EMORY'S EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT FOR HEALTH AFFAIRS NAMED TO INSTITUTE OF MEDICINE COUNCIL, NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES

March 10, 1997

Media Contacts: Sarah Goodwin, 404/727-3366 - sgoodwi@emory.edu
Kathi Ovnic, 404/727-9371 - covnic@emory.edu
http://www.emory.edu/WHSC/

Michael M.E. Johns, M.D., executive vice president for Health Affairs and director of The Robert W. Woodruff Health Sciences Center, Emory University, has been elected to the Institute of Medicine (IOM) Council, National Academy of Sciences. He will serve a three-year term.

The IOM was chartered in 1970 by the National Academy of Sciences to advance scientific knowledge and the health and well-being of all people of this nation and the world. It provides objective, timely and authoritative information to government, the professions and the public through its elected membership and access to the best expertise. The 20 members elected to the Council by their IOM colleagues provide policy guidance and approve programs and budgets for the IOM. Dr. Johns also serves on committees for strategic planning, finance and membership.

Dr. Johns came to Emory July 1, 1996, after serving as vice president for medicine, The Johns Hopkins University, and dean of The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. As director of the Woodruff Health Sciences Center, he serves as chairman of the board and chief executive officer of the Emory University System of Health Care, Inc. (EUSHC). An otolaryngologist/head and neck surgeon, Dr. Johns is known internationally for his studies of the effects and outcomes of treatment.

Dr. Johns received his bachelor's and continued with graduate studies in biology at Wayne State University. He received his M.D. degree with distinction from the University of Michigan Medical School in 1969. Following his internship and residency in Ann Arbor, he joined the Medical Corps of the U.S. Army and served as assistant chief of the Otolaryngology Service at Walter Reed Army Medical Center from 1975 to 1977.

He joined the Department of Otolaryngology and Maxillofacial Surgery at the University of Virginia Medical Center, moving quickly through the academic ranks to become a full professor in 1982. In 1981 he was named Young Surgeon of the Year by the Virginia Chapter of the American College of Surgeons and received the Honor Award from the American Academy of Otolaryngology and Head and Neck Surgeons.

Dr. Johns was recruited to The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in 1984 to become professor and chair of the Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery, a department he built into one of the country's largest and most prestigious.

Two years later he took additional responsibility as associate dean for Clinical Practice and began the reorganization of the faculty practice plan and the planning and development of the Johns Hopkins Outpatient Center.

Dr. Johns has published more than 150 scientific papers in his field, with an emphasis on tumors of the salivary gland. More recently he has written widely on graduate medical education and health care reform, for both professional and general audiences. He is editor of the Archives of Otolaryngology and serves on the editorial board of the Journal of the American Medical Association. The recipient of numerous honors and awards, he is a member of the Institute of Medicine and a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

For more general information on The Robert W. Woodruff Health Sciences Center, call Health Sciences News and Information at 404-727-5686, or send e-mail to hsnews@emory.edu.