Medical Alumni Citation Award

The University of Wisconsin Medical Alumni Association Medical Alumni Citation Award goes to a University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health alumnus who has achieved distinction in medicine. Achievement is recognized through excellence in the practice of medicine, in academic activities and in research accomplishment.

2012 Medical Alumni Citation Award Recipient

William J. Yount, MD '60

Dr. Yount is a nationally acclaimed immunologist and rheumatologist. He graduated first in his class from the UW School of Medicine and Public Health in 1960 and completed his internship, residency and fellowship at the Massachusetts General Hospital.

He then served in the U.S. Public Health Service clinical oncology unit in Boston and collaborated in the initial trials of vincristine, vinblastine and mitomycin C in a variety of refractory malignancies. Clinical trials of melphalan as the first successful treatment for multiple myeloma led him to a more basic interest in immunoglobulins and basic immunology.

Dr. Yount moved to Rockefeller University and the laboratory of Henry Kunkel in 1965. He used the purified myeloma proteins to discover the IgG and IgA subclasses, IgG subclass deficiencies and some of the Gm genetic markers. He found the IgG heavy chain genes to be closely linked.

In 1970, Dr. Yount was recruited to the University of North Carolina (UNC) School of Medicine to found the Division of Rheumatology and Allergy and Immunology. He established the Clinical Immunology and Immunopathology Laboratories and Rheumatology and Allergy Fellowship Programs. He continued his research on the IgG subclasses and studied the role of complement receptors in the pathogenesis of systemic lupus.

He continues to consult and teach in Rheumatology and Allergy and Immunology at UNC and was awarded the Reeves Distinguished Professorship in 2006.