Dr. Alfonso H. Janoski
The longtime Mount Washington resident was a retired endocrinologist and health care administrator
Dr. Alfonso H. Janoski, a retired endocrinologist and health care administrator, died May 4 from a stroke at Sinai Hospital. The longtime Mount Washington resident was 83.
Alfonso Hubert Janoski, the son of Alfonso Janoski, an Otis Elevator Co. worker, and Clementine Janoski, a homemaker, was born in Wilkes-Barre, Pa., and as a young child moved with his family to the Ironbound neighborhood of Newark, N.J.
When he was a teenager, his family relocated to Bloomfield, N.J. He was a 1953 graduate of Seton Hall Preparatory School in West Orange, N.J., and then earned a bachelor’s degree in 1957 from Seton Hall College, where he was a suma cum laude graduate and a member of Phi Beta Sigma fraternity.
“First of all, we were very close. We were like brothers, and when they wanted to define who we were, they said ‘Al, he’s the smart one, and that’s the absolute truth,’ ” said Louis A. Freda of North Caldwell, N.J., who attended Seton Hall College with Dr. Janoski. “He was absolutely brilliant and the only ‘B’ he received was in ROTC.”
After Dr. Janoski earned his medical degree in 1961 from Columbia University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons, he completed an internship and medical residency at New York City’s Bellevue Hospital, which he followed with a two-year residency in endocrinology and metabolism at Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center, also in Manhattan.
“Al was very driven and was very dedicated to becoming a physician. He lived in the projects in Newark and didn’t come from a family of wealth. Hewent to Columbia on a scholarship. He was driven to excel, and did,” Mr. Freda said.
“He just always wanted to be a doctor, and there was nothing in his personal life or family history that drew him to medicine. He just wanted to be a doctor and was in the pre-med program from day one,” Mr. Freda said.
Dr. Janoski served from 1965 to 1969 in the Army Medical Corps, attaining the rank of major.
From1969 to1982, and then part-time until 1998, Dr. Janoski was an assistant professor of medicine and director of endocrine laboratories at the University of Maryland School of Medicine while maintaining a private practice in endocrinology and metabolism from 1982 to 1989.
In addition to his work at the University of Maryland, Dr. Janoski was chief of the endocrinology section, assistant to the chairman of the medical department, and director of the endocrine and metabolism clinic at Franklin Square Hospital from 1982 to 1989.
Dr. Janoski was named medical director in 1989 of Prudential Healthcare in Baltimore, where he was responsible for the formulation, revision, interpretation, administration and enforcement of clinical services, programs and policies.
In1997, he wasappointed chief medical officer for the Tennessee Health Partnership in Knoxville, where he was a member of its senior management team for the managed care organization with 180,000 members.
Dr. Janoski served as vice president and medical director of Healthcare Management at Qualchoice of North Carolina from 2000 to 2002.
From2002until retiring two years later, he was the medical officer at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Division of Medical Imaging and Radiopharmeceutical Drug Products in Rockville.
His wife of 42 years, the former Jane Dean Stewart, a registered nurse, died in 2003.
The West Rogers Avenue resident enjoyed reading and fishing, and was also an Orioles and Ravens fan. He also liked vacationing on Cape Cod and in recent years at local beaches in Maryland and Delaware.
He was a communicant for 50 years of the Roman Catholic Shrine of the Sacred Heart in Mount Washington, where a Mass of Christian burial was offered May10.
Dr. Janoski is survived by his wife of 11 years, the former Judith Sherwood; a son, Stephen Janoski of Annapolis; a daughter, Susan Janoski of Mount Rainier, Prince George’s County; a stepson, David Arieh Sherwood; and a stepdaughter, Jennifer Sherwood, both of Wynnewood, Pa.; and four grandchildren.