Stanley Lorber, team physician for the 76ers

Stanley H. Lorber, 97, formerly of Philadelphia, longtime team physician for the 76ers and a noted gastroenterologist at Temple University School of Medicine, died Monday, Nov. 24, of heart failure at Good Samaritan Medical Center in West Palm Beach, Fla.

Born in New York City, he moved to Philadelphia with his family as a child.

As an undergraduate at the University of Pennsylvania, Dr. Lorber was a scholar-athlete, excelling in football and lacrosse. He received his medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and served as an Army flight surgeon during World War II.

He remained devoted to Penn throughout his life, and later became a major fund-raiser. For his efforts, the school awarded him the Penn Alumni Service Award for "generous, loyal, and energetic commitment to the university."

Dr. Lorber was a faculty member at Temple's medical school for 43 years, serving as a professor of medicine. For a quarter-century, he was chief of the gastroenterology section. Under his leadership, the section began to attract notice for research.

He performed research that added to scientists' understanding of gastrointestinal physiology, and wrote more than 140 scientific articles and numerous textbook chapters.

He addressed the 1970 Nobel Symposium in Stockholm. He also consulted for the U.S. Navy, the Veterans Administration, and the Food and Drug Administration.

After his retirement in 1992, Temple created the Stanley H. Lorber Chair in Medicine. A Temple magazine profiled him in 2007 as "a man who kept a busy schedule, loved a good story, and had a wry wit."

A highly respected clinician, he was revered by his patients, whom he treated with respect and kindness.

In the late 1950s, he convinced the owner of the Philadelphia Warriors that a basketball team should have a team physician.

Dr. Lorber became the first team doctor in the NBA, a position he held with the Warriors and 76ers for 25 years, and one that brought him NBA championship rings in 1967 and 1983, his family said.

A number of the team's players, including Wilt Chamberlain, Billy Cunningham, and Julius Erving, became lifelong friends and were frequent guests in his home.

With his wife, Selma, Dr. Lorber raised three children. After she died in 1983, he married Dorothea A. Lorber.

The couple retired to Florida, where they enjoyed an active social life and he played golf into his mid-90s.

He served on many boards and worked on behalf of educational institutions and civic organizations. "I have had a very fortunate life," he liked to say. "Where I can contribute, I try to do so."

Surviving, besides his wife, are a daughter, Betty; a son, Jeff; a stepdaughter, Kathleen; nine grandchildren; and seven great-grandchildren. Another daughter, Susan, died earlier.

Services were private.

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