The Board of Trustees govern the ABIM Foundation, and both guide and help advance the Foundation's work in medical professionalism. The Trustees include national leaders in quality assessment and improvement, medical education, consumer advocates, policy makers, purchasers, and physician leaders who have served on the American Board of Internal Medicine’s Board of Directors.
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John J. Popovich, Jr., MD
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Glenn M. Hackbarth, JD, MA
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Donald E. Wesson, MD
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Richard J. Baron, MD
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Christine K. Cassel, MD
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David B. Hellmann, MD
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Holly J. Humphrey, MD
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Sheila T. Leatherman, MSw
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Deborah Leff, JD
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Wendy S. Levinson, MD
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Elizabeth McGlynn, PhD
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Debra L. Ness, MS
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Estelle B. Richman, MA
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Beverly Woo, MD
Top John J. Popovich, Jr., MD
Chair
Dr. Popovich is the Senior Vice President of Clinical Affairs for Henry Ford Health System.
Dr. Popovich served as Head of the Pulmonary and Critical Care Division for 10 years, after having begun at Henry Ford as the Director of the Medical Intensive Care Unit. He has been the multiple year recipient of the Henry Ford Hospital Department of Internal Medicine Award for Academic Excellence in Teaching.
Currently the Chair of the Department of Internal Medicine at Henry Ford, Dr. Popovich also is the past Chair of the ABIM Board of Directors and current Chair of the ABIM Foundation Board of Trustees. Dr. Popovich has received Mastership status in the American College of Physicians, as well as the Laureate Award from the Michigan Chapter of the American College of Physicians. He is a highly respected lecturer and has authored more than 100 publications, abstracts and book chapters and has served as an editorial reviewer for several subspecialty journals. His research interest is the diagnosis of pulmonary thromboembolism.
Dr. Popovich received his medical degree from the University of Michigan. He completed his residency and fellowship training at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit, where he served as Chief Medical Resident. He is board certified in internal medicine and pulmonary disease.
Top Glenn M. Hackbarth, JD, MA
Vice-Chair
Glenn Hackbarth is Chairman of the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission and lives in Bend, OR. He has experience as a health care executive, government official and policy analyst.
Mr. Hackbarth was Chief Executive Officer and one of the founders of Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates, a multispecialty group practice in Boston that serves as a major teaching affiliate of Harvard Medical School. Mr. Hackbarth previously served as Senior Vice President of Harvard Community Health Plan and President of its Health Centers Division, as well as Washington Counsel of Intermountain Health Care. He has held various positions at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, including Deputy Administrator of the Health Care Financing Administration (now known as CMS). He was elected to the Board of Trustees of the ABIM Foundation in 2006 and currently serves as Vice Chair. He is a board member of the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA) and of The Commonwealth Fund. He is also a member of The Commonwealth Fund’s Commission on a High Performance Health System.
Mr. Hackbarth received his bachelor’s degree from Pennsylvania State University and his master’s and law degrees from Duke University.
Top Donald E. Wesson, MD
Secretary-Treasurer
Dr. Wesson is currently Vice Dean of the Texas A&M College of Medicine and Chief Academic Officer, Scott and White Healthcare in Temple, TX.
He was named Chairman of the Department of Internal Medicine at Texas Tech in 1999 and served until 2006, after which he assumed his current position at Texas A&M College of Medicine. Previously, Dr. Wesson was on the faculty at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center as Nephrology Division Chief. He served on the Baylor College of Medicine faculty after completing his residency training, and remained there until 1994.
Dr. Wesson has served on the Board of Directors of the American Board of Internal Medicine since 2001 and served as its Chair from 2007-2008. He is currently Secretary/Treasurer of the ABIM Foundation. Additionally, he is Secretary/Treasurer of the American Society of Nephrology, is a Past President of the Southern Society for Clinical Investigation and is a member of the American Association of Physicians.
