About the Distinguished Award for Humanitarian Service
The Distinguished Award for Humanitarian Service recognizes an Academy member who is widely known for a consistent, stable character distinguished by honesty, zeal for truth, integrity, love and devotion to humanity and a self-giving spirit.
The awardee is an outstanding example and model to emulate for a life dedicated to a nobler, more righteous, and more productive way for the human to live as an individual on this earth. The awardee is well known for professional excellence and has demonstrated professional dedication by the giving of professional skills freely, and without desire for personal gain or aggrandizement, to those in this world who cannot otherwise, physically and financially, receive them.
The 2025 nomination cycle is now closed. Award recipients will be announced in June 2025.
2024 Distinguished Award for Humanitarian Service Recipient
This year’s AAO-HNSF Distinguished Award for Humanitarian Service goes to Daniel D. Megler, MD. He is president of Lakeshore Ear, Nose & Throat Center and a clinical assistant professor at Wayne State University School of Medicine and the Michigan State University College of Osteopathic Surgical Specialties. After completing his initial medical training at the University of Belgrade in Serbia, Dr. Megler relocated to the United States and continued his medical training at Wayne State University School of Medicine.
Dr. Megler has served as board chair for The Holley Institute, a nonprofit organization founded in 1993 to provide life-enhancing programs for the deaf and those affected by hearing and vision loss. The institute provides screening for all newborns at Ascension St. John Hospital in Detroit for hearing loss, as well as community education and outreach programs. Dr. Megler’s fundraising efforts have raised hundreds of thousands of dollars in support of this organization.
Dr. Megler’s humanitarian efforts have been particularly notable in support of deaf and hard of hearing patients in his home country of Serbia. Serbia did not have newborn infant screening programs, so Dr. Megler organized meetings with the Serbian vice secretary of health, hospital presidents, the princess of Serbia, and the U.S. ambassador to Serbia to institute a new, mandatory infant screening law. He also directed American speech-language pathologists to help implement this program.
Furthermore, Dr. Megler has personally financed trips for Serbian children, families, teachers, and faculty to come to The Holley Institute’s Carls Family Village in Brooklyn, Michigan, a residential facility that provides education, training, and mentoring for deaf, deaf-blind, and hard-of-hearing children and their families. He has supplied more than 200 surgical intensive care unit beds, wheelchairs, and uniforms to various hospitals in Serbia; helped raise over $200,000 for new surgical tables and audiology equipment; and trained Serbian medical staff and otolaryngologists.
Previous Recipients:
- 2023: Robert J. Sinard, MD
- 2022: Edward E. Dodson, MD
- 2021: Peter J. Koltai, MD
- 2020: Merry E. Sebelik, MD
- 2019: Glenn C. Isaacson, MD
- 2018: Dr. Susan R. Cordes, MD
- 2017: Bruce H. Campbell, MD, FACS
- 2016: Wayne M. Koch, MD
- 2015: H. Dennis Snyder, MD, FACS
- 2014: John Thomas Roland, Jr., MD, FACS
- 2013: James E. Saunders, MD
- 2012: John M. Hodges, MD, FACS
- 2011: Anna H. Messner, MD
- 2010: Peter S. Roland, MD
- 2009: Richard Wagner, MD
- 2008: James D. Smith, MD
- 2007: Drew M. Horlbeck, MD
- 2006: Craig P. Hedges, MD
- 2005: Brent A. Senior, MD
- 2004: James L. Netterville, MD
- 2003: Byron James Bailey Jr., MD
- 2002: David S. Parsons, MD
- 2001: Michael J. McGee, MD
- 2000: Sylvan E. Stool, MD
- 1999: Juan J. Garro, MD
- 1998: Daniel M. Martinez, MD
- 1997: No award
- 1996: Salyaveth Lekagul, MD and Soontorn Antarasena, MD
- 1995: Hans von Leden, MD
- 1994: Jack V. D. Hough, MD
- 1993: Samuel O. Massey Jr., MD
- 1992: M. Coyle Shea Jr., MD
- 1991: M. C. Culbertson Jr. MD
- 1990: Col. Joan Zajtchuk, MD
