Realini Honored as 2017 Distinguished Alumna
At the 2017 Alumni Weekend dinner, Janet Realini, M.D., M.P.H., was recognized as the 2017 Distinguished Alumna. She is a nationally recognized physician devoted to reducing teen and unplanned pregnancies.
Dr. Realini served as a resident in the Department of Family and Community Medicine from 1975 to 1978. After teaching for 18 years on the faculty at UT Health San Antonio, she served as medical director of the family planning program at the San Antonio Metropolitan Health District, where she founded Project WORTH, the City of San Antonio’s youth development and teen pregnancy prevention program.
She is the founder and associate vice president of Healthy Futures of Texas, a nonprofit organization dedicated to reducing teen and unplanned pregnancies. She is the author of Big Decisions, an abstinence-plus teen sex education program. Big Decisions has been implemented in more than 20 Texas school districts, numerous community agencies, and has been adapted in resource-limited settings around the world.
Ruth Berggren, M.D., director of the Center for Medical Humanities & Ethics, presented the award to Dr. Realini at the dinner. “She has been a highly valued and recognized faculty member in our Long School of Medicine, leader in our community’s public health sector, and contributor in the leadership in both family practice education and public health on a national scene.
“Her activities with our school continue to the present through her presentation as an adjunct clinical professor in the Department of Family and Community Medicine and through her considerable educational contributions to Community Service Learning and Global Health at the Center for Medical Humanities and Ethics,” Dr. Berggren said.
Dr. Realini has accumulated a remarkable series of achievements through her vision, dedicated perseverance, educational expertise, and respect for the dignity of every person she meets, Dr. Berggren added.
