Suite of new physician leaders elected at 2025 Congress of Delegates

She has served as medical director for New York University and Einstein student-run free clinics. As CMIO she secured financial support for IT infrastructure and helped her institution become a regional leader in data sharing and ensuring equitable information access.

New president-elect

Kisha Davis, MD, MPH, FAAFP, of Montgomery County, Maryland, was elected president-elect for the AAFP. Davis oversees public health initiatives in her role as chief health officer for Montgomery County. Davis brings a history of medical leadership, having previously served as vice president of health equity at Aledade and medical director at CHI Health Care in Maryland. 

Davis also looks forward to utilizing her advocacy experience to the role. A former White House Fellow, Davis has also served as vice chair of the Medicaid and CHIP Payment and Access Commission, where she advised Congress, HHS, and states on Medicaid and CHIP policy. An active member and leader within the AAFP for more than a decade, Davis served on the Commission on Federal and State Policy, on the Membership Task Force and as the new physician member of the AAFP Board of Directors. She also convened the 2019 National Conference of Constituency Leaders.

Kohl is chief medical officer of TMF Health Quality Institute, a Medicare quality improvement organization that serves four states and two U.S. territories. He is also a colonel and chief flight surgeon in the Missouri Air National Guard, where he serves as the state air surgeon. Kohl chairs the Board’s award subcommittee and may also serve as a chair or member of one of the Academy’s task forces or other Board-appointed work groups. He will continue to appoint all reference and special committees of the COD, is empowered to grant the privilege of the floor of the COD and votes only in the case of a tie that doesn’t involve candidates for election.

Gersch, an emergency room physician, is ER medical and trauma director for CentraCare - Long Prairie, Melrose, and Sauk Centre hospitals, and also is medical director for two nursing homes. As vice speaker, he is a member of the Board and presides over meetings of the COD in the absence of the speaker or when designated by the speaker. The vice speaker serves as chair of the Resolution and Policy Review Subcommittee of the Board and assists the speaker in planning and conducting the COD. As vice speaker, Gersch may serve as a member of one of the Academy’s task forces or other special work groups appointed by the Board.

New directors

The Board includes nine directors that serve three-year terms. They are elected in groups, or as otherwise needed, on a rotating basis. Directors sit as members of various Board subcommittees, and one director is elected each year to serve as the at-large member of the Board’s executive committee. Between meetings of the COD, the Board oversees and administers the work of the Academy and development of its policies, appointing commissions, committees and other work groups necessary to assist it in fulfilling these responsibilities.

The 2025 Congress of Delegates elected three new board members:

• Robyn Liu, MD, MPH, FAAFP: A former president of the Oregon Academy of Family Physicians, Liu works in Portland, Oregon. Her career encompasses rural and frontier medicine, health policy research and administration and academic medicine with student, resident and faculty development.
• Douglas Spotts, MD, FAAFP: Spotts is the associate professor of health policy administration at Penn State. He previously served as past president of the Pennsylvania Academy of Family Physicians and the American Academy of Family Physicians Foundation.
• Tracy Hendershot, DC, MD, FAAFP: A family practice physician at West Virginia University medicine, Hendershot has served as president of the West Virginia Academy of Family Physicians and currently serves on the FamMedPAC Board and the AAFP Commission on Finance and Insurance.

New physician, resident and student board members

The new physician, resident and student members are all voting members of the Board who serve one-year terms. Each serve as liaison to one of the Academy’s standing commissions. Serving in those roles this year are:

• Jane Simpson, DO, new physician board member: Simpson serves as a physician at Wilson Memorial Hospital and Binghamton General Hospital in New York, where she also is the medical director of the palliative care unit.
• Derek Southwick, MD, resident board member: a former student delegate to the Congress of Delegates, Southwick graduated from the University of Washington School of Medicine and is in his residency at the Indiana University School of Medicine.
• Payal Morari, student board member: A fourth-year medical student at Kansas City University, Morari has served as a student alternate delegate to the Congress of Delegates.

Simpson was elected by her peers at NCCL. Southwick and Morari were elected by their peers at FUTURE by the National Congress of Family Medicine Residents and the National Congress of Student Members. All were confirmed by acclamation during the COD.