People in the News -- October

A number of Academy members received awards and honors this past month.

AAFP member Donald Frey, M.D., of Omaha, Neb., has been named vice president for health services at Creighton University in Omaha.

Frey, who holds the university's Dr. Roland L. Kleeberger Endowed Chair, was chair of the Department of Family Medicine at the Creighton School of Medicine. In his new position, he will be responsible for oversight of Creighton's schools of medicine, dentistry, nursing, and pharmacy and health professions.

Frey joined Creighton University in 1993 as director of the School of Medicine's family medicine residency program. He was named to the Kleeberger chair in 1996.

CMS has selected Mark Potter, M.D., M.P.H., of Chicago, from more than 150 nominees, to serve on the agency's Care Transitions Technical Expert Panel, or TEP. Potter was nominated for the position by the AAFP.

The TEP panel was created in conjunction with the Colorado Foundation for Medical Care as means of measuring hospital readmissions and follow-up patient care provided by physicians. CMS' goal is to reduce the number of unnecessary hospital admissions and, in turn, lower health care costs.

Potter is the program director of the family medicine residency at the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Medicine. He also serves as an assistant professor of clinical family medicine at the college.

AAFP member Terrence Steyer, M.D., of Charleston, S.C., associate professor of family medicine at the Medical University of South Carolina, has been named founding chair of the Department of Clinical Sciences at the Medical College of Georgia/University of Georgia Medical Partnership in Athens.

According to a Sept. 28 press release, Steyer, who is president of the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine, or STFM, will be responsible for building an interdisciplinary clinical-science department and supporting the development of a clinical curriculum. He also will oversee clinical research at the new campus, which is part of the Medical College of Georgia School of Medicine's expansion to increase the number of physicians in Georgia.

Steyer also has served as the STFM liaison to the AAFP Commission on Government Affairs and was a member of the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Advisory Committee on Training in Primary Care and Dentistry.

Barbara Yawn, M.D., M.Sc., of Rochester, Minn., has been selected by the National Quality Forum, or NQF, to serve on its steering committee for the National Voluntary Consensus Standards for Patient Outcomes project. Yawn was recommended for the position by the Academy.

As a member of the steering committee, Yawn will guide the work of representatives from across the spectrum of health care stakeholders as they develop quality measures related to medical conditions, including asthma, congestive heart failure, diabetes mellitus and ischemic heart disease.

Yawn is director of research at Olmstead Medical Center and an adjunct professor in the department of family and community health at the University of Minnesota, Rochester. She is also a member of the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force.