Professor Alberto Zanchetti passed away on March 24, 2018 at the age of almost 92 years. He had been in excellent physical health and with undiminished mental brilliance until a month before. Unfortunately, soon after returning from a lecture tour in Latin America he accidentally fell in his house and suffered a brain trauma that, after few weeks, led to his death.
Alberto Zanchetti was born on July 27, 1926 in Parma. He graduated in Medicine at the Parma Medical School in 1950 and immediately moved to Pisa to work under the guidance of Professor Giuseppe Moruzzi, a world‐famous neurophysiologist who had made the Physiology Institute of Pisa University perhaps the most famous international center for neurophysiological research in the World. Despite his young age, Alberto Zanchetti soon became one of the leading scientists in this highly qualified group, to which he contributed a large number of important studies on the anatomical connections and functional relationships of cortical and subcortical centers, using the most sophisticated electrophysiological approaches available in those times. A gem of this period was his monography on the Brain Stem Reticular Formation which won him the Marzotto Price, which at that time was the most prestigious Italian Award for Medicine.
After 6 years (which included a period in Portland, U.S.) Alberto Zanchetti left Pisa and moved to Siena to join the clinical and research group of Professor Cesare Bartorelli, then Chief of the Institute of Internal Medicine at the University. There he assembled a group of young and creative scientists (all going on to successful academic and research careers in Italy or abroad) with whom he began to work on the neural basis of blood pressure control using sleep and emotional behaviors of the cat as the main experimental models. The results substantially expanded previous knowledge and gave Alberto Zanchetti well‐deserved international fame in the cardiovascular world. His reputation was further enhanced in the hypertension field by his authorship of a pioneer paper on the use of thiazide diuretics for the treatment of hypertension, an approach that drastically improved the then ominous prognosis of this condition.
His fame grew further after 1966 when Alberto Zanchetti and most of his group moved to the University of Milan where Professor Bartorelli had been called to the chair of Internal Medicine. Their subsequent research continued to discover important aspects of cardiovascular regulation, such as the reno‐renal reflexes, the neural control of renin release, the pressor responses to sympathetic afferent stimulation and the interaction between baro and chemo reflexes in blood pressure control. There was, however, also a substantial expansion to human research, which provided novel observations on central, reflex and humoral cardiovascular control in normotensive and hypertensive human subjects. The team also worked on understanding the clinical aspects and pathophysiological background of sudden death.
There was also intense clinical research in hypertension, which made Alberto Zanchetti’s group a major contributor to the amazing progress of antihypertensive treatment that took place from the late sixties to the late eighties of the last century. In those years he also launched research on intra‐arterial and later non‐invasive automated ambulatory blood pressure monitoring, performing pioneer studies on cardiovascular control mechanisms in daily life and preparing the field for the 24 hour ambulatory blood pressure monitoring techniques that are currently in wide medical use. All of these activities he promoted and supervised as Professor of Internal Medicine and Director of the Center of Clinical Physiology and Hypertension, a position to which he was called by the University of Milan in 1975. He continued to honor that appointment with his research, teaching and clinical responsibilities until his retirement in 2001. Retirement, however, by no means ended or slowed down his research, which continued until the end of his life in his role as Director for Research at the Istituto Auxologico Italiano.
Alberto Zanchetti’s scientific activity has few, if any, comparisons. It spanned the spectrum from basic to physiological, pathophysiological and clinical research. His clinical contributions not only involved the design, conduct and interpretation of many important clinical trials, but also in recent years the publication of influential trial meta‐analyses that are highly quoted and acknowledged by the expert hypertension community.
Nevertheless, limiting Alberto’s achievements to research would not do justice to his multiform personality. Alberto Zanchetti was instrumental in the creation and growth of the International Society of Hypertension (ISH) and the European Society of Hypertension (ESH), for each of which he has served as President. He initiated and organized many ISH and ESH meetings at the University Campus of Milan, all attracting large attendances and achieving success. He was the driving force behind the early WHO/ISH Hypertension Guidelines, the first to be published in hypertension history. As well, he was a major force behind the ESH/European Society of Cardiology (ESC) guidelines which he first inspired in 2003; and he continued to substantially contribute to all of these publications, including the most recent ESC/ESH guidelines which will appear in the current year.
