Marshall Chin, MD, the Richard Parrillo Family Professor of Healthcare Ethics, has been elected to the Association of American Physicians (AAP). This prestigious honor reflects his extraordinary contributions towards improving the care and outcomes for vulnerable patients with chronic disease and reducing health disparities with a nation-leading focus on diabetes. Dr. Chin discovered how culturally-tailored quality improvement, chronic care management, and patient empowerment improve outcomes in safety net clinics. Dr. Chin joins 16 faculty from the Department of Medicine as elected members of the AAP.
Dr. Chin received his MD from the University of California at San Francisco in 1989, followed by his primary care residency training at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. He completed his general internal medicine faculty development and fellowship training also at Brigham and Women’s Hospital concurrent with a health service research fellowship from Harvard School of Public Health where he was granted his MPH in 1994. That same year he joined the faculty in the Department of Medicine as an Assistant Professor. In 2009, Dr. Chin was promoted to Professor, and in 2012, in recognition of his achievements, was named as the Richard Parrillo Family Professor of Healthcare Ethics.
Dr. Chin is a national thought leader in health disparities. He currently serves as the Director of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) Finding Answers: Solving Disparities Through Payment and Delivery System Reform Program Office; Director of the Chicago Center for Diabetes Translation Research; Co-Director, Merck Foundation Bridging the Gap: Reducing Disparities in Diabetes Care National Program Office;Associate Chief and Director of Research in the Section of General Internal Medicine; and Associate Director of the MacLean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics at the University of Chicago.
Dr. Chin is a recognized leader in designing and carrying out intervention studies to identify strategies that are applicable and can be successful in diverse clinical settings. He performed many of the key studies informing how to improve diabetes care and outcomes in federally-qualified health centers serving vulnerable populations with limited resources. He analyzed clinical, economic, and organizational outcomes, influencing the implementation of national initiatives and policies to improve chronic care management in health centers. His work over the past decade leading RWJF’s Finding Answers Program led to the creation of the Roadmap to Reduce Disparities, cited in the National Academy of Medicine’s report “System Practices for the Care of Socially At-Risk Populations” and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services “The CMS Equity Plan for Improving Quality in Medicare”.
Dr. Chin’s high-value health system-community collaborations have greatly improved diabetes outcomes among African-Americans on Chicago’s SouthSide. A national model of population health, his South Side Diabetes Project addressed medical and social determinants of health, a sustainable prevention model incentivized by global payment schemes.
Dr. Chin is past President of the Society of General Internal Medicine (SGIM) and serves on many national committees or advisory groups including the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities National Advisory Council. He is the recipient of mentoring awards from SGIM, the Biological Sciences Division and the Department of Medicine. In 2017 he was elected to the National Academy of Medicine.
The AAP is an honorific, elected society of America’s leading physician-scientists who exemplify the pinnacle of pioneering and enduring, impactful contributions to improve health. The AAP seeks to inspire the full breadth of physician-led research across all fields of science related to medicine and health, and to build a community of physician scientists in support of the principle that objective science and evidence are essential foundations for improving patient care and the health of Americans.