James Lloyd Chandler, 80, MD, US Navy Medical Corps, retired, died Sept. 18, 2023, in San Diego, Calif.
He was born June 5, 1943, in Bingen, the son of the late Hoy E. Chandler and Chrystal Goodwin Chandler.
He was preceded in death by his first wife, Beverly, and a brother, Gene Chandler.
He was valedictorian of the Nashville High School class of 1961, and was a National Merit Scholarship winner. He graduated from the University of Arkansas, and from the UofA Medical School before entering the US Navy Medical Corps.
In the Navy he remembered treating med-evacuated soldiers who still had dried mud on their boots from combat in Vietnam. He went on to graduate from the residency program in psychiatry at Oakland Naval Hospital and did a fellowship in child psychiatry at UCSF, at the prestigious Langley-Porter program. In 1982, he was appointed chairman of psychiatry at Naval Hospital San Diego, a position he held for over a decade. He was a leader in psychiatric education and vigorously promoted the residency program there. He was responsible in leading the Navy to cooperate with UCSD in a mammoth project to study the AIDS epidemic and was one of the co-principal investigators.
In his final years on active duty, he headed up the Navy’s leap into the managed care era. For his work in that area, he was awarded the Distinguished Service Medal, the Navy’s highest non-combat award.
Always full of humor, he was revered by his students and colleagues for his wisdom and sage advice.
He retired from the Navy as Captain after 30 years of service and then worked for 15 years in Managed Health Care as Senior Behavorial Medical Director before retiring.
Survivors include: his spouse, Magel Bratton Chandler; and a daughter, Chrystal Chandler Ensey, and husband Chris, of Rossville, Tenn.
No services are planned at the present.
