Vivek Murthy, MD, MBA
President Obama has nominated 37-year-old Boston hospitalist Vivek Murthy, MD, MBA, as surgeon general of the United States. Dr. Murthy has worked since 2006 as a hospitalist and assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. He is co-founder and president of Doctors for America, a Washington, D.C.-based group of 16,000 physicians and medical students that advocates for access to affordable, high quality health care and has been a strong supporter of the Affordable Care Act.
If confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Dr. Murthy would replace acting surgeon general Boris Lushniak. The surgeon general serves a four-year term. “We share a belief that access to quality health care is a basic human right,” Brigham president Dr. Betsy Nabel said in a statement about Dr. Murthy. “I am confident that he will be a passionate advocate and that he will have an extraordinary impact as our nation’s surgeon general.”
Dr. Murthy studied at Harvard, received his medical degree at Yale School of Medicine, and earned an MBA from Yale School of Management. In 2011, he was appointed to serve as a member of the Advisory Group on Prevention, Health Promotion, and Integrative and Public Health. He was co-founder and is chairman of the board of TrialNetworks, formerly known as Epernicus, since 2007. He co-founded VISIONS Worldwide in 1995, a non-profit organization focused on HIV/AIDS education in India and the United States, where he served as president from 1995 to 2000 and chairman of the board from 2000 to 2003.
Daniel Virnich, MD, MBA, has been named TeamHealth Hospital Medicine’s new chief medical officer. Dr. Virnich previously served as the company’s western region medical director. He currently serves on SHM’s Practice Management Committee and SHM’s Patient Experience Task Force. TeamHealth, based in Knoxville, Tenn., provides private hospitalist services in 47 states.
Dean Dalili, MD, FHM, is the new vice president of medical affairs at Hollywood, Fla.-based Hospital Physician Partners (HPP), a private hospitalist management company with services in more than 20 states. Dr. Dalili previously served as HPP medical director and regional medical director. He was recognized in 2012 and this year as one of HPP’s outstanding medical directors in the hospital medicine division for his operational and leadership excellence.
David Roe is the new executive director of IPC The Hospitalist Company’s Northeast Tenn./Southwest Virginia region, where he will oversee operations at both acute and post-acute care facilities throughout the region. Roe previously served as executive director of THS Physician Partners, a multi-specialty physician group based in Charleston, W.Va.
Robert Mickelsen, MD, has been appointed system medical director for Lovelace Hospitalist Services in Albuquerque, N.M. The programs at Lovelace’s three hospital facilities are all managed by Hospital Physician Partners (HPP), and Dr. Mickelsen will be charged with overseeing operations at all three hospitals. Dr. Mickelsen comes to his new role from Gerald Champion Regional Medical Center in Alamogordo, N.M., where he served as hospitalist medical director.
Francisco Loya, MD, MSc, has been named chief medical officer for EmCare Hospital Medicine. Dr. Loya earned his medical degree at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School in Dallas and completed his internal medicine residency at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. He earned his master of science degree in healthcare management from Harvard School of Public Health in Boston. After earning his master’s degree, Dr. Loya created a software tool (CMORx) that uses deductive algorithms to fill the gaps in medical records, which he will bring with him to EmCare. Based in Dallas, EmCare provides hospitalist and other services to more than 500 hospitals nationwide.