The California Academy of Family Physicians and the CAFP Foundation congratulates this year's award winners:

Bo Greaves, MD: 2012 Family Physician of the Year

J. Dennis Mull, MD: 2012 Award for Educational Excellence in Honor of Barbara Harris

Alisha Dyer, DO; Charlene Hauser, MD and Randi Sokol, MD: 2012 Residents of the Year

Bo Greaves, MD: 2012 Family Physician of the Year

The California Academy of Family Physicians presents this prestigious award to an individual who exhibits the finest qualities of family physicians and who goes above and beyond in service to patients and community.

Lyman “Bo” Greaves, MD exemplifies everything a family physician should be. A true champion of family medicine, Dr. Greaves has cared for families from birth to death – and he’s been doing it since graduating from the Santa Rosa Family Medicine Residency Program in 1990.

Better known simply as “Bo,” he became the medical director at the Santa Rosa Community Health Centers in 2011, but initially hesitated taking the position because he didn’t know if his patients would be able to follow him to the new Center. The Centers found a way to solve the dilemma and paved the way for Bo to become director. That’s how loyal Bo is to his patients … and that’s how much he was needed at the Health Center.

Bo is a natural born leader and advocate. While attending Johns Hopkins University, where he majored in English literature and minored in pre-med, he threw himself into demonstrating against the Viet Nam war and for civil rights. And while in residency at Santa Rosa, he worked his way up to become chief resident and started a residents’ union that still exists today.

After graduation, he opted to stay in the community and started one of the largest private practice groups in Santa Rosa. Bo’s passion for having the best care provided for patients came to a head in 2007, when he co-chaired a work group on primary care for Sonoma Health Action, a panel set up by the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors to devise ways to improve health care in the community. Bo advocated for the Patient Centered Medical Home (PCMH) and ultimately launched the PCMH Learning Collaborative, which went live in March 2010. The goal is to ensure that every person in Sonoma County has a personal medical home by 2020.

Bo is also considered one of CAFP’s true leaders.  Along with being a past president at CAFP, he was also the CEO of Primary Care Associates and Chief Medical Officer for several IPAs and Medical Groups.

When he’s not seeing patients, Bo is a proud husband, father and grandfather. He and his wife Daisy enjoy big hikes through Annadel State Park. His daughter Maria Greaves, MD, one of four children, was in the sixth grade when Bo started medical school. She became a family physician after witnessing her father’s enthusiasm and passion for medicine and is now trying to implement some of the same PCMH concepts at her practice in Santa Cruz.

Dr. Bo Greaves is truly a role model of the quintessential family physician, both a jack and a master of all trades.

We are thrilled to honor him as CAFP’s 2012 Family Physician of the Year.

Read the official press release for Dr. Greaves.

J. Dennis Mull, MD: 2012 Award for Educational Excellence in Honor of Barbara Harris

The California Academy of Family Physicians Foundation is proud to name J. Dennis Mull, MD MPH as the 2012 Barbara Harris Award for Educational Excellence.

For many involved in medical education in California, the name J. Dennis Mull needs no introduction. Throughout his career, he has been a professor, a mentor, and residency director to students from California to such far-flung places as Pakistan, Mexico, and Texas.

For the past 15 years, Dr. Mull has been a professor of clinical family medicine and Vice Chair for Faculty Affairs in the Department of Family Medicine, Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California. In this role, he has been responsible for enticing many students into joining the family medicine fold, where he is often quoted as saying “it is a joy and a privilege to be a physician . . . especially a family physician.” His legacy at USC includes revitalizing a nutrition curriculum, enticing students to complete their longitudinal clerkships in areas of unmet need in Los Angeles, and encouraging students to not only learn a patient’s health history, but also their language and culture to serve them best. 

