Lolita M. McDavid is Medical Director of Child Advocacy and Protection at Rainbow Babies and Children’s Hospital, the pediatric hospital of University Hospitals of Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine. She is responsible for community outreach and programming as well as coordinating the medical services for the Child Protection Unit, serving at-risk children and families in Northeast Ohio. The “No Hitting Zone” was created at Rainbow in 2005 and has been replicated in over 100 health and children’s services sites. She is a Professor of Pediatrics at CWRU School of Medicine. McDavid chaired the first panel for the Ohio Commission on Minority Health (OCMH), “Achieving Equity and Eliminating Infant Mortality Health Disparities in Racial and Ethnic Population: From Data to Action.”

From 1991 to 1995, she directed the Greater Cleveland Project of the Children’s Defense Fund (CDF). The project, which focused on the improvement and extension of health, anti-poverty, preschool and child support programs for local youngsters, was the first county-based advocacy effort in the country for the national Children’s Defense Fund.

Prior to her work with CDF, McDavid was Head of General Pediatrics at MetroHealth Medical Center (MHMC), the largest public hospital in Ohio. At MHMC she directed the pediatric clinics, the newborn nursery, and coordinated the pediatric emergency room.

Education has been a constant in McDavid’s life. Born to educators, she grew up in Wilberforce, Ohio, and earned an undergraduate degree at Western College for Women in Oxford, Ohio. She received a master’s degree in public administration and urban development from the State University of New York and a medical degree from Case Western Reserve University.

After completing a pediatric residency at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation, McDavid was a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholar and a Bush Fellow in child development and social policy, both at Yale University.

An activist on both the community and national level, McDavid is a former trustee of Miami University of Ohio, the Ohio Children’s Trust Fund, and the Cleveland Institute of Music. She has served on three advisory boards of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, various committees of the American Academy of Pediatrics including the Committee on Federal Government Affairs, and chaired the Public Policy and Advocacy Committee of the Academic Pediatric Association. Among her numerous awards, she has been honored by the Junior League of Cleveland, the YWCA of Cleveland, Providence House, Cleveland Magazine, Northern Ohio Live, and Crain’s Cleveland Business. McDavid has received the Leonard Tow Humanism in Medicine Award from the Arnold P. Gold Foundation. She is a frequent commentator on local and national media sites.

McDavid’s advocacy work has extended internationally. She chaired the Links Incorporated Black Women and Breast Health Initiative and with the Nassau, Bahamas chapter of the Links and Susan G. Komen for the Cure worked on raising knowledge and detection about the genetic connection between breast cancer in Ghana and the Bahamas. As a teacher, she has supervised medical residents from University Hospitals at St. Damien Children’s Hospital in Haiti after the devastating earthquake that struck Haiti. As a member of Women for World Health she has gone with an all-women team to do cleft lip and palate repair for the indigenous people of Ecuador, who are disproportionately affected.

“Lolly”, as she is known, is married and the mother of two. Her daughter is a graduate of Miami University of Ohio and her son is a graduate of the United States Naval Academy. She is proud to be in the third generation of college educated women in her family.