Physicians Workforce Advisory Committee Profiles
Stephen W. Bowman
Senior Staff Attorney/Methodologist
Joint Commission on Health Care
Stephen serves as Senior Staff Attorney/Methodologist for the Joint Commission on Health Care. He received his Juris Doctor and Master of Public Policy from the College of William and Mary and has worked in Virginia Government for the past 7 years.
Robin Clair Cummings
Assistant Director, Health Policy and Research
Medical Society of Virginia
Ms. Cummings is the Assistant Director of Health Policy and Research at the Medical Society of Virginia. She has previously served as Director of Programs of the Medical Society of Virginia Foundation, where she also held positions in preventive health and fund development. Prior to her work with the Medical Society, she has also worked in both the hospital and private practice settings. Ms. Cummings is graduated from Virginia Commonwealth University where she received her Master of Science in Health Administration and James Madison University where she received her undergraduate degree in Health Administration. She resides in Richmond with her husband Scott.
W illiam L. Harp, MD
Executive Director
DHP Board of Medicine (2000-Present)
Aileen Edwards Harris, M.S.A.
Healthcare Workforce and “Acting” Rural Health Manager
Division of Primary Care and Rural Health
Office of Minority Health & Public Health Policy
Virginia Department of Health
Aileen Edwards Harris, M.S.A. joined the Virginia Department of Health, Office of Minority Health and Public Health Policy in May 2005 as the Healthcare Workforce Incentives Coordinator. A year later, Aileen managed all incentive programs offered by the State to recruit primary care practitioners to Virginia's rural and underserved areas. Programs include the J-1 Visa Waiver, Nursing Scholarship and Loan Repayment Programs. As well, Aileen oversaw all OMHPHP recruitment and retention efforts while promoting health equity and social justice. In addition to healthcare workforce, Aileen serves in the capacity of the Rural Health Manager and works closely with Virginia's small hospitals to provide quality delivery of services. Aileen provides leadership to the Virginia Recruitment and Retention Collaboration Team, Virginia State Rural Health Plan, the Virginia Peninsula Physician Initiative Committee, the VCU Inner City/Rural Preceptorship Program Advisory Committee and serves on the National Rural Recruitment and Retention Network and Virginia Rural Health Association Boards.
Aileen has over seventeen years of health workforce related professional
experiences including serving as: Director of Admissions and Minority Affairs
at Virginia Commonwealth University, School of Medicine; Assistant Dean
of Diversity and
Aileen Edwards Harris, M.S.A., continued
Minority Affairs at Jefferson Medical College; and Pre-Medical Advisor at the University of Maryland, College Park campus. Mrs. Harris has a strong desire to improve access to healthcare in medically underserved areas as she is a native of Millboro, Virginia. She received her bachelor’s degree from Virginia Commonwealth University and her Masters of Science in Administration from Central Michigan University.
Roger A. Hofford, M.D.
Physician, Program Director and Section Chair
Family Medicine Carilion Clinic
Dr. Roger Hofford has been involved in medical student and family medicine resident education since 1983. He has a longstanding interest in rural medicine, medical informatics, healthcare policy and physician workforce issues.
Dr. Hofford received his undergraduate and medical degrees at the University of Virginia. He completed his family medicine residency at Riverside Hospital in Newport News, Virginia. He completed a faculty development fellowship at Duke University.
Dr. Hofford holds associate professor of family medicine faculty appointments at Virginia Tech Carilion Medical School, University of Virginia School of Medicine, Virginia Commonwealth University – Medical College of Virginia, and Virginia College of Osteopathic Medicine.
Dr. Hofford is a past president of the Virginia Academy of Family Physicians and currently serves on their executive committee. He is the founding president for the Virginia Rural Health Resource Center and currently serves as their treasurer. Dr. Hofford is Vice-chair of the Southwest Virginia Graduate Medical Education Consortium which was created by the Virginia General Assembly in 1999 to address the physician shortage in Southwest Virginia.
Michael T. Lundberg
Executive Director
Virginia Health Information (VHI)
Michael Lundberg has over two decades experience in developing health information for businesses, consumers, health care providers, and policymakers. His experience includes collection and use of information from hospitals, health insurance plans, long term care facilities, outpatient surgical centers and physicians. Health information produced has included consumer guides, efficiency reports, financial comparisons, health outcomes measurement, public health evaluation, motor vehicle crash outcomes, HYBRID administrative and laboratory data sets, and support for pay for performance programs in multiple states. Michael has worked to tailor reports to the varied needs of health care stakeholders . . . from consumers to policymakers with providers and businesses in between.
After receiving a Bachelor of Science degree and graduate studies at Old Dominion University, Michael began his career in health care data with a Professional Standards Review Organization (PSRO).
Michael’s employment background also includes hospitals, Peer Review Organizations, and, since July 1993, as Executive Director for Virginia Health Information, a nonprofit health care information company serving businesses, consumers, providers, and others. Through this venue, consumer guides, databases, and analytical systems have been designed and made publicly available for use by those interested in making more informed health care decisions.
