Alison Field

Alison Field, of Newton Center, Mass.; Oct. 10, 2024, from brain cancer. She was an internationally recognized epidemiologist specializing in childhood eating disorders. In 1996, while completing her post-doctoral fellowship at the Channing Laboratory at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, she launched the Growing Up Today Study (GUTS), a long-term study of eating disorders and obesity prevention and treatment. She joined Harvard Medical School’s faculty in 1997 as a professor of epidemiology and pediatrics and had appointments at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Boston Children’s Hospital. In 2015, she joined the Brown faculty, where she served as chair of the epidemiology department, director of the Center for Epidemiology and Environmental Health, and associate dean for faculty affairs at the Brown University School of Public Health. In 2024, the Obesity Society honored her many professional accomplishments by naming an award in her name: the Alison Field Early-Career Award for Excellence in Research in Pediatric Obesity and she was recognized with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Academy for Eating Disorders. Her initial cancer diagnosis in her early 30s propelled her into marathon training and she ultimately completed 10 races in five states over 15 years, including five Boston marathons, raising funds for the Dana Farber Cancer Institute.