Marcos Moscovich
Marcos Moscovich, MD, passed away at home, surrounded by his loved ones, on June 25, 2015, after a struggle with pancreatic cancer. He was 87 years old. He was born in Rosario (Santa Fe), Argentina, in April 1928, one of the eleven children of José Moscovich and Teresa Arenson. He studied medicine at the Universidad Nacional del Litoral in Rosario, where he graduated in 1953. When he was 21 years old, he met his future wife, Balbina Heitner, at a dance (she was 15). Upon graduation, he was drafted as a reservist and served two years as a military doctor in the garrison at Curuzú Cuatiá, Corrientes, under commanders who would later stage the coup that ousted president Juan Perón in 1955. Marcos and Balbina married in 1957. They had two children, Teresa and José Luis. They lived in Rosario and in a number of rural towns in the Argentine Pampas over the next 30 years, where he worked as a general practitioner and even delivered babies, often assisted by his wife; but the longest stays where in Cruz Alta and Chivilcoy, where he had a successful cardiology practice, following completion of a fellowship in Rosario. Between 1973 and 1986, the family split its time between Rosario and Buenos Aires and Marcos worked as a cardiologist at the hospital in Haedo (Buenos Aires). In the early 1980's, as he self-diagnosed a worsening coronary disease condition, he took up walking as a form of exercise and became a serious urban trekker in every city he lived in, walking an average of 6 miles a day, rain or shine. In 1988, Marcos and Balbina moved to the US, living in Chicago for six years. At age 58, Marcos passed the ECFMG exam, allowing him to practice as a physician in the US. In 1992, two months after he underwent emergency quadruple bypass surgery in Chicago, he accepted a residency at a Kansas City hospital, where he did grueling all-night shifts, working along young medical graduates to earn the necessary credits for an MD's license. A year later he obtained his medical license in California and practiced in Tracy as a clinical psychiatrist for almost ten years, living first in Pleasanton and then in Tracy, where he took up rose gardening. He and Balbina became US citizens in 1998. He retired in 2002 and he and Balbina moved to San Francisco, setting up a home in the Excelsior. An avid reader, in the early 60's he took a subscription to Time and Life magazines and taught himself English by reading those publications with the help of a dictionary. He eventually was able to read all of Shakespeare's works in English and many of the classics, in addition to Spanish, French, Russian Italian and Latin American literature. He was keenly interested in politics and for many years, until macular degeneration left him unable to read, he started his day with an online survey of newspapers from around the world. He is survived by his wife of 58 years, Balbina; two children: daughter Teresa (Jacob) Oommen, of Scottsdale, Arizona, and son José Luis (Robert Schwartz), of San Francisco; and three grandchildren: Ethan and Julianna Oommen and Anna Sophia Schwartz-Cohen. A memorial service will be held at Sinai Memorial Chapel, Divisadero and Geary, in San Francisco, on Sunday, July 26, at 11 a.m. His ashes will be buried in Rosario. Donations in his memory, in lieu of flowers, may be sent to West Bay Opera, 221 Lambert Ave., Palo Alto, CA 94306; online at www.wbopera.org <http://www.wbopera.org>, or by calling 650-424-9999.