Congratulations to two of our faculty members who are receiving distinguished academic promotions in the division of General Internal Medicine (GIM)! Drs. Gallagher and Chudgar are the first-ever Duke hospital medicine faculty members to receive this promotion to full professor.
“It gives me immense pleasure to announce these promotions two promotions to Full Professor in DGIM. As you know, academic promotions mark faculty members’ scholarly achievements and are a hallmark of professional accomplishment in our school. Faculty appointed to full professor have achieved recognition within Duke and at peer institutions as leaders in their fields both nationally and/or internationally."
- William Yancy, MD – Interim Division Chief, Duke General Internal Medicine
Saumil Chudgar, MD, MSEd, SFHM
Professor of Medicine, effective August 1, 2023
Dr. Chudgar is a renowned clinician educator and has achieved significant recognition for his educational efforts. He has been at Duke since he began medical school here in 2001 and became a Duke GIM faculty member in 2008. He was promoted to Assistant Professor in 2011 and Associate Professor in 2018.
David Gallagher, MD, SFHM
Professor of Medicine, effective August 1, 2023
Dr. Gallagher has excelled in clinical leadership and has held several roles at Duke since joining faculty in 2006. He was promoted to Associate Professor of Medicine in 2013. He currently is the Chief Medical Officer (CMO) for Duke University Hospital (DUH). Prior to his CMO position, he was Chief of Hospital Medicine Programs at Duke University Health System for 11 years.
Saumil Chudgar, MD, MSEd, SFHM
Dr. Chudgar first came to Duke in 2001 for medical school and never looked back. He stayed at Duke for his house staff training in Internal Medicine and we were extremely fortunate to be able to recruit Dr. Chudgar to join our faculty as a Medical Instructor in July 2008. He was promoted to Assistant Professor of Medicine in 2011 and Associate Professor of Medicine in 2018. He completed a Master of Science in Medical Education Leadership from the University of New England in 2013.
Leadership
Dr. Chudgar has served in a variety of critical roles as a faculty member at Duke that integrate his interest in medical education and clinical care. He is a ubiquitous influence in the Duke Medical School curriculum and teaches across all four years of medical student education. He has taken several leadership roles, serving initially as the Associate Director for three years followed by seven years as the Director of Undergraduate Medical Education in the Department of Medicine. In 2021 he was named the Assistant Dean for Clinical Education. The Internal Medicine clerkship that he directed is consistently highly rated by the students, exceeding both local and national standards for excellence.
Clinician-Educator
Dr. Chudgar has distinguished himself as an outstanding clinical teacher. He has won multiple awards from medical students for his teaching excellence, including the Golden Apple Teaching Award for Clinical Faculty (a record 6 times!) and the Thomas Kinney Distinguished Teaching Award, awarded by the graduating class to the clinical faculty member who has had the greatest impact on them during their entire medical school training. He has been awarded this award by five different classes of students. It is evident from his evaluations that medical students and residents recognize Dr. Chudgar’s passion for and commitment to clinical education.
Research
Dr. Chudgar has also made a very commendable effort at research. He has 32 peer-reviewed publications to date, 9 of which he is the first or senior author. Most of these publications are in the area of medical education research as he has investigated the efficacy of the curricular innovations he has made. He has been published in several of the top medical education journals.
Nationally Recognized
Dr. Chudgar is active in the Clerkship Directors in Internal Medicine and served for seven years on a national committee that looks at the transition from medical school to residency. Additionally, he has been active with the Society of General Internal Medicine (SGIM) and the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC). Most recently, he spent 5 years working with the National Board of Medical Examiners to develop test materials and cases for the USMLE Step exams. Dr. Chudgar has shared his work with many invited presentations and workshops at national and regional meetings. He has also received several grants, both internal through the GME Innovation and Duke AHEAD, but also nationally through Alpha Omega Alpha and the American Medical Association.
We are delighted that Dr. Chudgar has decided to continue his career growth at Duke University as an award-winning clinician educator and leader. His expertise in medical education research, his mentorship and teaching abilities, and his educational leadership in the Duke community make him a faculty member and leader in General Internal Medicine.
David Gallagher, MD, SFHM
Dr. Gallagher is currently the Chief Medical Officer (CMO) for Duke University Hospital (DUH). Prior to his CMO position, he was Chief of Hospital Medicine Programs at Duke University Health System for 11 years, and Associate Chief Medical Officer (ACMO) at Duke University Hospital (DUH) for 9 years. He has been a Clinical Consultant for Duke Central Automated Laboratories (DCAL) since 2021.
Clinical
Despite significant administrative and leadership responsibilities, Dr. Gallagher remains active clinically at DUH where he continues to see patients regularly on the inpatient medicine services. He participates in many quality improvement and patient safety projects, as well as clinical committees dedicated to DUH.
During his 11-year hospital medicine leadership, there was a significant growth of hospital medicine programs with revenues growing 295% annually and total program FTE by 184%. Hospital Medicine Programs at DUHS have been acknowledged as outstanding clinical entities with much of the success a direct result of Dr. Gallagher’s leadership.
He has been instrumental in the analysis, adoption, and maintenance of the use of the Epic readmission risk model at DUHS and published the findings as lead author in several publications: Journal of Personalized Medicine, British Medical Journal of Open Quality, and Kidney Medicine.
Education
In addition to his success in leadership, Dr. Gallagher has been an outstanding mentor and teacher. For 16 years as an inpatient teaching attending at Duke, he has taught residents and students rotating on Duke general medicine inpatient teaching rotations. In this role, he has received feedback that identifies him as an outstanding and very effective teaching attending. He was an educational leader for his hospital medicine programs, ensuring that hospital medicine faculty had the training and resources to be the best inpatient educators.
Research
Dr Gallagher has been an author on many peer review publications and has numerous meeting abstracts and presentations that he has done. The themes in the scholarly work he has helped author include readmissions reduction, venous thromboembolism risk in hospitalized older adults, physical activity in hospitalized older adults, clinical programs development, and hospitalist workflow improvements.
National Recognition
On a national level, Dr. Gallagher has been involved in two major national committees for the Society of Hospital Medicine (SHM): SHM Leadership Committee and SHM Academic Committee. Because of his accomplishments, he has also received the designation as Senior Fellow in Hospital Medicine through the Society of Hospital Medicine. Senior Fellows in Hospital Medicine have a proven record of excellence in clinical performance, teamwork, quality improvement, and leadership.
Dr. Gallagher’s strengths as a physician leader, his reputation as an outstanding clinician, his mentorship and teaching abilities, his scholarship, and his national reputation make him a highly valued faculty member in the Division of General Internal Medicine.