It is the honor of a lifetime to be nominated for the ACAAI Gold Headed Cane Award. I am currently an Emeritus Professor of Medicine at The Ohio State University. While at Ohio State I served in many roles including Chair of the Division of Allergy and Immunology; inaugural Program Director for the Allergy Immunology Fellowship; Designated Institutional Official, Associate Medical Director for University Hospitals, and Associate Dean for Graduate Medical Education. I am particularly proud of my work as a member of the Medicine and the Arts Board (Chair, 2011-13). This board successfully brought music, theatre, dance, poetry, art and narrative literature into all aspects of the medical center.
Before Ohio State, I spent 29 years in the Army, retiring as a Colonel in 2008. I spent the last nine years of my Army service at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center, where I served as the Chair of the Allergy Immunology Department, the Program Director of the National Capital Consortium Allergy Immunology Fellowship, Deputy Director of the National Vaccine HealthCare Centers Network, and Consultant to the Army Surgeon General for Allergy and Immunology.
In 2001, I was elected to the Order of Military Medical Merit, which recognizes distinguished service, the highest standards of integrity and moral character, an outstanding degree of professional competence and sustained contributions to Army Medicine. One of the greatest honors I received was the Lewis Aspey Mologne Award, the Army Surgeon General’s Award for Military Academic Excellence in 2006. This is given annually to the one Medical Corps officer who best exhibits a balance between outstanding leadership in military medicine and leadership in academics at a national level. In 2022, I was inducted into the Ohio Veterans Hall of Fame.
At my first College meeting in 1991, I was elected as the national Fellows-in-Training (FITs) Representative, representing FITs at the Board of Regents. It was during this time that I began to be mentored by some of our profession’s greatest. In 1996, I became a Fellow of the College and served on the Board of Regents (2004-07), returning to the Board as Treasurer in 2011. I served as President of the College (2015-16). In 2018, I was elected to the Board of Directors of the World Allergy Organization (WAO), representing ACAAI, and was elected as the WAO President for the 2023-2024 term.
Within the College, most people know me as the moderator of the FIT Bowl; I have been Co-chair of that event since its inauguration. I have represented ACAAI as Co-chair of the Joint Task Force for the ABAI Board Review Course, the Joint Task Force on the Future of Allergy, and on the Board of Directors of the Joint Council on Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (JCAAI). I have been on multiple committees and given many presentations at College meetings, including the Bernard Berman Memorial Lecture. The College was kind enough to give me both the Distinguished Fellow Award (2011) and the Distinguished Service Award (2023).
Active in organized medicine, I represented ACAAI in several roles within the AMA House of Delegates; Resident Physician Section; Young Physician Section, to include Governing Council from (1997-99); and as the Interim Delegate and then Alternate Delegate for ACAAI (2000-2013). I also served as an advisor on the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Allergenic Products Advisory Committee (2009-12).
Within the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME), I have been elected (2006-08) and re-elected (2008-11) as Chair of the Allergy Immunology Residency Review Committee (RRC). In 2012, I was selected for the ACGME Parker J. Palmer “Courage to Teach” Award.
