Pediatrician shifted career to hospital administration

1/19/2009

Dr. Edward Pike, a longtime Toledo pediatrician and adolescent-medicine specialist who became an administrator at St. Vincent Mercy Medical Center, died in his Sylvania Township home Saturday. He was 73.

The cause of death was listed as complications of diabetes, said his son, Edward Pike.

Dr. Pike, who was in private practice in West Toledo for many years and was a former president of the Toledo Pediatric Society, was instrumental in the pediatric program at St. Vincent, said Dr. Ward Taylor, a longtime friend.

"He was an extremely bright person and pediatrician, and I think that he greatly helped the pediatric program at St. Vincent to progress," Dr. Taylor said.

Dr. Pike was also an expert in childhood eating disorders, particularly anorexia and bulimia, Dr. Ward said.

A Cleveland native, Dr. Pike received his medical degree from the University of Pittsburgh.

"Obviously he loved children, and as the children he treated in his practice grew up to adolescent age, he progressed with them in his career," Mr. Pike said. "He practiced medicine in the Toledo area for 25 years, so we are talking about thousands of patients."

In 1990, Dr. Pike completed master of business administration studies at the University of Toledo and moved into the field of administration at St. Vincent and later at Providence Hospital in Southfield, Mich.

Dr. Pike was a former board chairman at St. Anthony Villa, a West Toledo facility for troubled youths. In the late 1990s, the Sylvania Township trustees appointed him the township representative to the Toledo Area Regional Transit Authority board of directors.

Surviving are his wife of 50 years, Patricia Pike; sons, Edward and Eric Pike; sister, Barbara Rotterman; brothers, Robert and John Pike; and two grandchildren.

The body will be in the Walker Funeral Home in Sylvania Township after 4 p.m. tomorrow. Services will be at 10 a.m. Wednesday in Christ the King Church.

The family suggests tributes be in the form of contributions to the church.