Dartmouth-Hitchcock’s Boards of Trustees elected a new chair and three new members during the Board’s meeting on December 4, 2015.
Anne-Lee Verville, of Hopkinton, NH, will begin her term as Board Chair on January 1, 2016. She succeeds outgoing Chair Prof. Robert A. Oden Jr. Ph.D. who will remain on the Board and will serve as Vice Chair.
Verville worked at IBM for 30 years, retiring in 1997. She served as IBM United States Marketing Group Chief Financial Officer, IBM Chief Information Officer, and led IBM’s effort to support the education industry worldwide from 1994 until her retirement.
In addition to serving on the Dartmouth-Hitchcock and Dartmouth-Hitchcock Health Boards of Trustees, Verville serves on the Board of Trustees of the Columbia Threadneedle Atlantic Mutual Funds. She is a member of the Committee of 200 and serves on the C200 Finance Committee. She was appointed to the National Skill Standards Board in 1995 by President Bill Clinton. Previously, she served on the Board of Directors of the National Alliance of Business and the Board of Advisors at the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University, the Board of Trustees of Western Governors’ University, and the Board of Advisors at Wake Forest University.
Verville earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in mathematics from Smith College and received an honorary Doctor of Commercial Sciences from Bloomsburg University.
“I am honored to be elected by my colleagues to lead the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Boards,” said Verville. “The challenges ahead are many for the future of health care, but so are the incredible opportunities. Dr. Jim Weinstein and our leadership team have designed a strategic model that has D-H well-positioned to achieve a sustainable health system. I’m excited about our future as D-H continues to provide the best care possible for our patients.”
In addition, Dartmouth-Hitchcock physicians Dr. Jeffrey A. Cohen, Dr. Timothy D. Scherer, and Dr. Brian C. Spence were elected to three-year terms on the Board.
Cohen is the Chair of Neurology at Dartmouth-Hitchcock, a position he’s held since 2012, and a professor of neurology at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth. He joined the Dartmouth-Hitchcock faculty in 2001. His areas of clinical focus include autonomic testing, clinical electrophysiology, neuromuscular disorders, peripheral neuropathy, and Post Polio Syndrome.
Dr. Cohen has served as director of Dartmouth-Hitchcock’s ALS Clinic since 2002, and co-director of the Adult MDA Clinic since 2006. In 2003 he established and became the director of the Clinical Neurophysiology and Fellowship Program. He has been a mentor as part of the Dartmouth Hitchcock Leadership Preventative Medicine Residency Program since 2003. In 2006, Dr. Cohen collaborated with a Dartmouth undergraduate to form Co-SIGN (College Student Interest Group in Neurology) which received funding from the American Academy of Neurology. He has been a course co-director for SBM neurosciences and regularly teaches as part of the medical student lecture series and Neurology small group sessions. He teaches students, residents, and fellows in the clinic, the inpatient unit, and in the classroom. He was recognized as the 2014 Burton Sandok Visiting Professor of Neurology at the Mayo Clinic.
Dr. Cohen earned a medical degree from the University of Oklahoma School of Medicine, and completed his internship and residency at Mt. Sinai Medical Center in New York.
Scherer is the Chair of Gastroenterology at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Nashua, where he has worked as an attending physician since 2002 specializing in general clinical gastroenterology, hepatology and advanced pancreaticobiliary endoscopy. He is presently the medical director of the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Nashua Endoscopy Center and has been a member of the Board of Governors at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Nashua since 2006.
He has been the recipient of New Hampshire Magazine’s “Top Doctor” for Gastroenterology eight years in a row. He is the founder of the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Southern Region GI tumor board at Saint Joseph Hospital in Nashua; Director of the Metabolic Syndrome Clinic program at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Nashua; and the co-founder of the Multidisciplinary GI tumor clinic at Norris Cotton Cancer Center in Manchester. Dr. Scherer also sits on the Dartmouth-Hitchcock GI Steering committee representing the Nashua campus. He currently practices at St. Joseph Hospital and Southern New Hampshire Medical Center in Nashua, and at Catholic Medical Center in Manchester.
Dr. Scherer is a graduate of State University of New York in Brooklyn, NY, and completed his residency training in Internal Medicine at Dartmouth-Hitchcock. He obtained fellowship training in Gastroenterology at Lahey Clinic in Burlington, MA, where he received the Outstanding Academic Achievement Award.
Spence is a member of the Department of Anesthesiology, with subspecialty focus in both regional and cardiac anesthesia. He is also board certified in perioperative transesophageal echocardiography and is a member of the National Board of Echocardiography Perioperative TEE Basic Exam Writing Committee.
Dr. Spence is an Associate Professor in the Department of Anesthesiology at the Geisel School. He is also the Medical Director of Preadmission Testing at Dartmouth-Hitchcock and has also has served as the Medical Director of Same Day Surgery, the Post Anesthesia Care Unit, and the Outpatient Surgery Center. He is also a member of the Perioperative Advisory Team.
Dr. Spence is a graduate of Dartmouth College and of Dartmouth’s Thayer School of Engineering School, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering. He received his MD from the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry before returning to Dartmouth-Hitchcock to complete his internship and residency in Anesthesia, and where he served as Chief Resident his final year. He completed the Master of Healthcare Delivery Science program at Dartmouth College in 2013 as a member of the inaugural class.
Also at its meeting, the Board recognized outgoing chair Prof. Robert A. Oden Jr. with The Professor Rob Oden Fund, supporting the student/patient partnership in compassionate health care delivery. The program, based in Dartmouth-Hitchcock’s Center for Shared Decision Making, is designed for undergraduate students at Dartmouth College and medical students at the Geisel School of Medicine students at Dartmouth, allowing them to experience clinical encounters from the patient perspective – a critical viewpoint for future clinicians who want to provide patient centered care. Students are assigned to patients requesting this assistance and have the opportunity to accompany patients to their appointment to take summary notes and make an audio recording to share with the patient. Attending the appointment allows the students to experience the patient-clinician interaction and appreciate how the support provided to the patient impacts the quality of the visit. The Professor Rob Oden Fund will allow the program to enhance its resources, train more student volunteers, expand into other clinical areas, and help launch similar programs at other medical schools.