Ty Tuggle

Dr. Charles T. Tuggle, III passed away in the early hours of December 29th, 2022, at the age of 40.  Dr. Tuggle, born on October 25th, 1982, and known as Ty to his family, friends, and colleagues, was the beloved husband of Vera; father of son Alexander and soon to be father of daughter Mila; son of Charles and Jean Tuggle of Memphis, TN; brother to William (Miranda) of Atlanta, GA and Mary (Russell) of New York, NY.

Dr. Tuggle, an accomplished scholar, was educated at Christian Brothers High School in Memphis, and the University of Georgia, where he was awarded the Foundation Fellowship, UGA’s highest academic scholarship. After graduating Summa Cum Laude, Phi Beta Kappa, and first in his class in Biochemistry & Molecular Biology, he spent a year at Kyoto University of Foreign Studies, where he mastered the Japanese language and fell in love with Japanese culture. Following this experience, Ty went to Yale Medical School, graduating with Honors, then completed his Plastic & Reconstructive Surgery residency at Yale New-Haven Hospital and a fellowship year in Reconstructive Hand Surgery at the Curtis National Hand Center in Baltimore. After decades long training, Ty began his career at LSU Health Sciences Center, where he was recently named an Associate Professor, with ambitions to build a world-class hand program in New Orleans, a city he quickly came to love.

With many specialty options as a plastic surgeon, Ty chose reconstructive hand surgery because of its surgical complexity and challenges, and because it allowed him to enable people who worked with their hands to regain their self-reliance, dignity, and worth. For Ty, there was a special beauty and purpose in restoring the functions of others’ hands through the labors of his own. He also loved children and took deep satisfaction in his congenital hand work at the Children’s Hospital of New Orleans. Ty was born to be a surgeon following in the footsteps of his grandfather, Dr. Matthew Wood, and uncle, also Dr. Matthew Wood, both distinguished neurosurgeons.  Dr. Tuggle was a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons, a member of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons as well as the American Society for Surgery of the Hand, a widely published medical author, and chosen for UGA’s 2020 class of “40 under 40.”

With his many accomplishments and bright future, Ty fought a courageous two-year battle with brain cancer. For eighteen months of this battle, he continued to use his surgical excellence to help those who needed him, returning to the Operating Room even after he himself had undergone brain surgery and throughout his chemotherapy treatments.  When asked why he continued to work long, hard hours instead of indulging his personal interests, he always answered that the meaning of life is to be found in the voluntary adoption of responsibility and for him that was to make others’ lives better.

Despite an all too brief life, Ty traveled widely, mastered Japanese, excelled at many of hand surgery’s most challenging procedures, loved his family, married the woman of his dreams, and lived and died with dignity. He is survived by a heartbroken but incredibly proud family.

There will be a service to celebrate and honor Ty’s life at two o’clock in the afternoon on Saturday, January 7th, 2022 at Hardin Hall in the Memphis Botanic Gardens.

There will also be a 2nd, smaller service in New Orleans:

Saturday, January 14th  10:00am - 12:00pm

Newman Bandstand at Audubon Park

In lieu of flowers, the family asks that you please consider a contribution to any of the following organizations:

Church Health Center Memphis, National Brain Tumor Society, Musella Foundation, or Robert Tisch Brain Tumor Center at Duke