He received his bachelor’s degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, attended Washington University School of Medicine and received his medical degree from Baylor College of Medicine. He completed his residency in internal medicine at the Baylor College of Medicine Affiliated Hospitals and his nephrology fellowship at the University of Illinois. Dr. Wesson is board certified in internal medicine and nephrology.
Top Richard J. Baron, MD
Dr. Baron practices general internal medicine at Greenhouse Internists, P.C., located in the Philadelphia area. Additionally, he is the founder and CEO of Philadelphia e-Quality, a non-profit company trying to accelerate adoption of electronic health records in small physician practices. Dr. Baron’s practice, in fact, has been a pioneer in the comprehensive adoption of electronic health records in the small practice environment.
Dr. Baron served as Chief Medical Officer of Health Partners, a not-for-profit Medicaid HMO set up by four teaching hospitals in Philadelphia, from 1988 to 1996. He was the architect of the Best Clinical and Administrative Practices program, funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Center for Health Care Strategies, working with medical leadership of Medicaid health plans around the country in learning collaboratives to improve the quality of care for their members. This program reached plans serving more than half of the Medicaid managed care population in the United States.
Dr. Baron is board certified in geriatric medicine and, while his certification in internal medicine is valid indefinitely, he voluntarily renewed the certification twice. He is the immediate past Chair of the American Board of Internal Medicine’s Board of Directors and currently is a Trustee of the ABIM Foundation. Additionally, he has been a member of the National Committee for Quality Assurance Standards Committee since 2005.
Dr. Baron received an English degree from Harvard and his medical degree from Yale. He did house staff training at NYU-Bellevue and served a three-year obligation in the National Health Service Corps in rural Tennessee.
Top Christine K. Cassel, MD
Dr. Cassel, a leading expert in geriatric medicine, medical ethics and quality of care, is President and CEO of the American Board of Internal Medicine and the ABIM Foundation. Dr. Cassel, who is board certified in internal medicine and geriatric medicine, was the first female board chair of the American Board of Internal Medicine.
In April 2009, Dr. Cassel was chosen by President Obama as one of 20 scientists to serve on the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST), which advises the President in areas where an understanding of science, technology, and innovation is key to forming responsible and effective policy. In addition, having chaired influential IOM reports on end-of-life care and public health, Dr. Cassel also serves on the IOM’s Comparative Effective Research Committee mandated by Congress to set priorities for the national CER effort. An active scholar and lecturer, she is the author or co-author of 14 books and more than 150 journal articles on geriatric medicine, aging, bioethics and health policy. Her most recent book is Medicare Matters: What Geriatric Medicine Can Teach American Health Care.
A national leader in efforts to inspire quality care, Dr. Cassel represents ABMS on the National Quality Forum’s National Priorities Partnership, is a member of the Commonwealth Fund’s Commission on a High Performance Health System, and served on the President's Advisory Commission on Consumer Protection and Quality in the Health Care Industry.
Dr. Cassel is past President of the American Federation for Aging Research, and the American College of Physicians, former Dean of the School of Medicine and Vice President for Medical Affairs at Oregon Health and Science University, Chair of the Department of Geriatrics and Adult Development at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, and Chief of General Internal Medicine at the University of Chicago.
She is the recipient of numerous honorary degrees, is an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Colleges of Medicine of the U.K. and Canada, the European Federation of Internal Medicine, and is a Master of the American College of Physicians.
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David Hellmann, MD
Dr. Hellmann is the Aliki Perroti Professor of Medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Vice Dean for Johns Hopkins, and Chairman of the Department of Medicine at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center.
Dr. Hellmann is a graduate of Yale College and the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Following his internship and residency on the Osler Medical Service at Johns Hopkins Hospital, Dr. Hellmann completed his rheumatology fellowship training at the University of California, San Francisco.
