Patients writing on Dr. Larisa Markewych’s office website Wednesday recalled the Palos Heights dentist as “a warm person and a great dentist” and posthumously thanked her “for giving us beautiful smiles and your gentle touch as a dentist.”
The tributes came in the wake of a Cook County medical examiner’s office finding that Markewych, 55, and her 53-year-old husband, Walter Puk, each died from a gunshot wound in the head, with Puk’s wound deemed self-inflicted.
Palos Park police and Palos Fire Protection District paramedics responded around 3:30 p.m. Tuesday to the couple’s home on the 12300 block of Mohawk Road in Palos Park after a relative found the couple unresponsive on the floor, police said.
Police said no other people appeared to have been involved, but said the South Suburban Major Crimes Task Force was reviewing the case.
Markewych graduated from Loyola University Chicago with honors in 1984, the same year she was licensed by the Illinois Department of Financial & Professional Regulation, according to her website. In 1996, she moved her practice from Chicago to Palos Heights, maintaining an office on the 7800 block of West College Drive. She was able to communicate with patients in Polish, Ukrainian and Spanish, according to her website.
Palos Park police, who had stationed an officer in the driveway of the home to discourage visitors, asked the public and media to respect the privacy of “family members in this difficult time.”
Cook County recorder’s office records show the couple had lived in their home since 1992, remodeling it in 2006.
Tribune reporter Rosemary R. Sobol contributed.