Posted on November 26, 2002 at 3:32 p.m.

BIRMINGHAM, AL — Suzanne Oparil, M.D., UAB professor of medicine and physiology and biophysics, director of the Vascular Biology and Hypertension Program in the Division of Cardiovascular Disease, and former president of the American Heart Association, has been honored with the 2002 AHA Lifetime Achievement Award.

“This means so much to me,” she said when accepting the award, which was presented at the 56th Annual Fall Conference and Scientific Sessions of the AHA Council for High Blood Pressure Research. “It’s exciting and gratifying to see our work of 30-plus years develop into therapies that have saved many lives and prevented numerous strokes and heart attacks.”

Oparil’s clinical expertise in hypertension and basic research make her one of the nation’s leading physician-investigators. She has made significant contributions to the field, including defining the role of the anterior hypothalamic area in salt-sensitive hypertension. In 1970, while a postdoctoral fellow at Massachusetts General Hospital, she demonstrated that angiotensin II, a cause of cardiac enlargement and hypertension, is produced in the pulmonary blood vessels. This research provided the rationale for the development of ACE inhibitors.

Oparil is a member of many organizations, including the American Federation of Clinical Research (now the American Federation of Medical Research, of which she was president in 1982), the American Society of Clinical Investigation, the Association of American Physicians, and the Institute of Medicine. She has also held advisory positions with the National Institutes of Health, including membership on task forces, advisory committees, and peer review committees. She is listed in Who’s Who in America, was recognized by the Medical Herald as one of the “nation’s top 20 women in health leaders,” and has published more than 450 journal articles, books and book chapters on clinical cardiology and hypertension.