A recipient of teaching awards from the University of California, San Francisco, Johns Hopkins University, and from the American College of Physicians, and a recipient of local and national "Best Doctor" awards, Dr. Hellmann is also a Master of the American College of Physicians. In 1998 he was also co-founder of the Johns Hopkins Vasculitis Center. Dr. Hellmann is author of more than 150 articles and chapters, is an associate editor of Medicine and The American Journal of Medicine and serves on the Editorial Board of The Pharos.
Dr. Hellmann is a Trustee of the American Board of Internal Medicine Foundation, and has served as Governor of the Maryland Chapter of the American College of Physicians, and as a Director of the American Board of Internal Medicine (2000-2006). In 2004, Dr. Hellmann created the Johns Hopkins Center for Innovative Medicine (CIM), which seeks to improve the quality of medical care on the Johns Hopkins Bayview campus by promoting innovations in patient care and medical research.
Top Holly J. Humphrey, MD
Dr. Humphrey, a board certified internist, is Dean for Medical Education at The University of Chicago. In this role, she oversees medical education for students in the Pritzker School of Medicine and for residents and fellows in graduate medical education programs at The University of Chicago Medical Center. She was Chief Medical Resident before joining the faculty as an Assistant Professor in 1989, which began a 14-year appointment as Director of the Internal Medicine Residency Program.
Recently, Dr. Humphrey began the Pritzker Advising and Mentoring Societies and the Bowman Society, an organization exploring issues of health care disparities and providing mentoring for minority students, residents and faculty. In 2005, she initiated a comprehensive curriculum reform effort entitled “The Pritzker Initiative: A Curriculum for the 21st Century,” which will be unveiled in Fall 2009. In 2003, she launched The University of Chicago’s Roadmap to Professionalism initiative. She has overseen the establishment of the University’s Academy of Distinguished Medical Educators and the development of the University of Chicago’s chapter of the Gold Humanism Honor Society.
In 2005, Dr. Humphrey delivered the Lowell T. Coggeshall Memorial Lecture, and in 1999, she received the Laureate Award from the American College of Physicians. Dr. Humphrey was the 2006-2007 ABIM Board Chair and is Emeritus Trustee of the ABIM Foundation. She is also a former President of the Association of Program Directors in Internal Medicine.
Dr. Humphrey earned her medical degree from The University of Chicago, where completed her residency and a fellowship in pulmonary and critical care medicine.
Top Sheila T. Leatherman, MSw
Sheila Leatherman is a Research Professor at the Gillings School of Global Public Health, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Visiting Professor of the London School of Economics and a Senior Fellow at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI).
Since 1997, she has worked in the U.K. as an independent evaluator of the impact on quality of care in the National Health Service of the Labor Governments’ reforms resulting in three books. In 2007, Ms. Leatherman was awarded the honor of Commander of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth for her work over the past decade in the National Health Service. She was elected to the U.S. National Academy of Sciences as a member of the Institute of Medicine and made an Honorary Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians.
Ms. Leatherman is the research advisor to a four-year demonstration project funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to develop and test innovations linking health programs with microcredit in India, West Africa, Bolivia and the Philippines. Currently, she is conducting a two-year project to assess global evidence of the impact of systematically integrating microfinance and health access interventions for the poor.
She has a broad background in health care management in State and Federal health agencies, as Chief Executive of an HMO, and as a senior executive of United Health Group in the United States. Ms. Leatherman is active in humanitarian relief in the developing world, serving two organizations as a Trustee and active volunteer; Freedom from Hunger and the American Refugee Committee. She is also a Trustee of the ABIM Foundation.
Top Deborah Leff, JD
Deborah Leff is President and member of the Board of Directors of the Public Welfare Foundation, a national foundation based in Washington, DC focusing on health reform, workers’ rights and criminal and juvenile justice.
Prior to becoming President of the Public Welfare Foundation, Ms. Leff held leadership positions in the public, private and non-profit sectors. She served as Director of the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, President and CEO of America’s Second Harvest, the nation’s largest domestic hunger relief organization, where she was a key national spokesperson on hunger, poverty and welfare reform, and President of the Joyce Foundation. Ms. Leff also has held several positions with the federal government, including as a Trial Attorney with the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice and Director of Public Affairs at the Federal Trade Commission.
