Macaran A. Baird, MD, Lecture
Join us for the Macaran A. Baird, MD, Lecture in Family Medicine and Community Health Leadership as we honor the contributions of Macaran A. Baird, MD, MS, professor and department head from 2002-2017, while exploring timely topics in family medicine and community health leadership.
Honoring the Legacy of Dr. Baird
Beloved by many, Macaran A. Baird, MD, MS, contributed extraordinary leadership and foresight to the Department of Family Medicine and Community Health throughout his 15 years of service. By creating a dedicated fund and an annual lecture that bears his name, we honor Dr. Baird's legacy in the spirit of continual evolution in family medicine.
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Our 2023 Lecture Featuring Dr. Cristy Page
Cristy Page, MD, MPH, is a family physician and national leader in rural healthcare delivery and workforce development.
She currently serves as executive dean of the UNC School of Medicine, a position she has held since 2019. In this role, she oversees the school’s tripartite mission of clinical care, teaching, and research. Under Page’s leadership, the UNC School of Medicine has made great strides towards realizing the vision of being known as the nation’s leading public school of medicine.
Page has overseen a continual increase in research funding. In 2022, funding exceeded $600 million for the first time, growing by more than $100 million since 2019. The school is also in the midst of a period of growth in medical education. In the spring of 2023, the UNC School of Medicine will open Roper Hall, a new medical education building. In the coming years, the school will also expand its class size to better meet the healthcare needs of North Carolina.
In addition to her leadership within the UNC School of Medicine, Page also oversees the educational and research enterprise across UNC Health’s statewide system. She is responsible for expansion and development of branch campuses to train more health providers, strategic growth of residency programs in affiliated hospitals, expansion of clinical trials to new communities, and leadership of statewide faculty, among other priorities. She is also a member of the UNC Health Board of Directors and a professor in the Department of Family Medicine, where she previously served as chair.
Page’s vision and leadership have also helped expand the clinical, research, and educational footprint of the UNC School of Medicine and UNC Health. She has been instrumental in a partnership with fellow North Carolina system Novant Health to work together in the Wilmington, North Carolina region. This work includes expanded educational opportunities for medical and other health affairs students, as well as access to clinical trials and expanded pediatric specialty care in the region.
Page’s leadership also expands well beyond UNC. As the founder of the Rural GME and Teaching Health Center GME Center, Page and colleagues have worked to enhance access to care in underserved areas across the nation. The consortium focuses on increasing access to care through support for the development of new rural residency programs across multiple specialties as well as health policy and health workforce scholarship. The consortium has produced extensive research on rural health workforce development and successfully informed policies that support increased access to underserved care. Since 2018, the consortium has directly supported 58 new programs that received funding from the Health Resources and Services Administration’s Rural Residency Planning and Development (RRPD) Program, as well as an additional 46 programs through the Teaching Health Center Planning and Development (THCPD) Program. A total of 463 new rural training positions have been accredited since the program’s inception. The Teaching Health Center GME center received $5 million award from the HRSA in December of 2021 and federal funding for the national centers over the last three years is nearly
$13 million.
A native of Wilmington and life-long North Carolinian, Page first came to UNC as a Morehead Scholar before going on to complete her medical doctorate, master of public health, family medicine residency, chief resident position, and faculty development fellowship in Chapel Hill. She has served on the UNC School of Medicine faculty since 2006.
Our Inaugural Lecture Featuring Dr. Jehni Robinson
Jehni Robinson, MD, is chair and clinical professor of the Department of Family Medicine and associate dean for Primary Care at Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California (USC). Formerly the chief medical officer at the Saban Free Clinic, Dr. Robinson has devoted much of her career to developing large, interdisciplinary teams and creating innovative models for providing comprehensive primary care to underserved communities. She is a true leader whose passion springs from a desire to bring joy to the practice of medicine by creating reliable systems of care that improve quality across a multi-specialty practice.
At our inaugural Dr. Baird Lecture, Dr. Robinson gave a presentation on street medicine. Watch her presentation on YouTube.
