Dr. Shira Baram, a senior and highly regarded fertility and IVF specialist at Haemek Medical Center in Afula, died suddenly after a medical event at home. She was 47. Baram was rushed in critical condition on Monday to the same hospital where she had worked for many years, but resuscitation efforts failed and her death was declared on Wednesday.
Haemek Medical Center said she had devoted her professional and human approach to caring for women and accompanying families at some of the most significant moments of their lives. The hospital described her as a committed, professional and beloved doctor who left a deep mark on colleagues and on many women who were her patients. Within hours of the news, social media was flooded with hundreds of farewells from patients, doctors, students and medical staff.
One of her recent patients, Shontel Magen, told mako Health that she had met Baram at Haemek just one day before the death. After eight failed attempts to conceive, Magen said treatment with Baram worked on the first try, and their son was born nine months ago. She said they had returned to begin treatment for another child. “It was clear to us she was part of the family, because thanks to her we are a family,” Magen said. “We went through many doctors, but there is no one like her.”
Tributes repeatedly called Baram humane, sensitive, professional and someone who gave hope. Colleagues said she was a role model and a major loss to fertility and gynecology. Baram began working at Haemek in 2006 after graduating from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, completed training in obstetrics and gynecology and a subspecialty in reproductive endocrinology and infertility in Toronto, and later joined the IVF unit and Clalit’s women’s health center in Beit She’an. She also taught, published research and belonged to medical associations in Israel and abroad.
