PHILADELPHIA, November 7, 2006 -- The Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) awarded eight individuals, including five internists who are members of the American College of Physicians (ACP), for their outstanding contributions to academic medicine at the AAMC's 117th annual meeting last week in Seattle, Washington.
The following ACP members earned AAMC honors. Each has achieved ACP's Fellow (FACP) or Master (MACP) status, an honorary ACP designation that recognizes ongoing individual service and contributions to the practice of medicine.
Francois M. Abboud, MD, MACP, earned the AAMC Award for Distinguished Research in the Biomedical Sciences. Established in 1947, the award recognizes outstanding clinical or laboratory research conducted by a medical school faculty member. Dr. Abboud is a professor of internal medicine and of molecular physiology and biophysics, the Edith King Pearson Chair of Cardiovascular Research, and associate vice president for research at the University of Iowa Roy J. and Lucille A. Carver College of Medicine. He is the former chair of the Department of Medicine at the University of Iowa Roy J. and Lucille A. Carver College of Medicine.
Eugene Braunwald, MD, MACP, earned the David E. Rogers Award. Sponsored by the AAMC and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the award recognizes a medical school faculty member who has made major contributions to improving the health and health care of the American people. Dr. Braunwald is Distinguished Hersey Professor of Theory and Practice of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and chairman of the Thrombolysis in Myocardial Infarction Study Group at Brigham and Women's Hospital. He is the former chair of the Department of Medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital.
Jordan J. Cohen, MD, MACP, earned the Abraham Flexner Award for Distinguished Service to Medical Education. Established by the AAMC in 1958, the award recognizes extraordinary individual contributions to medical schools and to the medical education community as a whole. Dr. Cohen is president emeritus of the AAMC, and chair of the Arnold P. Gold Foundation. Additionally, he serves on the board of directors of several organizations, including the Foundation for Biomedical Research; the Josiah Macy, Jr. Foundation; the Morehouse School of Medicine; National Medical Fellowships, Inc.; and the Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development.
Molly Cooke, MD, FACP, earned an Alpha Omega Alpha (AOA) Robert J. Glaser Distinguished Teacher Award, established by the AOA medical honor society in 1988 to provide national recognition to faculty members who have distinguished themselves in medical student education. Dr. Cooke is Governor of ACP's Northern California Chapter and professor of medicine and an endowed chair in the division of internal medicine at University of California, San Francisco, School of Medicine, where she has taught for more than 20 years. During the 2006-07 academic year, she is serving as senior scholar with the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and co-directing its Study on Medical Education.
Jeffrey G, Wiese, MD, FACP, earned an Alpha Omega Alpha Robert J. Glaser Distinguished Teacher Award, established by the AOA medical honor society in 1988 to provide national recognition to faculty members who have distinguished themselves in medical student education. Dr. Wiese is associate professor of medicine at Tulane University Health Sciences Center and chief of medicine at The Medical Center of Louisiana at New Orleans.
Internists, also known as doctors of internal medicine, specialize in the prevention, detection, and treatment of illness in adults. Internists can choose to focus their practice on general internal medicine or may subspecialize in one of 14 areas, such as cardiology, gastroenterology, or rheumatology.
The American College of Physicians (www.acponline.org) is the largest medical specialty organization and the second-largest physician group in the United States. ACP members include 120,000 internal medicine physicians (internists), related subspecialists, and medical students.