May 24, 2007

(SACRAMENTO, Calif.) — Mark C. Henderson, a highly regarded clinician-educator and leader in general internal medicine education, has been named associate dean for admissions and outreach at UC Davis Health System. His new appointment begins June 1, 2007.

Henderson is a professor of internal medicine, vice chair for education and director of the residency program in the Department of Internal Medicine.

“We are fortunate to have Mark's expertise and leadership to continue the school's efforts to recruit a compassionate, highly qualified and diverse group of medical students,” said Ann Bonham, executive associate dean, Academic Affairs. “His commitment to serving our community, state and country makes him a perfect fit to oversee our admissions process and to work with prospective and current medical students who believe in ensuring that all patients have access to high-quality medical care.”

Henderson's career has centered on teaching and providing excellent clinical care with a focus on the practice of evidence-based medicine. He has served on the Council of the Association of Program Directors in Internal Medicine (APDIM), the organization that represents the 400 internal medicine residency programs in the United States. and Canada. He has edited and authored training books used by internal medicine program directors and medical students nationwide including a 2005 book entitled “A Toolkit for Internal Medicine Education Programs,” and “The Patient History: Evidence-Based Approach,” which teaches problem-centered history taking.

His work represents a modern approach to residency training, familiarizing trainees with many of the issues they will experience as practitioners, from the rise of specialization and increase in time pressures to the hospitalist movement and the rapidly changing responsibilities of internists in inpatient and outpatient settings.

Since joining UC Davis in 2000, Henderson has improved the quality of education and increased the diversity of resident physicians. He established the first internal medicine residency program in the nation that provides structured research time for residents in their first year. He also established the Transforming Education and Community Health, or TEACH, program with the Sacramento County Department of Health and Human Services. Funded with a grant from the Health Resources and Services Administration, the TEACH program places five senior internal medicine resident physicians at the Sacramento Primary Care Center for a full year of training. The goal: to provide comprehensive, well-coordinated, culturally competent care to medically underserved adults with chronic illness in both the hospital and outpatient setting. The pilot program expands on the traditional training model, which typically offers a one-month rotation for residents in a county health clinic.

“As the safety net hospital for the region, UC Davis treats all patients regardless of their ability to pay,” said Fred Meyers, professor and chair of the internal medicine department. “But once beyond the hospital these patients have extreme difficulty obtaining outpatient follow-up care, due in part to severe shortages of primary care physicians. The TEACH program is just one example of many where Mark is partnering with leaders in the community to develop a robust internal medicine training program that's focused on reducing health disparities and increasing the number of primary care physicians who practice in underserved areas. Since the program began nearly three years ago, several graduates have chosen careers as primary care physicians in medically underserved clinics.”

Henderson has won numerous teaching awards, including the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio's Presidential Award for Excellence in Teaching in 1997 and the UC Davis Department of Internal Medicine Robert M. Walter Outstanding Faculty Award in 2002 and 2005, and a community partner recognition award from Sacramento County Department of Health and Human Services for the TEACH program in 2006.

His academic and research interests include medical student career choice, hospitalists in medical education, syncope, anticoagulation, utility of the medical history, and the use of evidence-based systematic reviews in medical education. He has done medical work in several Latin American countries, including a recent trip to Nicaragua with a group of first-year medical students.

Dr. Henderson received his medical degree from the University of California, San Francisco, in 1989. He completed his internal medicine internship and residency at the University of Texas Health Sciences Center in San Antonio, where he was chief resident under Jay H. Stein. He is married to Helen K. Chew, Director of the Clinical Breast Cancer Program at UC Davis.