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Keohane Names Search Committee for Duke Health System CEO

Roy J. Bostock will chair the committee that will search for the next leader of the university's health system

 

DURHAM, N.C. -- Duke University President Nannerl O. Keohane has appointed a 13-member committee to search for the university's next chancellor for health affairs, who also will serve as the president and chief executive officer of the Duke University Health System (DUHS).

Roy. J. Bostock, a founding member of the DUHS board of directors who retired from Duke's Board of Trustees this past July after 12 years of service, including the chairmanship of the Trustees' Business and Finance Committee, will chair the search committee. Bostock is chairman emeritus of BCom3 Group Inc., one of the world's leading advertising and marketing communications holding companies. Charles B. Hammond, M.D., E.C. Hamblen Professor and former chairman of the Department of Obstetrics/Gynecology, will serve as vice chair. The rest of the search committee includes Duke trustees, faculty, staff, a student representative and a representative from the Durham community.

Ralph Snyderman, M.D., announced on March 4 that he plans to step down in June 2004 as chancellor for health affairs at Duke University, where he is also president and chief executive officer of DUHS. Snyderman helped guide a number of important initiatives at Duke during the past 15 years, including the establishment of the Duke Clinical Research Institute, the Institute for Genome Sciences and Policy and the Duke University Health System.

"This is a crucially important leadership position at Duke. I am confident we will attract a recognized leader to one of the most attractive and dynamic leadership roles in all of academic medicine," Keohane said. "I've asked the search committee to conduct a broad and thoughtful search, and to provide me with a short list of candidates who are highly qualified to provide strong leadership for the medical center and health system. We hope the committee will be able to complete its work by late February 2004."

Keohane also plans to step down at the end of June. A separate search committee, headed by Robert K. Steel, vice chair of Duke's Board of Trustees, seeks to help the Trustees select Duke's ninth president by February 2004. The search for Keohane's successor was launched this summer. Keohane said the Trustees had intentionally sequenced the presidential search with the chancellor's search so the new president can participate in the process of selecting the next chancellor.

Joining Bostock and Hammond on the committee are:

-- Nancy B. Allen, M.D., professor of medicine, rheumatology and immunology, and chair of Duke's Academic Council, the university faculty governance body;

-- Charles Blackmon, community representative and past president of the Durham County Hospital Corporation and a member of the DUHS Board of Directors;

-- James Brashears, medical school student;

-- Blanche Capel, Ph.D., associate professor in the Department of Cell Biology;

-- Elizabeth C. Clipp, Ph.D., professor in the School of Nursing;

-- Daniel P. Kiehart, Ph.D., professor in the Department of Biology;

-- William G. Mitchell, Ph.D., professor in Duke's Fuqua School of Business;

-- Joseph O. Moore, M.D., professor of medicine, oncology and transplant services;

-- Dale Purves, M.D., past chair of the department of neurobiology;

-- Benjamin D. Reese Jr., Ph.D., vice president for institutional equity;

-- Karl M. von der Heyden, member of the DUHS board of directors and chair of the Duke University Trustees' business and finance committee.

N. Allison Haltom, vice president and university secretary, will serve as a non-voting ex-officio member of the committee. Julie Clodfelter is the committee's staff assistant.

Duke University Health System is a non-profit, fully integrated academic health care system dedicated to providing outstanding patient care, educating tomorrow's health care leaders and discovering new and better ways to treat disease through biomedical research. Duke University Medical Center includes the Schools of Medicine and Nursing, operates one of the country's largest clinical and biomedical research enterprises, and is dedicated to quickly translating advances in technology and medical knowledge into improved patient care.