Leaders in the Heersink School of Medicine are joined by the UAB Office for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion vice-president to serve as an Advisory Council to ODI by providing input and feedback regarding our ODI plans and initiatives. This allows us to leverage the diversity of thought, experience, and expertise of our leaders as we develop strategies to implement our priorities. Council members also serve as key advocates for diversity and inclusion initiatives throughout the school.
Paulette Patterson Dilworth, Ph.D.
UAB Vice President
Office for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
Paulette Patterson Dilworth was named Vice President for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at UAB in October 2015. Before joining UAB, she was faculty and assistant vice president for access and community initiatives at Auburn University and associate professor of curriculum studies in the School of Education at Indiana University-Bloomington. She earned a Ph.D. in educational studies from Emory University in Atlanta. Before moving to Indiana University in 2000, she worked at Emory University in the Office of Equal Opportunity Programs as Director of Minority Affairs and Assistant Director of Equal Opportunity Programs. Dr. Dilworth has more than 30 years of experience in higher education, diversity education consulting and training, recruitment, retention, research, teaching, and activism. In addition to this work, Dr. Dilworth has a strong affinity for art and music.
Cheri L. Canon, M.D.
Chair
Department of Radiology
Cheri L. Canon, M.D. is a Professor and Witten-Stanley Endowed Chair of Radiology at the Heersink School of Medicine and sits on UAB Medicine Joint Operating Leadership Council. She served as an oral examiner for the American Board of Radiology (ABR) for eleven years, a member of the Board of Trustees, and now sits on its Board of Governors as president-elect. She was the vice chair of the American College of Radiology (ACR), chancellor on the board, and previously served as the chair of the ACR Commission on Education. She is the past president of the Society of Chairs of Academic Radiology Departments (SCARD) and the co-creator of LEAD, a women’s leadership development program jointly developed by SCARD and GE Healthcare. She is active in the Birmingham community and is a member of the Birmingham Rotary Club and a MOMENTUM alumna, a Birmingham women’s leadership organization.
LaKisha Mack, MBA
Senior Associate Dean,
Administration and Finance
LaKisha Mack began her UAB career more than 20 years ago in the O’Neal Comprehensive Cancer Center, where she was a financial assistant in the Center’s clinical studies unit. She joined the Heersink School of Medicine Dean’s office in 2014 as the Associate Dean for Finance and Administration to ensure organizational alignment in the areas of finance, human resources, and facilities. Since then, she has worked with faculty and staff across the school to allocate and approve budgets, conduct financial forecasting, interpret policies, and manage federal regulations regarding funded research. As the Senior Associate Dean of Finance and Administration at Heersink, Ms. Mack ensures policy compliance, participates in strategic planning, and collaborates with the university and health system on all administrative and financial activities.
Mitchell Cohen, M.D.
Chair
Department of Pediatrics
Mitchell Cohen, a national leader in pediatric medicine and an internationally renowned specialist in children's digestive disorders, also serves as physician-in-chief of Children's of Alabama. Cohen holds the Katharine Reynolds Ireland Chair in Pediatrics at Heersink School of Medicine. Before joining the faculty at UAB, he was vice chair of pediatrics for clinical affairs and director of Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center in Cincinnati, Ohio. He received his MD from Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, followed by an internship and residency at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland. He also served as a Lieutenant Commander in the Commissioned Corps USPHS. He is a past president of the North American Society for Pediatric Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition and is the current chair of the Section of Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition of the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Marie-Carmelle Elie, M.D.
Chair,
Department of Emergency Medicine
Marie-Carmelle Elie, M.D. is the Endowed Emergency Medicine Professor and Chair of the Department of Emergency Medicine at Heersink School of Medicine. Dr. Elie obtained her undergraduate degree from Columbia University and her medical degree from the State University of New York in Brooklyn with a distinction in research. Following her emergency medicine residency at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York, she completed the prestigious Critical Care/Trauma Fellowship at the R. Adam Cowley Shock Trauma Center at the University of Maryland. She is triple board-certified in emergency medicine, critical care, and hospice and palliative care medicine. Dr. Elie has previously served in leadership posts at the University of Florida as the Director of Emergency Medicine Research and the Chief Medical Officer of Haven Hospice and Palliative Care. In 2022, she became the first academic physician at the intersection of emergency, critical care, and palliative care medicine to be inducted into the National Academy of Medicine.
Seth Landefeld, M.D.
Chair
Department of Medicine
Seth Landefeld is a physician and clinical investigator in geriatrics and health care research. He joined UAB from the University of California San Francisco, where he was chief of the division of Geriatrics and associate chair for strategic planning and implementation in the UCSF Department of Medicine. In landmark studies of acutely ill hospitalized elders, Landefeld and his colleagues invented the Acute Care for Elders Unit, a novel method for improving patients’ functional outcomes. This model has been adopted at medical centers nationwide, including at UAB Hospital. Landefeld received his medical degree from Yale and trained in internal medicine at UCSF and in clinical epidemiology at Harvard. He is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation and the Association of American Physicians and was recently a Fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University. In 2011, he received the Robert J. Glaser Award “For Exceptional Contributions to Education and Research,” the highest award of the Society of General Internal Medicine.
Herb Chen, M.D., FACS
Chair,
Department of Surgery
Dr. Chen is Chair of the Department of Surgery at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB), and the Surgeon-in-Chief of UAB Hospital and Health System. He is a Professor of Surgery, Pediatrics, and Biomedical Engineering and holds the Fay Fletcher Kerner Endowed Chair. His clinical interests include endocrine surgery, and he is a pioneer in radio-guided parathyroid surgery. Dr. Chen’s lab has been continuously funded for over 21 years and studies the role of Notch signaling in thyroid and neuroendocrine cancers. He is the American Cancer Society MEN2 Thyroid Cancer Professor. Dr. Chen is the Editor-in-Chief of the American Journal of Surgery. He has held several leadership positions in major academic societies, including President of the Society of Asian Academic Surgeons Foundation, President of the Association for Academic Surgery, President of the Society of Clinical Surgery, President of the American Association of Endocrine Surgeons, and President of Surgical Biology Club II. Dr. Chen has mentored over 130 faculty, post-doctoral fellows, residents, medical students, and undergraduates in his lab. He has published over 620 original research and review articles and has edited 28 textbooks. He is well-known for his passion for teaching and mentoring the next generation of surgical leaders. Dr. Chen has also been recognized as a champion for diversity, equity, and inclusion.
Craig Hoesley, M.D
Senior Associate Dean, Medical Education
Chair, Department of Medical Education
Dr. Hoesley is a member of the faculty at Heersink School of Medicine and currently serves as the Senior Associate Dean for Medical Education and Chair of the Department of Medical Education. He received his medical degree from the University of South Florida and completed his internship, internal medicine residency, chief residency, and infectious disease fellowship at UAB. He joined the UAB faculty in 1999 and served as the internal medicine clerkship director before becoming the associate dean for undergraduate medical education in 2008. As senior associate dean, he oversees the undergraduate and graduate medical education programs, continuing medical education, and medical student services at the school. Dr. Hoesley's research interests include the development of a microbicide to prevent the sexual transmission of HIV, and he is the UAB site leader for the NIH-funded Microbicide Trials Network. He is also the current chair of the University Hospital Pharmacy and Therapeutic Committee.