Dr. Todd S. Ing was a nephrologist and professor of medicine whose expertise was in the field of dialysis, which extends the lives of patients whose kidneys do not function.
Ing treated patients at the Edward Hines Jr. VA Hospital for more than 25 years, and he also co-authored five editions of the “Handbook of Dialysis,” which is used by nephrologists worldwide.
“He was a giant in clinical nephrology, and he was one of the few people who put dialysis research on the map,” said Dr. David Leehey, a nephrologist and a longtime professor of medicine at Loyola University Chicago’s Stritch School of Medicine whom Ing mentored.
Ing, 89, died of complications from bladder cancer on Oct. 24 at NorthShore Evanston Hospital, said his son, Dr. Brian Ing. He had been a Wilmette resident for 50 years.
Born Siu-Toa Ng and raised in Hong Kong, Ing attended college and medical school at the University of Hong Kong. He underwent further medical training in Montreal, where he had a residency in internal medicine, and in Halifax, Nova Scotia, where he undertook a fellowship in hypertension. He also had one year of training at the Royal Postgraduate Medical School of London under noted nephrologist Dr. Oliver Wrong.
In the mid-1960s, Ing moved to Chicago for a fellowship in nephrology at what was then Rush Presbyterian-St. Luke’s Medical Center. After completing that fellowship in 1967, Ing was an assistant professor at Wayne State University in Michigan for two years.
In 1969, he became an assistant professor at the University of Illinois’ Chicago Medical Center, and two years later, he returned to Rush as an assistant professor.
In 1976, Ing took a position at the Hines VA Hospital, where he was the chief of the renal and hypertension section while at the same time working as a professor of medicine at the nearby and affiliated Loyola University’s Stritch School of Medicine. In addition to seeing patients and teaching medical students, Ing conducted research and published academic papers.
Ing’s son said that his father came up with the idea for the “Handbook of Dialysis” as a pocket guide that physicians could consult.
“There was some other dialysis book at the time, and he put forward this idea to do this pocketbook on dialysis, and people said, ‘There’s already this dialysis book, why would you do that?’ After Ing’s book came out, no one talked about the other one,” Brian Ing said.
Ing went on to co-edit four successive editions of the book, with its sixth edition due to be published shortly.
“They call it a ‘triple threat’ to be good in academics, good in research and good in patient care, and Dr. Ing was good at all three,” said Dr. John Daugirdas, a nephrologist and one of Ing’s two co-authors of “Handbook of Dialysis.” “He cared about his patients at the VA, and he was always very hands-on with patients treated by our nephrology service, by attending physicians, to get the highest level of care.”
Ing also took a great interest in dialysis, even in the early years in his career when scientific interest in dialysis therapies was not a priority among nephrologists. Ing came up with numerous innovations, Daugirdas said, and he also had the idea to form an international society to focus exclusively on the study of hemodialysis.
“He was always very, very creative,” Daugirdas said. “What he cared about was the science of medicine and dialysis.”
Leehey said Ing took great interest in those he mentored.
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“He was a doer,” Leehey said. “He really pushed us to do our best. Todd Ing liked to write a lot of (academic) papers and books, and I now have written a lot of papers and books, and that would not have happened if not for Dr. Ing.”
Ing retired from seeing patients at the Hines VA in 2001, but he never retired from research and writing about nephrology, his son said.
“His goal was to have more scientific publications after retirement than before retirement,” Brian Ing said.
In addition to his son, Ing is survived by his wife of 58 years, Mabel; another son, Ian, four grandchildren; two brothers, Quing Ng and Beau Ng; and a sister, Irene Kwan.
Services were held.
Bob Goldsborough is a freelance reporter.
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