A West Virginia University doctor committed to seeing that children’s hearts pump on all four chambers has claimed the institution’s highest honor for service.

Dr. William A. Neal, a pediatric cardiologist and professor in the WVU School of Medicine, is this year’s recipient of the Ethel and Gerry Heebink Award for Distinguished State Service.

I’m honored to receive the award,Neal said.I have felt it is in the best interests of WVU and the state of West Virginia for faculty to serve the state in any way we are capable. The nature of my specialty training in children’s heart disease has afforded me the opportunity to do that over the past three decades.

Neal, who joined the Department of Pediatrics in 1974, is interim chief of pediatric cardiology. He served as department chairman from 1985-98 and as chief of pediatric cardiology from 1976-90.

He was instrumental in the development of WVU Children’s Hospital and served as its first medical director.

His work on childhood heart disease encompasses three initiatives:

• Establishing neonatal intensive-care units in Morgantown, Charleston and Huntington and an emergency transport for critical-care newborns

• Opening pediatric cardiology outreach clinics in Beckley, Huntington, Lewisburg, Martinsburg, Parkersburg and Wheeling

• Launching the Coronary Artery Risk Detection in Appalachian Communities, or CARDIAC , Project, which provides free cholesterol screening for the state’s elementary school students and the parents of children with high cholesterol levels

The neonatal ICUs and pediatric cardiology clinics, started in 1974 and 1975, produced phenomenal results from the outset. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, West Virginia had the nation’s most rapid decline in infant deaths, bringing it to within range of the national average.

The CARDIAC Project, established in 1998, expands Neal’s work in detecting and treating heart disease to families with a history of the ailment. In 2000 he received a grant from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to research an inherited disorder responsible for high cholesterol levels and the risk of an early heart attack in certain people.

Neal’s latest endeavors are as coordinator ofPhysicians on the Moveand spokesman forWV on the Move,projects to increase awareness of the relationship between obesity and heart disease. ThroughPhysicians on the Move,doctors enroll patients to participate in a walking program.WV on the Move,funded by the state Public Employees Insurance Agency, is a public awareness campaign encouraging West Virginians to walk more and eat less.

He is the co-author of three books and nearly 70 articles on heart disease in children.

A native of Huntington, Neal attended Wheeling Jesuit College, earned a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from Xavier University and obtained his medical degree from WVU .

He served as a flight surgeon in the U.S. Navy in Vietnam and as a medical resident at the University of Minnesota before returning to WVU .

One of Neal’s more memorable moments in his career is the first neonatal transport to WVU in 1975.

The patient was a premature baby from Buckhannon in cardiac arrest, and the equipment on board the transport unit was obsolete, Neal said. Against all odds, the baby survived and today is 29 years old, healthy and a functioning member of society who keeps in touch with the doctors who saved his life, he added.

The other doctor responding to that first emergency call was Martha Mullett, then chief resident-in-training, he said. Mullett is now a professor of neonatology at WVU and married to Neal, who credits her with making the neonatal program at Children’s Hospital such a success.

Neal resides in Morgantown with Mullett. He has four children, two stepchildren and 10 grandchildren.

The late David Heebink created the Heebink Award in 1982 in memory of his parents Ethel, a long-time WVU English professor, and Gerry, an Extension dairyman in the Davis College of Agriculture, Forestry and Consumer Sciences from 1935-56. The $2,500 award goes to a faculty or staff member who has provided extended service to the state.

Neal will accept his award at a special convocation at 7 p.m. Friday, April 16, in the Mountainlair Ballrooms as part of WVU ’s Weekend of Honors.