New York Program Director Won’t Be Deterred From Teaching

Mumford served six years in the Navy’s Nuclear Power program as an electrician’s mate, a job that made him responsible for the operation, repair and maintenance of a submarine’s electrical power generation and lighting systems, electrical equipment, and appliances. That experience, and the leadership roles that came with it, gave him confidence and a sense of accomplishment.

“It got me to the point where I figured out that if I decided I was going to do something, I could do it,” Mumford said.

Forty years later, Mumford’s determination hasn’t faltered. In the past three years, he has dealt not only with the challenges of the pandemic but also with two stage 4 cancer diagnoses. He underwent a radical prostatectomy in 2020 and returned to work three weeks later. In 2021, a CT scan and subsequent PET scan revealed pancreatic cancer. He has been receiving chemotherapy for a year.

Mumford has no plans to retire or scale back his roles as program director of the Glen Cove Hospital Family Medicine Residency and assistant professor at both the Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell and the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.

“I like being at work,” he said. “I like what I do. I don’t want to quit, so I will do it as long as I can. My joke is that I will retire when they roll me out of the hospital with a sheet over my head.”

Mumford, a member of the New York State AFP Board of Directors since 2006, completed his term as chapter president last spring and was honored as the chapter’s Family Physician of the Year. In announcing the award, the NYSAFP cited Mumford’s tireless work ethic, inspiring teaching, patient advocacy and unwavering commitment to the chapter.

“Sometimes when I’m doing interviews with medical students as part of the Match process, they will ask me what I am most proud of about the program,” he said. “It’s the residents and the faculty. I like the people I work with, and I actually feel like I work for them. I’m here to support them and create an environment where they can get the training they need.”

Mumford’s roles as advocate and teacher overlap when he encourages and supports residents and faculty as they make their voices heard at NYSAFP’s annual advocacy day in Albany. During that event, students, residents and members meet with state legislators and staff about issues such as pandemic planning and prescription drug coverage. Mumford said he is particularly proud of advances made with the New York State Board for Medicine thanks to advocacy work on issues related to the licensing of international medical graduates.  

He also encourages residents and faculty to get the full value of their AAFP membership, actively supporting and promoting participation in NYSAFP and AAFP commissions and encouraging attendance at family medicine educational and leadership events such as the Congress of Delegates and the Family Medicine Experience, the National Conference of Constituency Leaders and the Annual Chapter Leadership Forum, and the National Conference of Family Medicine Residents and Medical Students.  

Mumford said he knew he wanted to be a program director as early as medical school.

“Teaching has always been something that I found rewarding,” he said. “When I was in college and medical school, I was a lifeguard trainer and CPR instructor, so I did a lot of that and really enjoyed it. It was gratifying to see people make progress and learn the skills that they needed to achieve their goals.”

After graduating from the Bronx-Lebanon Family Medicine Residency in 1993, Mumford completed a faculty development fellowship at the Institute for Urban Family Health before serving four years as an associate residency director at Beth Israel. In 2001, he achieved his goal, returning to Bronx-Lebanon as program director.

That storybook ending isn’t where the story ends. Around the same time he returned to Bronx-Lebanon, Mumford’s wife was diagnosed with breast cancer and died a few years later. As a single dad with three young children, Mumford felt the need to look at other career options and spent the next nine years in inpatient care at Mount Sinai.

He got a second chance to be a program director in 2016 when he joined Glen Cove.

“I like being a program director,” said Mumford, who is now married to family physician and AAFP Board member Sarah Nosal, M.D. “It’s an opportunity to create learning environments and support learning programs for residents. What I’ve tried to do here is create a situation where we’re able to individualize the training for each resident. Rather than have a fixed template that everybody has to follow, we look at people’s strengths and interests and build on those.”

Mumford’s mother was a nurse, and his stepfather was a cardiothoracic surgeon. Out of 10 siblings and stepsiblings, he was the only one who followed their parents into health care.

“I remember a conversation with my stepfather after I told him I was going into family medicine,” Mumford said. “He said, ‘I think you’ll be all right. You’re smarter than I am.’ It was an acknowledgment that it takes a lot to be a good family doctor because of the breadth of knowledge that’s required. In medical school, I liked everything and there was nothing that I wanted to stop doing.”

As a child of the Cold War era who spent years on nuclear submarines, the versatile nature of family medicine appealed to Mumford.

“I wanted to be able to do something where I would be useful, no matter where I was, no matter the circumstance,” he said. “Family medicine felt like the right thing to do. If you have your brain and your hands, you can always do something to help people. That broad training would be valuable and make me a contributing member of society no matter what happened.”