Ralph W. Hamilton, emeritus professor of surgery in Penn’s Perelman School of Medicine, died April 23 after a long illness. He was 85.

Dr. Hamilton was born in Raleigh, North Carolina. He earned his BS in chemical engineering from Lehigh University in 1955 and graduated with honors from Penn’s School of Medicine in 1959. After an internship at Pennsylvania Hospital, he returned to the University of Pennsylvania, where he remained until his retirement in 1996. He was promoted to associate professor of surgery in 1972 and full professor two years later. He earned emeritus status at the time of his retirement.

In 1967 he also began a practice of plastic and reconstructive surgery at HUP, where he became associate chief of plastic surgery in 1980. He also joined Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia as an attending plastic surgeon and served as chief of plastic and maxillofacial surgery at Presbyterian Medical Center.

His clinical practice included the broad field of plastic surgery with special interest in the treatment of tumors of the head and neck, melanoma, and diseases of the thyroid and parathyroid glands. Dr. Hamilton authored more than 40 scientific articles and book chapters.

He is survived by his wife, Gail; sister, Frances H. Elton; daughters, Amy Schultheis, Susan McGovern and Sarah Hamilton; and grandchildren, Emily and Grant Schultheis; Alexandra, Samantha, and Grace McGovern; Benjamin and Annabel Halberg and Giovanna Gail Contarino Hamilton.