Dr Ivan Janos Szasz, 1936–2017

Issue: BCMJ, vol. 59, No. 8, October 2017, Page 427 Obituaries
By: Bill Mackie, MD


Ivan died peacefully at home surrounded by loved ones—his wife, Patricia; his daughters, Jenny Spring (Jim) and Linda Szasz (Craig); and his grandsons, Marcel and Garnet—and with a feeling of gratefulness for the full life he enjoyed.

Ivan was born in Budapest, Hungary. He started medical training in Budapest, and with the outbreak of the 1956 revolution, he escaped to London, England, where he worked at Middlesex Hospital stoking a coal furnace and learning enough English to resume his studies. Upon graduating from medical school, Ivan immigrated to Canada, where he worked at Ottawa Civic Hospital. He eventually moved to BC to become a surgeon in Trail (where he also coached the Trail-Rossland Stingrays Summer Swim Club).

In the 1980s he turned his interest to nuclear medicine, completing a fellowship in Vancouver in 1985. He published extensively in this evolving field; taught brain imaging, traveling to the University of Mendoza in Argentina as an International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) visiting professor in brain imaging in 1998; was named a technical expert by the IAEA; and served on the Laboratory Accreditation Committee for Nuclear Medicine. He was a proud member of Doctors of BC and acted as guest editor for the December 1987 issue of BC Medical Journal. In 2012, he was awarded the CMA Senior Member Award.

Ivan loved working as a physician but, in his heart, he was a Renaissance man with many other passions and an immense interest in the world around him. He loved to read, go to the movies, travel, and eat. A handyman extraordinaire, he would have been just as happy to be a carpenter. And he loved swimming. Ivan played water polo in Hungary and was part of the UBC Masters Swim Club (where I met him). Ivan was the king of the butterfly; he was the FINA national champion in the 100 m fly in 2011 and 2016 and the 200 m fly in 2011. Ivan loved to compete and to help others compete—my family members would advise me to not race Ivan as he was always up for the competition. He made close friends in the swim world.

Ivan will be dearly missed by all those whose lives he touched.
—Bill Mackie, MD
Vancouver

Bill Mackie, MD. Dr Ivan Janos Szasz, 1936–2017. BCMJ, Vol. 59, No. 8, October, 2017, Page(s) 427 - Obituaries.


Above is the information needed to cite this article in your paper or presentation. The International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) recommends the following citation style, which is the now nearly universally accepted citation style for scientific papers:
Halpern SD, Ubel PA, Caplan AL, Marion DW, Palmer AM, Schiding JK, et al. Solid-organ transplantation in HIV-infected patients. N Engl J Med. 2002;347:284-7.

About the ICMJE and citation styles

The ICMJE is small group of editors of general medical journals who first met informally in Vancouver, British Columbia, in 1978 to establish guidelines for the format of manuscripts submitted to their journals. The group became known as the Vancouver Group. Its requirements for manuscripts, including formats for bibliographic references developed by the U.S. National Library of Medicine (NLM), were first published in 1979. The Vancouver Group expanded and evolved into the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), which meets annually. The ICMJE created the Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals to help authors and editors create and distribute accurate, clear, easily accessible reports of biomedical studies.

An alternate version of ICMJE style is to additionally list the month an issue number, but since most journals use continuous pagination, the shorter form provides sufficient information to locate the reference. The NLM now lists all authors.

BCMJ standard citation style is a slight modification of the ICMJE/NLM style, as follows:

  • Only the first three authors are listed, followed by "et al."
  • There is no period after the journal name.
  • Page numbers are not abbreviated.


For more information on the ICMJE Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals, visit www.icmje.org

BCMJ Guidelines for Authors
Dr Andrew Toth says: reply

I learned the sad news; that Ivan passed away. Ivan and I, we set in the same
class room for five years. I regret that I could not meet up with him here in
Canada.
Rest in peace Ivan

Leave a Reply