Dr. Tom Petty, an internationally known expert in treating respiratory diseases, died at his home Dec. 12 of pulmonary hypertension. He was 76.
Petty developed the concept of home oxygen units, said colleague Dr. James Good, professor of medicine at National Jewish Health.
Petty was “a major consultant” with industry in the 1960s in making home oxygen tanks as well as a device that measures oxygen in a patient’s blood without breaking the skin, Good said.
Petty himself was using supplementary oxygen the last several years of his life.
Petty wrote more than 30 books and an estimated 850 articles on lung problems and was a visiting professor at scores of universities.
He created the division of pulmonary and critical-care medicine at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center and was involved for 50 years with the Aspen Lung Conference. About 10 years ago, the conference was renamed for him, Good said.
Petty was named a master in the American College of Physicians and the American College of Chest Physicians.
Good called it “a mixed blessing” that Petty developed lung problems, because it gave him an insight into what patients were going through and how they could be helped.
One of his books was “From Both Ends of the Stethoscope.”
During his career, Petty was the head of the division of pulmonary medicine at the University of Colorado, director of the Webb-Waring Lung Institute and a professor at National Jewish.
He trained more than 150 doctors in pulmonary and critical-care medicine, Good said.
He had a website called “Ask Tom” where people could ask him questions.
“He had questions from everyone, dignitaries to prison inmates,” said his daughter, Caryn Winkler, of Centennial.
He kept a correspondence going for years with a lung patient in Selma, Ala., Winkler said.
In 1984, he was called in as a consultant for those with lung problems after the Bhopal, India, gas leak that killed and injured thousands, Wink ler said.
Thomas L. Petty was born in Boulder on Christmas Eve, 1932. He began work at age 12 delivering the Boulder Camera and worked at the paper for years to pay for tuition at the University of Colorado. He eventually became janitor, then worked with the lead- melting machines for linotypes and as assistant circulation manager.
In middle school, he became interested in science and liked to build radios from components. “I intended to become a ham operator,” he wrote in his recollections. But he chose medicine, he wrote, because of his brother’s early death and his mother’s poor health.
He earned his undergraduate and medical degrees at CU.
In addition to his daughter, Petty is survived by his wife, Carol Petty; two sons: Dr. John Petty of Durango and Tom Petty of Denver; eight grandchildren; and his longtime colleague and friend Louise Nett.
Virginia Culver: 303-954-1223 or vculver@denverpost.com
