Dr. Alexander Hantel retires from Edward/Edward-Elmhurst Health

NAPERVILLE - Dr. Alexander Hantel retired last week as system medical director, Oncology Services, for Edward-Elmhurst Health. He retired after 30 years with Edward Hospital, and Edward-Elmhurst Health and more than 40 years in health care.

Hantel specialized in hematology/oncology. He began in Naperville as the medical director of Oncology Services for the Edward Cancer Center in 1993.

Under his leadership, Edward's Oncology Services and the Edward Cancer Center earned numerous achievements and recognitions. For example, Hantel helped open the Edward Neuro-Oncology Multidisciplinary Center, the only center in area to treat brain and spinal cord tumors, in 2009. In 2009, he also opened the Multidisciplinary Thoracic Oncology Clinic, the first in DuPage, Kane and Will counties to offer coordinated, more efficient treatment of lung cancer and other malignancies and abnormalities of chest.

Hantel oversaw the opening of the American Cancer Society Wig Boutique at Edward Plainfield Cancer Center, open to all cancer patients in the region, and the only wig boutique serving Southwest and far South suburbs of Chicago.

He opened Edward Plastic & Reconstructive Surgery in the Edward Cancer Center on Edward's Naperville campus in 2016, one year after opening the Walter Payton Liver Center Outreach Clinic at Edward Cancer Center.