Medical Center Physician Chosen for National Board
Javeed Sukhera, M.D., a fellow in Psychiatry at the University of Rochester Medical Center, has been named to the board of directors of the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC).
The 17-member board serves as the governing body for the association, which represents all 133 accredited U.S. and 17 accredited Canadian medical schools, almost 400 major teaching hospitals and health systems, including 62 Department of Veterans Affairs medical centers, and nearly 90 academic and scientific societies. Through these institutions and organizations, the AAMC represents 128,000 faculty members, 75,000 medical students, and 110,000 resident physicians.
A native of Toronto, Canada, Sukhera will serve a two-year term as the resident physician representative on the AAMC board. He recently completed his residency and is now a fellow in child and adolescent psychiatry at the Medical Center.
“I am honored and humbled by my appointment and look forward to working with my colleagues in AAMC leadership to address the numerous challenges faced by academic medicine, while facilitating innovation and supporting the work of medical schools, teaching hospitals, residents and students,” he said.
Sukhera, a graduate of Trinity College at the University of Toronto, earned his medical degree at the Medical School for International Health, a collaboration between Columbia University and Ben-Gurion University in Israel with an emphasis on global health.
During his time in Israel, Sukhera took a leadership role with a Canadian organization that fostered scientific collaboration between Israeli, Palestinian and Jordanian health professionals. He mentored health professions students and organized a forum between Palestinians and Israelis on the future of academic medicine within the region, eventually presenting the findings in a report entitled, “Academic Medicine in Areas of Conflict” at an international conference.
Sukhera has continued to pursue professional and academic interests as a resident at the Medical Center, including establishing a global psychiatry track within his residency program and traveling to rural Honduras to conduct research on intimate partner violence.
He has received the University’s John Romano Award for Excellence in Medical Student Teaching and the American Psychiatric Institute for Research and Education’s Janssen Scholarship, recognizing his potential as a future leader in mental health research. In 2008, he was nominated by the American Association of Chairs of Departments of Psychiatry to the Organization of Resident Representatives.
The board’s new members were announced during the AAMC’s annual meeting in November. The board also includes an alumnus of the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry, Philip A. Pizzo, M.D., now dean of Stanford University’s School of Medicine. To view the complete list of board members, go to: https://www.aamc.org/about/leadership/45080/leadership_board.html.