DR. CLAIRE B. SLEDGE

CAIRO, Ill. -- Funeral service for Dr. Claire B. Sledge of Cairo will be held at 10 a.m. Friday at Barkett Funeral Chapel. The Revs. George Jaeger and Tim Taylor will officiate. Burial will be at a later date at Rosedale Cemetery in Ada, Okla.

Friends may call at the funeral home after 5 p.m. today.

Sledge, 71, died Tuesday, Sept. 24, 1991, at her home.

A retired medical doctor, she had served as chief pathologist at Lourdes Hospital in Paducah, Ky.; St. Mary's Hospital/Southern Medical Center in Cairo; hospitals in Mayfield, Salem and Benton, Ky., and in Anna.

Sledge served as a coroner's physician in Alexander and Pulaski counties 20 years, and served as sheriff and coroner of Kankakee. She was board certified in obstetrics and gynecology, and served as chairman of the Medical Utilization Review of Southern Illinois.

She was a graduate of Oklahoma University School of Medicine, and served her residency in pathology at Mayo Clinic.

Sledge was a member of American Medical Association, Alexander-Pulaski County Medical Society, McCracken-Graves County Medical Society, Fellow of the American College of Pathologists, and Grace Episcopal Church in Paducah.

Survivors include a sister, Mary Allan of Chicago; a brother, Dr. Clement Sledge of Boston, Mass., several nieces and nephews.

She was preceded in death by her parents, John and Mollie Sledge, and a brother, John B. Sledge.