Leadership updates
A sampling of recent major achievements and developments from UC Davis Health and the UC Davis School of Medicine. For more listings and news, please visit our newsroom and follow us on social media.
Inaugural System Chief Operating Officer for UC Davis Health
Michael Condrin, M.B.A., has been appointed System Chief Operating Officer (System COO) and Chief Administrator for UC Davis Medical Center. As the inaugural System COO, Condrin will drive the vision and strategy for the nearly $4 billion clinical enterprise, encompassing the medical center, the cancer center, and expanding network of multispecialty clinics, surgery centers, imaging centers, and outpatient clinical affiliations. Condrin previously served as the Interim Chief Administrator for UC Davis Medical Center, Chief Operating Officer for the Hospital Division and Chief Operating Officer for Ambulatory Care. Under his leadership, UC Davis Health launched the Patient Contact Center, expanded telehealth capabilities, and opened the Ernest E. Tschannen Eye Institute and the Edwards Family Athletic Center for sports medicine clinic. He was recognized by Becker’s Hospital Review in February as one of “60 academic medical center COOs to know.”
Jennifer Doll named Chief Financial Officer
Jennifer Doll, M.P.A., C.P.A., a highly accomplished executive with more than 31 years of experience in public accountancy and financial leadership, has been named Chief Financial Officer at UC Davis Health. She will provide executive oversight for the financial operation of UC Davis Health, including the School of Medicine, Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing, Medical Center, and the Medical Group. Doll previously served as the Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at the Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU Health Care), an 800-bed academic health system where she collaborated with leadership on strategic partnerships with two affiliated health care entities. She also served University of Missouri Healthcare as its Interim CFO/Executive Director Finance. Doll was recently chosen by Becker’s Hospital Review as one of “77 academic medical center CFOs to know” for 2024.
Permanent Hospital Chief Medical Officer
UC Davis Health named Joseph Galante, M.D., M.B.A., F.A.C.S., as its Hospital Chief Medical Officer. Galante, who served as interim, will oversee Hospital Clinical Care Services (HCCS) and provide medical oversight of all hospital and campus processes in collaboration with the school of medicine, patient care services, and operational leadership. He will continue as a keystone in collaborative leadership of ORs, ICUs, the ED, and the 48X outpatient surgery center. Galante was among Becker’s “chief medical officers to know” in 2023, 2024 and 2025; he joined Department of Surgery faculty in 2008.
Ambulatory Chief Medical Officer named
Debbie Aizenberg, M.D., has been named Ambulatory Chief Medical Officer for UC Davis Health, where she will lead Ambulatory Clinical Care Services (ACCS) and oversee ambulatory quality, safety, efficiency, and accessibility. She will also continue as Executive Director of UC Davis Medical Group. Aizenberg previously served as Associate Chief Medical Officer for Ambulatory Care, and is a clinical professor of Otolaryngology, Head and Neck Surgery. She has received institutional awards for excellence, and has been recognized as a top doctor in regional and national media.
Cancer Center names Physician-in-Chief
David Tom Cooke, M.D., F.A.C.S., has been permanently appointed physician-in-chief for UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center after serving as interim. Cooke is a UC Davis Health professor and founding chief of the Division of General Thoracic Surgery, and will continue as the cancer center’s associate director of Inclusion, Diversity, Equity and Accessibility (IDEAL).
Stahmer named new director of UC Davis MIND Institute
Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences Aubyn Stahmer, Ph.D., has been appointed director of the UC Davis MIND Institute. Stahmer is a clinical psychologist, a nationally recognized expert in autism intervention, director of the MIND Institute’s Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities, and has been a faculty member of the MIND Institute since 2015.
Stahmer’s extensive federally funded research program emphasizes increasing access to autism services for historically marginalized communities. She has published more than 150 research articles and served as the editor of the international journal Autism for 11 years. She specializes in implementation science, which focuses on moving research innovations to community programs.
Stahmer is also the director of the LEND (Leadership Excellence in Neurodevelopmental and Related Disabilities) program, which provides leadership training to clinicians, families, self-advocates, community leaders and others involved with developmental disabilities.
She takes over the MIND directorship from Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences Marjorie Solomon, who has been serving as interim director since Distinguished Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences Leonard Abbeduto stepped down in late 2023. As part of the new appointment, Stahmer will also hold the Tsakopoulos-Vismara Endowed Chair in the UC Davis School of Medicine.
Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center celebrates leadership changes
The UC Davis Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center (ADRC) announced two leadership changes that bolster the center’s next phase of research and public education impact. Charles DeCarli, M.D., long-standing leader of the ADRC, welcomed Rachel Whitmer, Ph.D., to serve as co-director with him.
Whitmer served as the associate director of the ADRC beginning in 2019, and in that role expanded the breadth of ADRC research. Whitmer’s expertise complements the ADRC’s aims, including DeCarli’s research focus on the impact of vascular, neurodegenerative, and genetic influences on cognition among diverse populations.
DeCarli joined the center in 2000 as associate director and assumed the directorship in 2004, guiding the center to its current stature as a national leader in Alzheimer’s and dementia research and community education.
A second addition to the center’s leadership is Thomas Wingo, M.D., Ph.D., named faculty and associate director. As a cognitive neurologist and geneticist, Wingo studies shared mechanisms across major psychiatric and neurodegenerative diseases, including how people change cognitively over time. Eventually, Wingo will take over behavioral neurology direction of the ADRC.
Over the next two years, DeCarli, Whitmer and Wingo will collaborate with other ADRC leaders and staff to ensure the continued success of the center as it moves into a new phase of scientific discovery, medical innovation and community care.
Weitzel appointed Chair of Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine
Nathaen Weitzel, M.D., has been appointed professor and chair of the Department of Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine at the UC Davis School of Medicine. He previously served as a professor, vice chair of clinical operations and quality, and associate chief medical officer of perioperative services at University of Colorado Health. Weitzel has earned numerous teaching awards and has an extensive publishing background, serving as editor-in-chief of Seminars in Cardiothoracic and Vascular Anesthesia for more than a decade. Recently he managed clinical operations across more than 90 locations, oversaw the launch of a new hospital tower, and recruited more than 30 anesthesia providers in three years.
Leadership transition for Center for Precision Medicine and Data Science
Colleen Clancy, Ph.D., associate dean of faculty development and professor of Physiology and Membrane Biology and Pharmacology, has been appointed director of the Center for Precision Medicine and Data Science. Fred Meyers, M.D., M.A.C.P., distinguished professor emeritus of Internal Medicine, Hematology and Oncology, previously served as the center’s director, and recently served as co-director with Clancy to ensure a smooth transition. Meyers will continue as the center’s director of educational programs, and as associate director of Cancer Research, Training and Education Coordination (CRTEC) at the UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center and director of the School of Medicine’s Academic Research Careers for Medical Doctors (ARC-MD) Program.
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Lubarsky among medical center CEOs to know
David Lubarsky, M.D., M.B.A., F.A.S.A., CEO of UC Davis Health, has been recognized by Becker’s Hospital Review as among “96 academic medical center CEOs to know” in the country
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Clinical highlights
Read snapshots about UC Davis Health’s clinical milestones, programs and technology, including how we’ve expanded care for complex kidney stones and opened a new NICU unit for the smallest of preemies
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