William J. Rea, M.D., is a thoracic and cardiovascular surgeon with a strong passion for the environmental aspects of health and disease. Founder of the Environmental Health Center (EHC-D), Dr. Rea is currently director of this highly specialized Dallas based medical facility. The center also has a clinic in Chicago, Illinois. In 1988, Dr.

Rea was named to the world's first professorial chair of environmental medicine at the Robens Institute of Toxicology at the University of Surrey in Guildford, England. He was also awarded the Jonathan Forman Gold Medal Award in 1987 and the Herbert J. Rinkel Award in 1993, both by the American Academy of Environmental Medicine, as well as named Outstanding Alumnus by Otterbein College in 1991. He was also named to the Mountain Valley Water Hall of Fame for work in the field of study of clean water and, in 1995, he received the F.A.M.E. Award for pioneering work in environmental and preventive medicine.

In 1997 he was named International Man of the Year and in 2002 Dr. Rea received the O. Spurgeon English Humanitarian Award from Temple University. An author of medical textbooks, Dr. Rea has also published more than 100 peer-reviewed research papers related to the topic of thoracic and cardiovascular surgery and environmental medicine.