Dr. David Blumenthal to Be the 2010 Lubin Distinguished Visiting Professor (Sept. 15)

Dr. David Blumenthal

David Blumenthal, M.D., M.P.P., will be the 2010 Lorraine and Ralph Lubin Distinguished Visiting Professor at Weill Cornell Medical College. Dr. Blumenthal will meet with medical students, faculty and members of the administration during his day at Weill Cornell. He will give a formal lecture, "The Future of Health Information Technology: Meaningful Use of Electronic Health Records," at the David Rogers Health Policy Colloquium on Wednesday, Sept. 15, at 1 p.m. in Uris auditorium. The public is welcome to attend his talk.

Dr. Blumenthal serves as the national coordinator for Health Information Technology under President Barack Obama. In this role he is charged with building an interoperable, private and secure nationwide health information system and supporting the widespread, meaningful use of Health Information Technology (HIT).

Dr. Blumenthal received his undergraduate, medical and public policy degrees from Harvard University and completed his residency in internal medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital. Prior to his appointment to the administration, he was the Samuel O. Thier Professor of Medicine and professor of health policy at the Massachusetts General Hospital/Partners HealthCare System and Harvard Medical School. He was practicing primary care physician as well as director of the Institute for Health Policy. Dr. Blumenthal is a renowned health services researcher and national authority on HIT adoption. With his colleagues from Harvard Medical School, he authored the seminal studies on the adoption and use of health information technology in the United States. He is the author of more than 200 scholarly publications, including most recently "Heart of Power: Health and Politics in the Oval Office," which tells the history of U.S. presidents' involvement in health reform from Franklin Roosevelt through George W. Bush.

A member of the Institute of Medicine and a former board member and national correspondent for the New England Journal of Medicine, Dr. Blumenthal has held several leadership positions in medicine, government and academia including as senior vice president at Boston's Brigham and Women's Hospital; executive director of the Center for Health Policy and Management and lecturer on public policy at the Kennedy School of Government; and as a professional staff member on Senator Edward Kennedy's Senate Subcommittee on Health and Scientific Research.

He was the founding chairman of AcademyHealth and served previously on the boards of the University of Chicago Health System and of the University of Pennsylvania Health System. He is recipient of the Distinguished Investigator Award from AcademyHealth and was awarded a Doctor of Humane Letters from Rush University.

Dr. Madelon Lubin Finkel, professor of clinical public health and director of the Office of Global Health Education at Weill Cornell, endowed the Lorraine and Ralph Lubin Distinguished Visiting Professorship in the Department of Public Health in memory of her parents. The Lubins strongly believed in the value of education as a means to making a difference in the lives of others. Over the past 10 years, each recipient of the annual award has achieved the highest recognition in either the field of epidemiology or health care policy and is regarded as an excellent role model for students. As part of the daylong event, the awardee has the opportunity to meet with students taking the Public Health Clerkship as well as with interested first- and second-year students. The highlight of the day is the lecture presented at the Rogers Health Policy Colloquium.

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