Drew University Names New Leadership
Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science on Tuesday announced that it has named Thomas Yoshikawa, chair of internal medicine at Martin Luther King/Drew Medical Center, as acting president, provost and chief operating officer of the university, which administers physician training programs at King/Drew, the Los Angeles Times reports.
The move comes after Los Angeles County supervisors threatened to terminate the county's contact with the university for failing to comply with contract requirements to administer the programs. The university has been without a permanent president since January 2004 after a task force called for the removal of Charles Francis.
The school appointed Nancy Hanna to replace Sharon Ashley as director of the school's residency training programs.
In addition, Ronald Edelstein, senior associate dean for academic affairs, was named acting dean of the university, replacing Marcelle Willock, who retired last week.
The medical school also elected Thomas Priselac, president and CEO of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, as a member of the Board of Trustees.
In a letter dated June 21, county Department of Health Services Senior Medical Director Bruce Chernof wrote that the university has made "significant improvement" in its education programs. However, the department fined the university $1,000 for not detailing plans to correct problems.
Chernof wrote that the school's graduate medical education office "must do more than simply list problems. It is incumbent upon the academic leadership of the university to address identified issues if the university hopes to pass" inspection by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education in December (Ornstein/Leonard, Los Angeles Times, 7/6).