David A Roth

Newport Beach - Dr. David Allen Roth, of Newport Beach, CA, formerly of Weston, MA, passed away in early February after a long, brave battle with prostate cancer. Dr. Roth, an internationally recognized neurosurgeon, whose patients included world leaders and rock stars, always claimed his greatest accomplishment was, in his own words: "my two sons".

Dr. Roth was born November 20th, 1932, at the very bottom of the Great Depression, to Dora and Joseph Roth in New Castle, IN. He was the last of six children. While his mother's dream was for him to become a Rabbi, as a teenager he discovered his own dream of becoming a famous radio disc jockey, after winning a local speech contest. Determined to see more of what the world had to offer, he spent the following summer hitchhiking his way across the American South, with a quick stop in Mexico, only allowed back into the US by showing his library card to the immigration officer. As a high school senior, he won first place in three more speech and dramatic performance contests, beating out future actor James Dean and senator Joe Lieberman.

While attending college at the University of Indiana, he was encouraged by his oldest brother Richard to take pre-med courses instead of communications. After graduation, he enrolled in medical school at the same institution. He spent his summers in medical school working as a TV announcer in Las Vegas, devouring the resorts' midnight 99-cent buffets, sleeping in the green room, and dating show and chorus girls, including Miss Sweden. One of these showgirls, future Hollywood actress Joan Marshall, convinced him to return to medical school to finish his degree, after he vacillated between a career as a disc jockey or physician. After his second year of medical school, he transferred to the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, reasoning that since he had settled on medicine as his career, he should go to the best school that would accept him. Two years later, after graduating, he started as a surgical intern at Johns Hopkins, where he would build close relationships with mentors such as Dr. Alfred Blalock, the father of cardiac surgery, Dr. Michael DeBakey, arguably the greatest surgeon of the 20th century, and many residents who would go on to become Chairs at their respective academic institutions.

Intern year was followed by acceptance into the University of California - Los Angeles (UCLA) Neurosurgery Residency program, after which he continued his surgical training with some of the greatest thinkers and surgeons in the field through a fellowship in London, and ultimately landed his first job as a neurosurgeon at Boston City Hospital, with an appointment as Assistant Professor at Harvard Medical School. Now at the pinnacle of academia, Dr. Roth published many peer-reviewed journal articles on brain tumors, pain control during surgery, and most seminally, his work as an early pioneer of microneurosurgery. After a few years of success in academia, Dr. Roth took a job at Melrose-Wakefield Hospital as the Chief of Neurosurgery, where he would spend the next 40+ years. He was one of the first surgeons in the United States to use a microscope and surgical binoculars (loupes) for spine surgery, and perfected the technique of minimizing incision size and blood loss, turning many formerly care-intensive spinal surgeries into outpatient procedures. Dr. Roth was recognized in local and national media for his contributions to surgery; by the time he retired, Dr. Roth had accomplished over 12,000 spinal neurosurgical cases.

Although his surgical career was quite robust, Dr. Roth's greatest joy in his life was his family. His marriage to his wife Lisa in 1985, followed by the births of his two sons, Cameron in 1989 and Graham in 1990, focused his purpose on being a loving and dedicated father. He was omnipresent on the sidelines of the Weston High School football field and in the audience at Fenn and Boston University Academy theater performances. Later, he would travel one month to Nashville to watch one son play lacrosse at Vanderbilt, and the next to Palo Alto to attend his other son's musical performance at Stanford. He appreciated the value of travel, and traveled with his family often: rafting the Colorado River in the Grand Canyon, driving across France visiting wine vineyards, visiting national parks in the American West, skiing and hiking in Aspen, and wading in the warm waters of the Turks & Caicos Islands. He was an avid Boston sports fan, and reveled in the dynasty years of Tom Brady and the New England Patriots. It was impossible to leave any conversation with him without investment advice, as he was a steadfast devotee of Jack Bogle and the Vanguard philosophy.

He was warm, loving, brilliant, dedicated, a little obsessive-compulsive, and only wanted the best for those he loved. His retirement years were spent in sunny Newport Beach, CA, closer to his nieces and nephews, with frequent visits from his sons. He will be greatly missed.

He is survived by his two sons, Dr. Cameron A. Roth, of Scottsdale, AZ, and Graham S. Roth, of San Francisco, CA, and his loving former wife, Lisa F. Roth, of Lincoln, MA, as well as many nieces and nephews. His ashes will be scattered in the Maroon Bells mountains in Aspen, CO, by his immediate family.