07/15/2025

Bruce Bacon, M.D., professor emeritus of internal medicine, died Sunday, July 6, 2025. He was 75.

An internationally recognized clinician and researcher, Bacon led the way in developing new treatments and improving care for patients with liver disease. 

In 1996, he was a part of the team that discovered the gene for hemochromatosis, HFE, a genetic disorder in which the body absorbs and stores too much iron. He helped lead national clinical trials that developed new cures for hepatitis C. Widely regarded as a top leader in the field of hepatology, Bacon’s expertise in hemochromatosis, viral hepatitis, chronic liver disease, general hepatology, and liver transplant caused patients from around the world to seek him out to care for and cure their liver disease. 

“To friends, patients, and colleagues, he was a great human being and physician, and someone you could always count on,” said Wing-Kin Syn, M.D., Ph.D., the current James F. King Chair in Gastroenterology and co-director of the Saint Louis University Liver Center.

Bacon earned his Bachelor of Arts degree from the College of Wooster in 1971. He then earned his medical degree from Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine in 1975. 

He began his career in academia in 1978 as a teaching fellow at Case Western. From 1982 to 1988, he served as a professor at the medical school. In 1998, he moved to Louisiana State University School of Medicine to take on the role of associate professor of medicine and physiology and biophysics and chief of gastroenterology and hepatology.

Bacon joined SLU in 1990 when he was hired to be a professor of internal medicine and serve as the director of the division of gastroenterology and hepatology. At SLU, he was the James F. King Chair in Gastroenterology. 

While at SLU, Bacon joined forces with Adrian M. Di Bisceglie, M.D., a hepatologist who came to SLU from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). 

In 1994, Bacon and Di Bisceglie launched the Saint Louis University Liver Center, which became a world-renowned hub for patient care, basic and clinical research, and medical and public education in liver disease. 

“Dr. Bacon was a close personal friend, perhaps my best friend,” said Di Bisceglie, professor emeritus of internal medicine at SLU. “He is the reason I came to SLU in 1994, and he is a big part of the reason I enjoyed a successful academic career at SLU.”

With Bacon and Di Bisceglie leading the way, the Liver Center gained international attention for its work caring for and eventually curing patients with hepatitis C, including country singer Naomi Judd. Judd credited Bacon with curing her disease.  

“Dr. Bacon was revered by his patients for his prodigious knowledge combined with his ability to convey the depth of care that he had for each of his patients,” said Brent Tetri, M.D., professor of internal medicine and co-director of the Liver Center.

Bacon was renowned for his work as a researcher as well as his work with patients. Di Bisceglie said his work in the lab, particularly the discovery of hemochromatosis, was incredibly significant in the field. 

“Dr. Bacon was so many things,” Di Bisceglie said. “He was a good laboratory researcher in iron metabolism, and he was part of the team that discovered the gene for hemochromatosis, the most common inherited liver disease. He was also an outstanding clinical researcher – this stemmed from his knowing his patients so well. Fatty liver disease, now known as metabolic-associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD), was a known clinical entity, but it was Dr. Bacon who described the clinical and laboratory characteristics of this entity. MASLD is now recognized to be the most common liver disease overall, but he described it for us.”

Bacon was the former president of AASLD (2004) and former chair of the Subspecialty Board on Gastroenterology for the American Board of Internal Medicine and former chair of the Subspecialty Board on Transplant Hepatology for the ABIM. 

He was instrumental in the creation of transplant hepatology as a standalone subspecialty; as a testament to his service to hepatology, he was awarded the Distinguished Service Award by the AASLD in 2010. He was also Chair of the AASLD Foundation in 2013 and Master of the American College of Gastroenterology in 2016, and was associate editor for Gastroenterology and editor-in-chief for Current Hepatitis Reports.

“Dr. Bacon was an extraordinary mentor for me and many other junior faculty members, trainees and students,” Tetri said. “I readily attribute my success in the field of metabolic liver disease to his generous willingness to include me as a co-investigator in his prescient early studies of this important disease.”

Bacon was continuously funded by the NIH from 1982 to 2007 for work on iron-induced hepatotoxicity and hepatic fibrogenesis, and was either the principal investigator or collaborating investigator on a large number of NIH-sponsored grants. He authored or co-authored over 350 articles, reviews and chapters in highly respected journals and was the co-editor of the textbooks Liver Disease: Diagnosis and Management and Comprehensive Clinical Hepatology. 

At SLU, he led the development of the clinical trials unit and was instrumental in the founding of the Friends of the Saint Louis University Liver Center, a non-profit which continues to provide research support to SLU today.  

Bacon retired from SLU in 2020, leaving behind a lasting legacy. 

“Dr. Bacon was simply an amazing doctor – his patients loved him and, in turn, he knew them all, respected them all, and took care of them all, and this doesn't even get us to his accomplishments as a leader, administrator and mentor to so many,” Di Bisceglie said. “We miss him dearly.”

A Celebration of Life will be held from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 20, at the Hilton St. Louis Frontenac.

The family requests that donations be made to the Friends of the Saint Louis University Liver Center.