Finally, he has served as the Editor‐in‐Chief of the Journal of Hypertension from 1995 to his death. To this task he offered a prodigiously wide medical culture and an extraordinary dedication that impelled him to scrutinize all the papers submitted to the Journal, often personally editing those he thought were scientifically interesting but somewhat deficient in style. This emphasizes another aspect of Alberto Zanchetti’s personality. He was a great mentor for the many younger investigators that he encountered. This involved not only the students who had the privilege of working with him, but also the foreign investigators who over the years joined his Institute for research experience and all young investigators from Italy who turned to him for guidance. From this perspective, his “School” was much larger than the formal ones in Siena and Milan.
For his achievements Alberto Zanchetti has received innumerable prestigious Awards, including the dedication in his name of the ESH Award for Lifetime Achievements in Hypertension. This was celebrated in a meeting in his honor held in Barcelona a few months before his death. Yet, reflecting the title of that meeting (“Alberto Zanchetti: the Man, the Scientist, the Friend”), at the personal level he remained a man who expressed genuine interest in other people and his amazing historical, artistic and musical culture (favored by a prodigious memory), which made him inspiring company. He enjoyed good food and wine, had a good sense of humor and loved to talk about sport, football in particular. His personality inevitably established strong demands on his staff, but at the same time he had great human understanding and was always ready to discuss and resolve individual problems.
For those who have known him, Alberto Zanchetti will remain in memory as a great scientist and a great man. His students will always remember him with gratitude for what he has done for their professional careers, above all by his example of high professionalism. They all benefitted from his rigorous approach to clinical research, which in turn he insisted should always be derived from understanding the underlying mechanisms derived from basic research.
Our thoughts go to his daughter Silvia and his sons Mario and Giorgio as well as to his beloved grandchildren. He will be deeply missed.
Remembering Alberto Zanchetti Remarks on behalf of the Journal of Clinical Hypertension and the World Hypertension League
The In Memoriam for Alberto Zanchetti is a deeply moving tribute by a group of his former students, and is made all the more remarkable by the fact that these writers are themselves now internationally acclaimed authorities and leaders in the field of hypertension. Indeed, the major reputations of these scholars gives even more emphasis to the reach and importance of Alberto Zanchetti’s legacy.
Of course, Professor Zanchetti’s influence extended far beyond the borders of Italy. He was truly an international figure, not only at large scientific congresses, but also as a teacher, mentor and inspiration to countless researchers and clinicians in all parts of the world.
One of us (MW) had the opportunity of working with Professor Zanchetti on several occasions: on steering committees of clinical trials, on advisory boards and society committees, and as a co‐author with Professor Zanchetti on peer‐reviewed publications. I was always deeply impressed by Alberto’s depth of knowledge, but equally so by his ability and drive to address the details of a project: describing exactly how patients were recruited, defining the correct statistical tests, optimizing the presentation of data, and – of particular relevance in describing Alberto – leading the painstaking search for the precisely correct words to describe results and report conclusions.
Alberto was also the consummate journal editor. Together with his distinguished colleague, Professor Giuseppe Mancia and other members of his team, he brought the Journal of Hypertension to great heights, again manifesting his exceptional grasp of the basic and clinical sciences of hypertension. As much as any of his reviewers, he would provide thoughtful and creative critiques that guided authors in maximizing the strength of their work.
Professor Zanchetti gave freely of his time to supporting important international organizations in the field of hypertension. And beyond his leadership roles in ESH and ISH, we are most mindful of the contributions and support that he so graciously extended to the World Hypertension League. The WHL is closely involved with hypertension societies in over 80 countries, many of which are striving to create workable hypertension programs for their communities despite severely limited resources. Dr. Zanchetti in his relationships with the WHL was fully aware of these issues and strongly supportive of the WHL and the clinicians involved in fighting these battles.
Alberto Zanchetti was not just about work. As described in the tribute by his colleagues, he was exceptionally knowledgeable about a broad range of cultural, social and political matters. He was an absolutely delightful and engaging companion in any social setting. Alberto was greatly devoted to his family. He can be described as a man who found joy and satisfaction in every moment of his long life.
We mourn the loss of an extraordinary scientist and friend.