People in the News -- December

Eric Wall, M.D., M.P.H., of Seattle has been appointed to serve on the Effective Health Care Stakeholder Group of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, or AHRQ. Wall, who was nominated for the position by the AAFP, is a practicing family physician and senior medical director for Qualis Health, a nonprofit private health care quality improvement organization based in Seattle. He chaired the Academy's Commission on Science from 2005-07, has been involved in the development of various clinical practice guidelines, and currently serves on the AMA's Performance Measures and Evaluation Subcommittee.

Members of the stakeholder group provide input to AHRQ's Effective Health Care Program on such topics as critical research information gaps and ways to address them, implementation issues for program reports and findings, and how other identified information needs can be filled. Group members also provide feedback from report users and offer guidance on quality improvement initiatives for the overall program, as well as suggest ways to optimize the program's impact on users.

Former AAFP EVP Robert Graham, M.D., of Cincinnati has been elected chair of the Alliance for Health Reform's board of directors. Graham, who was the Academy's EVP from 1985-2000, succeeds the alliance's founding chair, Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va.

A member of the alliance board since 1994, Graham currently is a professor and holds the Robert and Myfanwy Smith Chair in the department of family medicine at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine. In 2001, he was named director of the Center for Practice and Technology Assessment at AHRQ. Two years later, Graham became acting deputy director of AHRQ, remaining in that post until 2004.

In addition, family physician and former AMA President Nancy Dickey, M.D., of College Station, Texas, has been re-elected to the alliance's board. Dickey is vice chancellor for health affairs at the Texas A&M University System Health Science Center.

Academy member Gerald Cross, M.D., of Alexandria, Va., has been appointed principal deputy undersecretary for health of the Department of Veterans Affairs, or VA, making him the second highest-ranking official with the Veterans Health Administration. Cross was previously the acting principal undersecretary for health, deputy chief of patient care services and national director of primary care at the VA. He joined the VA after holding various leadership positions with the U.S. Army, having served as commander of four medical facilities, deputy commander for Army medicine in Europe and command surgeon for U.S. Army Forces Command.

Daniel Derksen, M.D., of Albuquerque, N.M., has been named a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health Policy Fellow for 2007-08. Derksen, currently a professor and vice chair in the department of family and community medicine at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque, is a past president of the New Mexico AFP and a former chapter delegate to the AAFP Congress of Delegates. The Robert Wood Johnson fellowship program, which is administered by the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences, seeks to further the professional growth of mid-career health professionals from academic and community settings by offering them an orientation to the health policy development process, along with work assignments in legislative or executive branch offices.

Winners of the 2007 AAFP/Bristol-Myers Squibb Awards for Excellence in Graduate Medical Education are

Brian Arndt, M.D., of Madison, Wis.;
Shirish Balachandra, M.D., of Rochester, N.Y.;
Katherine Barnett, M.D., of Jamaica Plain, Mass.;
Clint Colberg, M.D., of Salina, Kan.;
Perla del Pino-White, D.O., of Reading, Pa.;
Gretchen Dickson, M.D., of Lee's Summit, Mo.;
Roberto Echeverri, M.D., of Baltimore;
Todd Felix, M.D., of Lancaster, Pa.;
Elizabeth Fry, M.D., of Greenville, N.C.;
Daniel Goodyear, M.D., of Huntington, Vt.;
Reetu Grewal, M.D., of Boiling Springs, S.C.;
Kristina Kaufmann, D.O., of Fort Wayne, Ind.;
Erin Lunde, M.D., of Santa Rosa, Calif.;
Kelly McMullen, M.D., of Denver;
Tam Nguyen, M.D., of Santa Clara, Calif.;
Grace Park, M.D., of Urbana, Ill.;
Robert Quattlebaum, M.D., of Mount Pleasant, S.C.;
Felisha Rohan-Minjares, M.D., of Albuquerque, N.M.;
Shalini Shah, M.D., M.P.H., of York, Pa.; and
Amber Stonehouse, M.D., of Philadelphia.

The selection criteria for the awards are demonstrated leadership abilities, community involvement/social commitment, and exemplary patient care/interpersonal relationships. Each recipient of this year's award received $2,000, plus free registration, airfare and two nights' lodging to attend the 2007 Scientific Assembly in Chicago.