Published by Legacy Remembers on Apr. 18, 2024.
Jean Louise "(Otis)" Freeman UPPER The light of our lives dimmed and laughter quieted with the death of Jean Louise Freeman from complications of Alzheimer 's disease on April 14, 2024. She was born on May 26, 1947, in Philadelphia, PA, the middle daughter of Eleanor Dupree Otis and Charles Foster Otis. Jean retired as a professor from the University of Texas Medical Branch in 2016.
She graduated from Abington High School in 1965 and Mount Holyoke College in 1969. Subsequently she worked for Professor Gary Koch at the University of North Carolina and Professor Robert Fetter at Yale University. With Dr. Fetter's encouragement and leadership, she obtained a Doctor of Philosophy, with a concentration in epidemiology, from Yale University in 1984.
She worked as an assistant professor with Dr. Jack Wennberg at Dartmouth Medical School from 1985 to 1989. In 1989 she moved with her husband and daughter to Galveston, where she worked the Dr. James Goodwin.
Jean had a remarkable and diverse career. Her papers with Dr. Koch remain among the most widely cited in statistical literature for their work on kappa agreement statistics. At Yale, she, Dr. Fetter, and Mr. John Thompson wrote and edited seminal texts and papers on Diagnostic Related Groups. The methodology remains the foundation of the Medicare reimbursement system for hospital care in the United States as well as many health care systems around the world.
Jean's work with Dr. Wennberg on studies of small area variation in health care delivery compared hospitalizations in New Haven and Maine to those in Boston. These contributed to our understanding of how the availability of hospital beds strongly correlates with the length of stay in hospitals.
Jean came to UTMB to work with Dr. Goodwin on the utilization of Medicare data to understand patterns of health care diagnosis and treatment. Together they wrote many papers showing large datasets can be used effectively to understand health outcomes and treatment consequences. For her work she was awarded the Grace Bucksch Gnitzinger Distinguished Professorship in Aging.
At UTMB Jean worked tirelessly with students, residents, and young faculty. She led masters and doctoral students through the arduous process of graduate studies. She mentored dozens of young faculty by helping them develop resumes and portfolios to assist their career development. Seeing new professionals evolve and become established was a core joy of her life.
Jean loved traveling, both for business and pleasure. Her passport showed too many countries to list. The most memorable was when she promised to give a talk in Sydney, Australia. It would happen during the preparation of a grant in New Hampshire. She submitted a draft, flew to Sydney, gave the talk, and flew home in time to submit the final draft to NIH. A busy four days.
Jean is survived by her loving husband Daniel H. Freeman, Jr., daughter Elizabeth G. Freeman, and son-in-law Michael Keltz. She is also survived by her older sister Shirley Panizza, married to Antonio Panizza, of Reston, VA, and younger sister Nancy Doyle, married to Mark Doyle, of
Chattanooga, TN. She has a niece Jennifer Panizza in Reston, VA and nephew Michael Panizza, married to Eleonora Sceusa, in Freetown, Sierre Leone.
Jean was interred at a private ceremony at Trinity Episcopal Church. In lieu of flowers, donations should be made to the Jean Louise (Otis) Freeman '69 Scholarship Fund at Mount Holyoke College, South Hadley, Massachusetts.