Michael serves in leadership positions with nonprofit organizations including Virginians Improving Patient Care and Safety, Centralized Credentials Verification Service, Inc. (CCVS) and the National Association of Health Data Organizations.
Stephen S. Mick, Ph.D., FACHE
Arthur Graham Glasgow Professor and Chair
Department of Health Administration
Virginia Commonwealth University
Education
Yale, Doctor of Philosophy, Sociology
Research/Teaching Areas
Dr. Mick's current teaching responsibilities include HAD 602, "The
Health Services System," and HAD 702, "Health Care Financing,
Organization, and Delivery Systems." Other teaching interests include
health care management and organization, rural health and health services,
and comparative national systems. His research interests include the health
care workforce-particularly international medical graduates (IMGs), rural
health care, and the relation between health care resources, use of services,
and health status.
Awarded a Fulbright Senior Research Fellowship, Dr. Mick spent the 1993-94 academic year in France studying rural hospitals. He has been a consultant to the Council on Graduate Medical Education (COGME). During his career, Dr. Mick has taught health administration at Yale University, Oklahoma University, the University of Washington, the Johns Hopkins University, and the University of Michigan, where he directed the Doctoral Program in Health Services Organization and Policy. From 1997 through 1999, he was a delegate to annual meetings of the International Medical Workforce Conference. Dr. Mick is currently serving a four-year term as the Chairperson of the Health Systems Research study section of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ). He is also on the Advisory Council of the RUPRI Center for Rural Health Policy Analysis.
Dr. Mick serves as a Commissioner for the Commission on Accreditation for Healthcare Management Education (CAHME). He is a member of the board of the Coalition for
Health Services Research, and he is the 2007 Co-Chair of the Program Planning Committee for the Annual Meeting of the Association for University Programs in Health Administration (AUPHA).
Current Projects
Under contract from the Virginia Department of Health, Dr. Mick and his
research group are developing estimates of the requirements for physicians
for the years 2010 and 2015. This work should provide state policy makers
and other interested parties with a new assessment of the probable trends
in primary care and specialty care medicine in the Commonwealth.
Dr. Mick is also working with Laura L. Morlock, Ph.D., of the Johns Hopkins University, on a follow-up study of some 1,000 rural hospitals to determine the outcome of two decades of changing federal and state reimbursement policies and of market forces on hospital performance and survival. Funded by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, this study will be the most comprehensive assessment of rural hospital activities since Mick and Morlock's earlier work in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
Dixie Tooke-Rawlins
Dean and Vice President
Virginia College of Osteopathic Medicine (VCOM)
Dixie Tooke-Rawlins grew up in a rural community, and as a young woman just out of high school worked as an office assistant for two physicians while attending nursing school at night to prepare for college. "I realized then I wanted to know more answers about medicine than I could study for as a nurse," she recalled. "My mother was a dietician at a nursing home, and she encouraged me to be in health care. She was always talking about her patients and how it was possible to make a difference helping people."
Tooke-Rawlins graduated from medical school in Osteopathic Medicine and began her career working in emergency medicine. After eight years, she shifted her focus to family medicine and eventually into academic medicine. A series of fortuitous career steps brought her to the recently established (2001) Edward Via Virginia College of Osteopathic Medicine (VCOM), which she helped to found and now serves as Dean.
Located in the heart of the Blue Ridge and Appalachian Mountains, VCOM's
mission is to prepare osteopathic primary care physicians to serve the rural
and medically underserved areas of the Appalachian region, and to provide
scientific research that improves human health.
The college focuses on recruiting students from rural areas and providing
training that encourages doctors to practice in rural setting, while also
working to increase the number of minority medical students serving in these
communities.
VCOM is also active in establishing ongoing medical mission programs for providing care and clinical training in the Dominican Republic and Central America-an important initiative for the college, according to Tooke-Rawlins.
Nominated as a Local Legend by Rep. Rick Boucher (D-VA-9), Tooke-Rawlins used her medical and academic experience, and leadership abilities to play a critical role in establishing VCOM, an institution greatly needed in an underserved section of Virginia. "One challenge prepares you for the next, Tooke-Rawlins commented. I've always liked helping to establish and start new things."
As Dean and Vice President for Academic Affairs for VCOM, Tooke-Rawlins oversaw the initial building design, the budget, the faculty recruitment, and the establishment of a new medical curriculum designed to provide significant training experiences for students in rural areas and community hospitals. The College provides state of the art facility and support to the teaching hospitals through electronic libraries, telecommunications, videoconferencing, and access to a structured academic program.
"The opportunity to be part of a new college of osteopathic medicine has been wonderful," she said. "Any change or movement in established curriculums is difficult, but now, starting from the beginning, I can help shape our mission.
"The VCOM recruitment and curriculum is focused on producing physicians who practice compassionate care for those most in need and who focus on caring for the whole patient, mind, body, and spirit.
"But really I also feel my greatest achievement is my family. Along with practicing medicine, my husband and I have managed to raise two very fine sons, whose achievements will overshadow mine someday I'm sure" commented Tooke-Rawlins.