Steven C. Halbert, 59, physician who stressed prevention

Dr. Steven C. Halbert, 59, a physician who integrated conventional medicine with innovative complementary therapies, died of brain cancer Friday, Oct. 22, at home in Wyncote.

After his diagnosis a year ago with stage 4 glioblastoma, Dr. Halbert underwent surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation as well as Eastern medicine treatment, including acupuncture, chi gong, and Reiki.

"When it became clear that he would not survive his illness," his wife, Doris Freleger, wrote in a tribute, "he used his keen knowledge of the human body coupled with his spiritual practice to accept the limits of the body and to embrace the continuation of his spirit."

When a friend said to him before he died, "You have helped so many people," he answered, "And I hope to continue," his wife said.

She has written a book of poems focused on Dr. Halbert's illness and his process of acceptance and transcendence.

Dr. Halbert, who was board certified in emergency and internal medicine, headed the Preventive Medicine Group in Wyncote since 1986. The medical practice emphasized health maintenance and disease prevention. His office looked out onto an arboretum and a creek providing a natural environment for patients, his wife said.

Dr. Halbert was a clinical assistant professor at Jefferson Medical College and was affiliated with the Jefferson Myrna Brind Center of Integrative Medicine.

He was a founding physician at the center in 1998 and taught one of the first integrative courses offered to Jefferson medical students. A colleague, Dr. Steven Rosenzweig said, "Dr. Halbert was instrumental in shaping that new academic medical practice. He developed evidence-based treatment protocols that established a highest standard of care."

In 2006, Dr. Halbert was awarded a NIH-funded fellowship in biostatistics and epidemiology at the University of Pennsylvania. Recently, two articles on the results of his research on alternative therapy for treating high cholesterol were published in the American Journal of Cardiology and the Annals of Internal Medicine.

For the last seven years, Dr. Halbert and his wife, a psychologist, were involved in a healing study using Buddhist and Kabbalistic concepts.

Dr. Halbert graduated from Cheltenham High School and earned a bachelor's degree from Albright College. He studied medicine at the University of Brussels, where classes were in French, and earned a medical degree from Temple University in 1979. He completed an internship and a residency in internal medicine at Abington Memorial Hospital.

He wanted to be a doctor from the time he was 9, his wife said. The couple met at his cousin's birthday party and married in 1975.

For more than 30 years, they participated in improvisational dance sessions sponsored by Group Motion Workshop. He was passionate about dance and music, and played the classical guitar, she said. He was also a gymnast, runner, biker, and hiker and loved gardening.

In addition to his wife, Dr. Halbert is survived by his son, Ari; his mother, Lucille Mann; and a sister, Terry Halbert.

A funeral was Sunday, Oct. 24, at Goldsteins' Rosenberg's Raphael-Sacks Memorial Chapel in Philadelphia. Burial was in Shalom Memorial Park, Huntingdon Valley.

Donations may be made to the National Brain Tumor Society, 124 Watertown Rd., Watertown, Md. 02472.