Virginia Leila Lubkin was born in New York City on October 26, 1914. She attended New York University, graduating Summa Cum Laude in 1933 and graduating AOA from Columbia Physicians and Surgeons Medical School in 1937. After her internship, she completed her ophthalmology training at multiple hospitals in New York in the early 1940s, followed by ophthalmic plastic surgery training with Dr. Wendell Hughes. 

While she was a resident at Mount Sinai Hospital, an attending told her, “You will open the field of Ophthalmology to American women.”

Dr. Lubkin was in private practice and on the staff of Columbia Physicians and Surgeons and the New York Eye and Ear Infirmary (NYEEI) from 1945 to 1990. In 1978, she founded the Aborn Center for Eye Research at the NYEEI, which was renamed the Aborn-Lubkin Eye Research Lab in 2004 in her honor.

Dr. Lubkin was a clinician, teacher, and researcher with numerous eclectic interests. In 1959, she published a paper with Dr Hughes introducing a fornix conformer. Her interest in history and archeology led to an article summarizing the history of Ophthalmic Plastic Surgery from 3000 BC to 1000 AD. Her intense curiosity led her to numerous research projects in Ophthalmology and Ophthalmic Plastic Surgery, which was the reason she established the Aborn Center for Eye Research.

During my Oculoplastics Fellowship in 1975-76 and my subsequent years as an attending at NYEEI, Dr. Lubkin was always ready to teach and shared what she had learned and experienced in her many years of practice with the residents and fellows. At the time, she was involved in research regarding dry eyes and frequently discussed her work.

Dr. Lubkin was active nationally and internationally. She was active in the American Academy of Ophthalmology, teaching a course in “Complications of Blepharoplasty” during the 1980’s. Internationally, she lectured in many countries. Her energy and interests went well beyond Ophthalmology, encompassing history and archeology as noted above. She was also on the Board of Directors of The Jewish Guild for the Blind in NYC.

Virginia was a very upbeat person, getting involved in everything around her and ahead of her time. For her generation, it was unusual that she kept her maiden name, never changing it to her married name. And she effectively balanced a challenging professional career with a full family life. I remember her at many spring meetings, passing me on hikes, frequently with her husband, affectionately referred to as “Marty.”

When Virginia Lubkin died on May 5, 2004, her family consisted of her husband, four children, 12 grandchildren, and 10 great-grandchildren. She certainly led a prolific, energetic life, breaking barriers and being a role model for women in medicine. She played an important and integral role in the founding of our subspecialty.

Christy became passionate about oculoplastics and began looking for a fellowship. She learned which ones would not take a woman (e.g. Dick Tenzel); and along the way, she met with Joel Glaser who offered her a neuroophthalmology fellowship at Bascom Palmer which she took 1983-84, immediately following residency.  The following year, she ended up at UCSF as one of the 1^st women (Bernice Brown was the first) with Crowell Beard, Earl Rathbun, and John Sullivan in what they called the “freeway fellowship” for 12 months in 1984-85.    

After her graduation from the oculoplastics fellowship, Christy joined the faculty at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.  She felt like she had a lot to prove, as very few women had gone before her.  Perhaps because the only previous woman faculty quit after one year, her chairman, Paul Lichter, offered an extension to achieve tenure – it’s unclear if he thought she was not ready, or it was male prejudice, but she didn’t need the extension.  She found it harder to get asked to be on committees, to be invited to collaborative meetings, or to be invited to speak.

Christy got involved in Women in Ophthalmology early in her career.  She started in the 1980s and got great advice from other women about tactics to enhance her trajectory.  They told her that if you wanted to be on an AAO committee, she should write to several of the chairs.  She tried it and remembers that “One never answered, and another replied, ‘why would I want you?’”  Ultimately, the third took her.  Later, she became vice chair of that committee.  Now, she enjoys mentoring and would be happy to chat about ideas and guidance with interested young oculofacial plastic surgeons.  Among her pearls of wisdom: Be open to opportunities that come along.  Some are unplanned but many can be pursued.

Christy’s work as an educator and researcher has been prodigious.  In 2010, she was the first woman to be invited to give the prestigious Wendell Hughes lecture (a combined AAO-ASOPRS honor).  She chose the topic: “From Bench to Bedside: Genetics of Congenital Anopthalmia,” reflecting her work with a gene associated with retinol binding protein transporter that led to a novel treatment for children with MAC (microphthalmos, anophthalmos, coloboma) spectrum of congenital disease.  Her research interests have ranged from periocular malignancies to thyroid eye disease, but most recently, she has become very active in organizing and writing about global ophthalmology.

About 15 years ago, Christy began to be very active in the international community, initially with the International Council of Ophthalmology and later the World Association of Eye Hospitals (she is the Chair-elect at present) and the ASOPRS Global Opportunities Committee.  Since 2015, she has been the co-director of the Kellogg Eye Center for International Ophthalmology and has worked assiduously in Ethiopia at St Paul’s Millennium Medical College in Addis Ababa. Her goal has been to help them establish an academic department and research program.  She describes this as “Very exciting!  It has been wonderful to share the fun and awe.  To use the old adage, we’ve tried to “teach them to fish instead of giving them fish.”  The western allopathic ideas around medical ethics, fair compensation, and peer-reviewed scientific publications were mostly new to them. She recalls that there were just over 70 ophthalmologists in the entire country when she started, and now they have opened more residencies, and the total is around 140 ophthalmologists.  In addition, fewer are leaving the country as the community has become stronger.  Dr. Nelson was given the Humanitarian Award by Women in Ophthalmology in 2022 in recognition of this work.  Half of the Michigan ophthalmology residents are involved in this outreach program so Christy’s work is likely to continue when she retires. (In fact, one of them did a survey showing that residents are more likely to stay involved in global humanitarian work if they participate in residency.)  She has recently been invited to try to get something similar going in Nepal.

Dr. Christine Nelson’s evolution from a ground-breaking female resident at Duke to a ground-breaking Hughes' lecturer to a ground-breaking global educator has been remarkable.  Her academic work, together with her teaching, mentoring, and leadership, has inspired and propelled many young women (and men – including me) to pursue similar interests over the past 30 years.