During much of the 1980s and early 1990s, Ms. Leff was Senior Producer at ABC News’ Nightline, World News Tonight and 20/20, where she won numerous national awards, including the Emmy and the DuPont Awards. She currently serves on the Board of Trustees of the ABIM Foundation and chairs the Board of Directors of StoryCorps.
Ms. Leff received her undergraduate degree from Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, where she was named a University Scholar. She earned her law degree from the University of Chicago Law School and received an honorary doctorate in humane letters from Lake Forest College.
Top Wendy S. Levinson, MD
Dr. Levinson, a board certified internist, is the Sir John and Lady Eaton Professor and Chair of the Department of Medicine at the University of Toronto. She also is the Physician-in-Chief at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre in Toronto.
Dr. Levinson is the current Chair of the American Board of Internal Medicine’s Board of Directors, and a member of the ABIM Foundation Board of Trustees. She is a member of the Board of Directors of the Association of Professors of Medicine and a past President of the Society of General Internal Medicine. Dr. Levinson previously was on the faculty of the Oregon Health and Science University and the University of Chicago Medical School.
Dr. Levinson is a national and international expert in the field of physician-patient communication and the physician-patient relationship. Her research has spanned a number of highly relevant policy issues, including the relationship of medical malpractice to breakdown in communication, the effectiveness of primary care physicians and surgeons in helping patients to make informed decisions and the relationship of communication to patient satisfaction. Dr. Levinson has contributed to large-scale training programs to enhance the skills of primary care physicians and surgeons in effective communication with their patients. Her current research focus is on the disclosure of medical errors to patients.
After earning a bachelor’s degree from the University of Toronto, Dr. Levinson earned her medical degree from McMaster University in Ontario.
Top Elizabeth McGlynn, PhD
Elizabeth McGlynn, PhD, an internationally known expert on methods for evaluating the appropriateness and technical quality of heath care delivery, is Associate Director of RAND Health and holds the RAND Distinguished Chair in Health Care Quality. As Associate Director, she is responsible for strategic development and oversight of the research portfolio and for external dissemination and communications of the findings of RAND Health research. Dr. McGlynn is leading RAND Health’s COMPARE initiative, which is developing a comprehensive method for evaluating health reform proposals. She is also conducting research on the methodological and policy issues associated with implementing measures of efficiency and effectiveness of care at the individual physician level for payment and public reporting.
Dr. McGlynn is a member of the Institute of Medicine and serves on a variety of national advisory committees. She was a member of the Strategic Framework Board that provided a blueprint for the National Quality Forum on the development of a national quality measurement and reporting system and is currently the Vice Chair of the Providence - Little Company of Mary Hospital Service Area Board in Southern California. She serves on the editorial boards for Health Services Research and The Milbank Quarterly.
Dr. McGlynn holds a bachelor’s degree in international political economy from Colorado College, a master’s in public policy from the University of Michigan’s Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy, and a doctoral degree in public policy from the Pardee RAND Graduate School.
Top Debra L. Ness, MS
Ms. Ness is President of the National Partnership for Women and Families. For over two decades, Debra Ness has been an ardent advocate for the principles of fairness and social justice. Drawing on an extensive background in health and public policy, Ness possesses a unique understanding of the issues that face women and families at home, in the workplace, and in the health care arena. Before assuming her current role as President, she served as Executive Vice President of the National Partnership for 13 years. Ness has played a leading role in positioning the organization as a powerful and effective advocate for today’s women and families.
