Herbert E. Kaufman, MD, one of ophthalmology’s most renowned innovators, died on July 11, 2026.
Born in Brooklyn, New York in 1931, Kaufman earned his medical degree from Harvard Medical School in 1956, after which he completed his internship at Massachusetts General Hospital and served as the founding chairman of the Department of Ophthalmology at the University of Florida, “where he established one of the nation’s premier academic eye centers,” according to the Sarasota Herald-Tribune in his obituary. He also served as chairman at the Louisiana State University Eye Center.
“I did my cornea