Michael Stuart Pessin (1940-1996)

When Mike Pessin died suddenly and completely unexpectedly on the night of September 9, 1996, Neurology and Stroke lost a very ardent and able advocate, teacher, and practitioner.

Michael Stuart Pessin was born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri. He received his undergraduate education at Washington University in St. Louis, graduating in 1962. He then received a masters in Psychology also at Washington University and then graduated from the University of Missouri Medical school in 1969. He trained in the neurology residency program of the University of Colorado.

Mike came to Boston in 1973 to the Massachusetts General Hospital, where he was a stroke fellow and then a junior faculty member on the stroke service until 1978. He then moved to the New England Medical Center, where he was to spend the rest of his distinguished medical career. Mike founded the stroke service at the New England Medical Center and was its director, leader, and guiding force for 18 years. He quickly rose to the rank of Professor of Neurology at Tufts University.

During the years, Mike made some very important contributions to the field of stroke. He first studied and reported many of the clinical aspects of carotid artery disease, including the angiographic morphology of carotid bifurcation lesions, the relation of that morphology …