Ness serves on the boards of some of the nation’s most influential organizations working to improve health care. She is a member of the Board of Directors, and chairs the Consumer Advisory Council, of the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA), the nation’s leader in accrediting and developing quality measures for managed care organizations. Ness is on the Board of the National Quality Forum (NQF), established by the President’s Advisory Commission on Consumer Protection and Quality in the Health Care Industry to develop and implement a national strategy for healthcare quality measurement and reporting. She co-chairs the Consumer-Purchaser Disclosure Project, a group of leading consumer, employer, and labor organizations working to ensure that all Americans have access to publicly reported health care performance information. She sits on the on the Board of Trustees of the American Board of Internal Medicine Foundation (ABIMF), which works to advance medical professionalism and physician leadership in quality assessment and improvement. She also sits on the Steering Committee of the AQA and was appointed to the Quality Alliance Steering Committee (QASC) formed in August 2006 by HHS Secretary Michael Leavitt, co-chairing its Cost/Price Transparency Working Group.
In addition, Ness serves on the Executive Committee of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights (LCCR) and co-chairs the LCCR’s Health Care Task Force. She is on the Board of Directors of the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) as well as EMILY’S List.
Ness graduated summa cum laude from Drew University with a bachelor’s degree in psychology and sociology. After completing graduate work in social welfare and public health policy, she received her Masters of Science from Columbia University School of Social Work. She worked in numerous capacities at the Service Employees International Union, first as director of adult education and career development efforts, and later conducting strategic planning and organizational development programs for local unions. In 1986, she moved to head up field operations for the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL), where she worked to revitalize the organization’s grassroots political capability and affiliate network. She became NARAL’s deputy director in 1989 and helped propel the organization’s transformation into a major force in American electoral politics. She joined the National Partnership in 1991.
Ness lives in Rockville, MD with her husband, Sydney Martin.
Top Estelle B. Richman, MA
Estelle Richman, Secretary for Pennsylvania Department of Public Welfare, was appointed in January 2003 by Governor Edward G. Rendell.
Her career spans more than 25 years of public service, including her most recent position as the first female Managing Director for the City of Philadelphia, responsible for oversight of 13 city departments. She also served as the first Director of Social Services for the City of Philadelphia. Her efforts led to a more integrated and coordinated system of delivery to ensure that health and social services for Philadelphia's children, adults and families are provided in a more effective and efficient way. Other positions held by Ms. Richman include the City of Philadelphia's Commissioner of Public Health and Deputy Commissioner for Mental Health, Mental Retardation and Substance Abuse Services; Southeast Area Director for the Office of Mental Health in the Pennsylvania Department of Public Welfare and Assistant Director with the Positive Education Program in Ohio.
Ms. Richman is the recipient of the 1998 Ford Foundation/Good Housekeeping Award for Women in Government. In addition, Behavioral Health System, largely created by Ms. Richman, was named a winner of the 1999 Innovations in American Government from the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University. A nationally recognized expert on issues of behavioral health and children's services, Ms. Richman has been honored for advocacy efforts by the National Alliance on Mental Illness; the American Psychiatric Association and the American Medical Association, among others.
She holds a master's degree from Cleveland State University.
Top Beverly Woo, MD
Dr. Woo received her medical degree from Stanford University School of Medicine. She completed her residency training in internal medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston and was a clinical fellow in medicine at Harvard Medical School. A member of the Society of General Internal Medicine, American Medical Women’s Association and the Federated Council for Internal Medicine Task Force on Curriculum for Internal Medicine Residency Programs, she has served on the editorial boards of Harvard Family Health Letter and Harvard Women’s Health Watch. Dr. Woo is also the Associate Master of the Francis Weld Peabody Society and the Director of the Patient-Doctor I Course at Harvard Medical School. Her major research interests include the diagnostic evaluation of common medical problems (anemia and gynecologic infections) and preventive medicine and appropriate use of screening examinations and tests in clinical practice relative to breast cancer. She practices general internal medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital. Dr. Woo is the author or co-author of a number of original journal articles, book chapters and monographs, and reviews. She serves on the Committee on Communications for the CPD Program, Committee on Certification, and Committee on General Internal Medicine. Dr. Woo was elected to the ABIM Board of Directors in 1997 and as an ABIM Foundation Trustee in 2004.