Anthony F. DePalma was born October 12, 1904, in Philadelphia to Italian immigrant parents from Alberona, Province of Foggia.
[3][4] During his time there, he established a Ph.D in anatomy,[1] worked in an off-campus private practice,[4] established an orthopedic research department,[1] and wrote over 70 manuscripts and five acclaimed medical textbooks – Surgery of the Shoulder (1950, three editions), Diseases of the Knee (1954), Degenerative Changes in the Sternoclavicular and Acromioclavicular Joints in Various Decades (1957), The Management of Fractures and Dislocations (1959, two editions), and The Intervertebral Disc (1970, co-authored with Richard H. Rothman)[4] – which have been translated into several other languages.
[3] He retired from Jefferson the first time in 1970 and moved to Pompano Beach, Florida, but was invited by the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey to head their new Orthopedic Department in January 1971.
[1][3] DePalma came out of retirement ten years later, taking the Florida state medical exam and opening a solo orthopedic practice in Fort Lauderdale in 1977, which he ran until 1983.
[3] He was married to his second wife, Gertrude "Trudy" McGowan DePalma, for 34 years, having met her as an operating room nurse in 1953.
"[1][3] DePalma died April 6, 2005, of congestive heart failure at North Broward Hospital near his home in Pompano Beach.