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<\/a>Morton is considered a leading authority on diseases that have plagued these sects for generations. Using cutting-edge technology, Morton and his team have discovered numerous genetic illnesses and developed novel treatments, says Joseph B. Martin, M.D., former dean of Harvard Medical School. \u201cThe care [Morton and his team] provide for these families has no counterpart,\u201d says Martin.<\/p>\nMorton\u2019s research also has influenced the mainstream medical community in the treatment of numerous genetic illnesses, particularly glutaric aciduria type 1 (GA1) and maple syrup urine disease (MSUD)\u2014metabolic disorders whose study has consumed much of his professional life.<\/p>\n
Thanks in part to his work, these disorders are recognized as more common and highly treatable if diagnosed early. In fact, most newborns in the United States and throughout the world are tested for GA1 and MSUD as part of routine screenings. \u201cThese are not just curious diseases of the Amish,\u201d says Morton. \u201cThey affect people all over the world.\u201d<\/p>\n
Morton has received numerous accolades for his work, including the Albert Schweitzer Prize for Humanitarianism in 1993 and a John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Fellowship in 2006. He also received an honorary doctor of science degree from Trinity in 1990. \u201cHe is one of Harvard Medical School\u2019s most remarkable alumni,\u201d says Martin.<\/p>\n
So, it may seem surprising that Morton, growing up in a small town in West Virginia, did poorly in school. An independent learner, he preferred studying literature, mathematics, and music outside<\/em> of class. \u201cI thought of myself as a good student, but what I studied never quite matched what was going on in school,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n The spring before his high school graduation, he dropped out to work as a boiler man on steam-powered ore boats on the Great Lakes. In 1970, during the Vietnam War, he was drafted and reluctantly joined the U.S. Navy to do the same work.<\/p>\n But wherever he went, he continued his studies. \u201cHolmes is far more impressed with what he doesn\u2019t know than with what he knows,\u201d says friend and mentor William Mace, Trinity professor of psychology, emeritus.<\/p>\n Before coming to Trinity, Morton took correspondence courses in geometry and physics and studied at community colleges. After reading an article in Scientific American, <\/em>he became fascinated by developmental psychology and neurology, which led to an interest in medicine.<\/p>\n Still, he was an unlikely applicant to Trinity. \u201cMy grades were poor, standardized test scores were unremarkable, and neither indicated an aptitude for science,\u201d he says. But Professor of Religion Emeritus Frank Kirkpatrick, then director of the school\u2019s Individualized Degree Program, saw something in the 24-year-old. \u201cHe was determined and self-directed, just the kind of student we were looking for,\u201d says Kirkpatrick.<\/p>\n Morton thrived in the program, which is designed for older students and focuses on independent learning. \u201cHe was the talk of the department,\u201d says Charles A. Dana Professor of Biology Craig Schneider. \u201cWe were always impressed with his questions.\u201d<\/p>\n Morton spent so much time in the Trinity library that the college eventually paid him to work at the reference desk. \u201cHolmes\u2019s goal was to learn as much as he could, as fast as he could,\u201d says Mace. His dedication paid off, and 4\u00bd years after his interview with Kirkpatrick, he graduated Phi Beta Kappa with honors in his majors of biology and psychology.<\/p>\n He went on to Harvard Medical School, graduating in 1983, completed his residency in pediatrics at Boston Children\u2019s Hospital, and was awarded a research fellowship in biochemical genetics at Children\u2019s Hospital of Philadelphia. It was in Philadelphia where Morton made a discovery that changed the course of his career.<\/p>\n A lab technician asked him to analyze a urine sample from a 6-year-old Amish boy from Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. The boy was mentally alert but had no control of his limbs and was confined to a wheelchair; his local doctor had suspected cerebral palsy.<\/p>\n In examining the sample, Morton instead found signs of GA1, a metabolic disorder that can inhibit the body\u2019s ability to process certain proteins. Children with GA1 are born healthy, but when they develop a fever or common childhood illness, toxic chemical compounds build up in their brains and cause severe damage. Those who survive are left with irreversible paralysis that resembles cerebral palsy. At the time, GA1 had been documented in only eight patients worldwide, none of them from Lancaster County.