Dr. Debra Viti grew up in West Babylon residing on Justice Street with her parents and her brother, Paul. She graduated from West Babylon Senior High School in June, 1977.

Dr. Viti received her BA from Indiana University. She was accepted to three Ivy League medical schools: Cornell, Georgetown University and Dartmouth. Debra received her MD from Cornell University Medical College in 1991. After completing her internal medicine residency at the University of Iowa hospitals and clinics, she moved to the Boston area in 1994 to practice internal medicine at Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates (HVMA) and joined the Harvard Medical School community as a clinical instructor at Mount Auburn Hospital. Debra was an active teacher at HMS and contributed, for many years, to Patient-Doctor II courses and to OSCE examinations. In addition, Dr. Viti was a primary care internist at the HVMA Cambridge and Somerville practices and was beloved by her patients. She was also an HVMA physician facilitator in the Brigham and Women’s Hospital Emergency Department. She was active on the Quality Assurance and Research Committees of HVMA and had strong research interests in the study of women’s health issues. In collaboration with the Department of Ambulatory Care and Prevention, Dr. Viti conducted a study of women’s attitudes toward alternative medicine use for menopause, the results of which were presented in 2004 at the national meeting of the North American Menopause Society. She was also a member of the Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Human Studies Committee.

Dr. Viti credited her wonderful experience at West Babylon High School to the successes in her life. She is quoted as saying “I had some memorable teachers at West Babylon High School who guided me into going to college. They not only changed my future, but that of my brother Paul and many cousins who followed my lead.”