoracic surgeon and chairman of the surgery department at Sacred Heart Medical Center in Spokane, Wash.

Standing a few inches taller than 6 feet, Dr. McCabe "was this tall, good-looking, Irish Catholic guy from Notre Dame with a wonderful smile and a twinkle in his eye," Coleman said.

Growing up in Asbury Park, N.J., Dr. McCabe played football, basketball, and baseball in high school. He met Rose Castellano when he was a lifeguard on the Jersey shore and they married 37 years ago.

Dr. McCabe graduated in 1970 from the University of Notre Dame and in 1974 from the New Jersey College of Medicine and Dentistry in Newark.

As medical school came to an end, he asked his wife if they should stay in New Jersey, she recalled, and "I said, 'Where's the best place to train for surgery?' And he said, 'Mass. General Hospital.' He said one of the best days of his life was when he found out he matched for his residency here."

About to launch a surgical career in 1979, Dr. McCabe was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, which affects the central nervous system. Because he could not perform surgery, he became a teacher and rose to become associate chief of emergency services at the hospital.

For nine years, beginning in 1983, he also was the state medical director for the Department of Public Health's Office of Emergency Medical Services. And in 2004, he became a full professor at Harvard Medical School. Accompanying the nomination for that promotion, Warshaw said, were "hundreds of testimonials from students all over the country who wrote to say how he influenced their lives."

A dozen years ago, Dr. McCabe could no longer walk and began getting around on wheels, rather than on foot, but "no one ever saw the wheelchair," said his daughter, Krista. He usually didn't notice, either. "He would wheel around and he'd see his reflection in windows and mirrors and he'd say, 'Is that me? It can't be.' "

His vibrancy as a teacher made his mode of transport easy to overlook.

"The students loved him, and the residents did, too," Federman said, "but it never got in the way of his very high expectations."

Said Coleman, "Those of us who actually got to practice surgery get to touch a thousand lives. There are tens of thousands - I don't know how many patients Charlie touched because he taught their surgeons and they brought him with them into surgery."

Because he spent considerable time in hospital beds - Dr. McCabe had also battled lymphoma - he drew on experience for some clinical lessons.

"People respected him because he didn't just go in there and teach as a doctor, he taught as a man," his daughter said. "He used to give assignments like, 'How are you going to be human to your patients? When you see the fear in their eyes, what are you going to do to give them solace and comfort?' "

"It was his life, it truly was," Rose McCabe said of her husband's teaching. "I can honestly say that here was his second home. His first home was Mass. General."

Even when the difficulties simply getting to work required rising earlier and earlier, "his hallmark was an absolute, indefatigable cheerfulness," Warshaw said.

"He was a magic maker," his daughter said. "A lot of people would look at our lives and say, 'Do you ever wish your dad could walk?' I wouldn't trade one second of my life for it do be different. Every thing he touched, every moment was magic."

Amid serious illnesses and intrusive treatments, Dr. McCabe reminded those around him what he frequently told his students: Each challenge is surmountable, each day is beautiful. He had no regrets.

"He used to say that if you change one thing, you have to change everything," said his daughter. "He said that if he never got MS, he might never have become a teacher, and teaching was the love of his life."

For his funeral Mass, which will be held at 10 a.m. tomorrow in St. Joseph Church in Boston, Dr. McCabe wanted his friends to wear bright clothes, rather than somber suits.

"Charlie asked me to do his eulogy," said Coleman, who plans to sport a red tie, his friend's favorite color, as his voice broke talking about Dr. McCabe. "I guess it's going to be the hardest and easiest thing I've ever done. He said, 'I want everybody smiling and I want everybody to celebrate.' He said, 'I want no one crying,' and I said, 'Charlie, you've got the wrong guy.' "

In addition to his wife and daughter, Dr. McCabe leaves two sisters, Charlene McGee of Spring Lake, N.J., and Marybeth Neylon of Brick, N.J.; and a brother, Jay of Holmdel, N.J.