<\/p>\n Genetic researchers have long been interested in Amish and Mennonite families because of their closed communities, says Morton. Marriage to outsiders is strictly forbidden in these religious orders, resulting in shallow gene pools. The Plain People now in Lancaster County are descended from fewer than 200 individuals who immigrated to the United States from Europe in the 1700s. This reduced genetic diversity makes these populations more susceptible to genetic disorders, including GA1 and MSUD.<\/p>\n In June 1988, Morton visited the Amish boy at his family\u2019s farm and learned that other children had similar symptoms. \u201cThe Amish called them \u2018God\u2019s special children\u2019 and said they had been sent by God to teach us how to love,\u201d says Morton. \u201cThat idea deeply affected me.\u201d<\/p>\n He began visiting these children weekly, rarely charging for his services. Two part-time jobs\u2014doing research at Johns Hopkins University and caring for newborns at Bryn Mawr Hospital\u2014paid the bills. He discovered that untreated GA1 caused the afflictions of many of these \u201cspecial children\u201d but that the disease was preventable. Children who were put on a protein-restricted diet supplemented with the vitamin riboflavin rarely experienced the devastating effects of the disease.<\/p>\n To continue this work, Morton and his wife, Caroline, decided to open a research and treatment clinic in the heart of Amish and Mennonite country, where their patients lived. They applied for numerous grants, but with little success, they agreed to take out a second mortgage on their home to fund an expensive piece of medical equipment that would allow Morton to test infants for GA1 before symptoms developed.<\/p>\n On September 20, 1989, just before they were to sign the mortgage papers, an article about them appeared on the front page of The Wall Street Journal. <\/em>Frank Allen, then the Philadelphia news bureau chief for the Journal<\/em>, had spent a day shadowing Morton as he made house calls to his patients. While he was overwhelmed by what he saw\u2014\u201cThese children were horribly damaged,\u201d says Allen\u2014he was greatly impressed with Morton\u2019s passion, gentleness, and sense of humor.<\/p>\n By 7:00 a.m. on the day the story ran, phone calls were flooding the bureau. The numerous donations that followed, including two checks for $100,000 each, more than funded the equipment. \u201cIt all worked out because of Frank Allen,\u201d says Morton. The two remain friends, and Allen, now retired, is writing a book about Morton.<\/p>\n The Clinic for Special Children, once dubbed \u201cthe little clinic in an Amish corn field,\u201d in Strasburg, Pennsylvania, was founded that same year as a combination pediatric-care clinic and cutting-edge research facility for rare genetic conditions. Over the years, the nonprofit has evaluated 2,600 patients from 34 states and 14 countries and with more than 150 genetic conditions.<\/p>\n In 2012, Morton founded a second clinic, the Central Pennsylvania Clinic\u2014A Medical Home for Special Children and Adults, in a rented space in Belleville, Pennsylvania; construction was completed on a new Belleville facility in August 2019. The Strasburg and Belleville clinics have the same mission: to provide general health care to those with rare, genetic disorders, says Morton. \u201cBut [the Belleville clinic] recognizes the fact that genetic disease affects people of all ages.\u201d Carefully managing these disorders from birth to death results in better lives for the patients, he says.<\/p>\n Allen notes that Morton\u2019s extraordinary dedication and his successful clinic model have inspired seven other clinics near Amish and Mennonite communities throughout the United States.<\/p>\n Though Morton has affected thousands of lives in the 30-plus years of his career, he remains humble. \u201cIt has been an interesting job, working in this setting and culture,\u201d he says. But with an eye toward the future, he stresses the importance of getting younger people involved in this work. \u201cThese kinds of medical issues will always be here, and it\u2019s important that there are people to replace me.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" D. Holmes Morton, M.D., IDP\u201979 dedicates career to Amish, Mennonite children BY MARY HOWARD PHOTOS BY ED CUNICELLI Pediatrician and geneticist D. Holmes Morton, M.D., IDP\u201979 could have enjoyed a lucrative career as a researcher at a prestigious teaching university. Instead, he found meaningful work among the Plain People\u2014the Amish and Mennonites of Lancaster County, … <\/p>\n<\/a>