2008
Debra Risher Flowers, 57, a retired substance abuse medical director at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in the District, died Nov. 9 of
respiratory failure at her home in Adelphi.
Dr. Flowers taught in the Department of Psychiatry at Howard University from 1986 to 1992 and served as director of medical student
education and as an assistant professor at Howard from 1988 to 1990. She was at the VA Medical Center from 1990 to 1992.
Her husband, Wendell Flowers, recalled that his wife taught her students not only research methodology but also how to study. "She
seemed to have an almost photographic memory and could cite not only the principles of medicine but often the chapter and page of the
text where those principles were detailed," he said.
She was an advocate for including gender and cultural difference in research studies before it was popular to do so and was the author of
an influential article, "Training Psychiatric Staff to Treat a Multicultural Patient Population" (1984). She also participated in seminal studies
and research on buprenorphine, the drug that is now the accepted treatment for preventing opiate use.
Dr. Flowers was born in the District, attended St. Martin's Catholic School and graduated from Roosevelt High School. She attended the
University of Detroit for three years, where she was one of the few women in the ROTC. She transferred to Fisk University and received her
undergraduate degree in 1972. She then spent a year at Vanderbilt University before transferring to Meharry Medical College in Nashville to
complete her doctorate in neuropharmacology in 1976.
After receiving her medical degree with high honors from Howard University College of Medicine in 1982, she did her residency and
internship at Howard University Hospital, with one year in flexible medicine and a year in psychiatry. She then received a two-year fellowship
at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism in Bethesda.
In 1992, Dr. Flowers was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. She retired from her position at the VA Medical Center but took on new
responsibilities when she and her husband adopted a child. She also indulged a lifelong interest in interior decorating, despite her
physical limitations. When she decided the kitchen floor needed new tiles, she got out of her wheelchair, sat on the floor and glued them
down herself. An avid gardener, she tended flowers and vegetables in elevated beds her husband built for her in the family's back yard.
Survivors include her husband of 28 years; her son, Wendell Amon Risher; and her father, Watson Risher, all of Adelphi.
-- Joe Holley