with blood cells. He is a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation trustee emeritus and a past president of the American Diabetes Association.
Edward E. Cornwell, M.D., F.A.C.S., F.C.C.M.
Surgeon-in-Chief, Howard University
Hospital; LaSalle D. Leffall Professor and Chairman of Surgery, Howard
University College of Medicine
Specialty: Surgery
Cornwell, 51, has achieved national recognition for increasing size, scope, and improvements in trauma practices and patient care at some of the nation’s leading medical institutions. In fact, he has spent his career working in communities where young African American males are victims of fatal gunshot wounds. “A phenomenal percentage of gunshot wounds were coming in dead on arrival. So, further improvements were needed in outreach and violence prevention beyond hospital walls,” says Cornwell, who made violence prevention a focal point of mainstream academic surgery.
That is part of his charge as he leads Howard University’s Department of Surgery to national prominence in patient care, teaching, and research. “During the days of segregation, there were few places [for African American medical students] to go other than Meharr
y and Howard,” he says, citing Howard’s role in the development of first-class physicians and surgeons. “A lot of my early heroes were doctors right here.”
Cornwell joined Howard in January, leaving his post as professor of surgery and chief of trauma at Baltimore-based The Johns Hopkins Hospital. A native son of Washington, D.C., his vision for Howard’s department of surgery is to advance surgical procedures such as transplants, cardiovascular surgery, and bariatric surgery used to help obese patients lose weight. He has also focused on the treatment of cancer and improvement of trauma/critical care services. -Carolyn M. Brown
F. Kennedy Gordon, M.D.
Title: Owner, Gordon Elite Sports Medicine P.C.
Specialty: Primary Care Sports Medicine
With a vast career in sports medicine, including work with the New York Giants football team, Gordon’s Union, New Jersey-based practice caters to both pro athletes and individuals who suffer with pain and want to improve their life with exercise. He served as a staff physician at the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Lake Placid, New York, in 2000.
L. Julian Haywood, M.D.
Title: Professor of Medicine, Director, Electrocardiography Department
L.A. County, USC Medical Center
Specialty: Cardiology
A veteran in cardiovascular medicine, Haywood is a senior attending physician at the Los Angeles County, University of Southern California Medical Center. One of the first black full professors in cardiology at a major medical school, he co-developed (with Hewlett-Packard) digital monitoring systems for arrhythmia detection.
Kenneth A. Jamerson, M.D.
Title: Professor, Department of Internal Medicine, University of Michigan Medical School; Medical Director, Program for Multicultural Health, University of Michigan Health System
Specialty: Hypertension
Jamerson has been principal investigator of some of the most noteworthy analyses of hypertension. With the help of clinical research to explore racial disparities in the treatment of elevated blood pressure levels, he and his colleagues are gaining insight into why African Americans make up such a disproportionate share of patients.
Risa Lavizzo-Mourey, M.D., M.B.A.
Title: President and CEO, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
Specialty: Geriatrics
Lavizzo-Mourey leads the Princeton, New Jersey, nonprofit that deploys nearly $500 million in annual grants to fund the improvement of the