In his educational career, Dr. Mull also has taught at UC Irvine and the Aga Khan University in Karachi, Pakistan. His vision of providing quality medical care in developing countries (including Mexico, Vietnam and Saudi Arabia,) coupled with his commitment to teaching, led him to help establish the Sota Village Health clinic in Shirati, Tanzania, in East Africa. A partner of the Sota Village Health Clinic and President of the Shirati Health Education and Development Foundation, US Branch, Dr. Mull continues to visit his clinic in Tanzania every year.

Dr. Mull's contributions to family medicine have had an enormous impact on fostering future family physicians, particularly through his successful efforts to bring teams of health professionals and medical students to Tanzania for medical rotations. He has published extensively and worked as a reviewer for six professional journals. He is the founder of the Summer Institute of Medical Spanish in Ensenada, Mexico and continues to provide medical treatment at the South Central Family Health Center in Los Angeles, a Federally Qualified Community Health Center serving indigent Spanish-speaking clients. In 2002, Dr. Mull was appointed by Governor Gray Davis to the California Healthcare Workforce Policy Commission and served on the Board of Directors of the International Health Medical Education Consortium and the Nhan Hoa Community Health Care Center in Garden Grove, California.

Although he is known most for his skills as an educator, colleagues frequently describe Dr. Mull as the ultimate family physician—often caring more about his impoverished patients than his own career. He continues to inspire and mentor through his words and actions and we are proud to call him a Lifetime Member of CAFP.

Congratulations to 2011 Barbara Harris Award winner Dennis Mull, MD.

Read the official press release for Dr. Mull.

Alisha Dyer, DO, Charlene Hauser, MD and Randi Sokol, MD: 2012 Residents of the Year

The California Family Medicine Resident of the Year award is given a resident who represents the finest characteristics of family medicine. This year, CAFP is honored to give the 2012 award to three outstanding residents: Alisha Dyer, DO, Charlene Hauser, MD, MPH, and Randi Sokol, MD, MPH.

In addition to their relentless advocacy for family medicine and commitment to CAFP, Drs. Dyer, Hauser, and Sokol, in collaboration with CAFP Foundation, worked together to create the inspiring “Future Faces of Family Medicine” (FFFM) program. FFFM exposes classes of 20 high school students to careers in Family Medicine and primary care. Now just two years later, FFFM has won a national award, had two successful years in Sacramento, and is set to be launched throughout California.

Through a four-month program, residents from Sutter and UC-Davis, led by Drs. Dyer, Hauser, and Sokol, worked together to design a curriculum that exposes high school students to lively discussions, hands-on workshops, and patient care, while building their leadership skills. A total of six 75-minute weekday sessions and two half-day weekend sessions are conducted. Sessions include health topics, CPR training, visits to the cadaver lab and simulation center at UC-Davis, and a panel of Family Medicine residents, who share their struggles and victories on the road toward medical careers. Students shadow pre-med students, medical students and residents at a local volunteer clinic serving a medically underserved population.

Dr. Dyer had experience with the Medical Pathways Program during high school — ultimately shaping her desire to pursue a career in primary care. Then, after a wavering pathway that included joining the Army National Guard, her  passions for primary care were rekindled when she had the opportunity to work one-on-one with Winters, CA, family physician Carla Kakutani, MD, for four weeks through CAFP’s Summer Family Medicine Preceptorship Program. Now a third-year family medicine resident at Sutter, and President of CAFP’s Residency Council, Dr. Dyer strives to inspire a new class of family physicians.

Dr. Charlene Hauser, now a Chief Resident at UC-Davis Family Medicine Residency Program, also had a bumpy path to her career in primary care. After completing her Intern year of surgery residency, Dr. Hauser realized that if she wanted to help patients, she needed work on preventing their poor lifestyles. Thus, Dr. Hauser converted to family medicine, where public health and prevention are the treatments of choice. Dr. Hauser’s early exposure to public health, earning an MPH while in medical school, fueled her desire to provide high school students with early exposure to preventive medicine.

Dr. Sokol, who is now a third-year family medicine resident at UC-Davis, hopes this model of collaboration across Family Medicine projects will serve to inspire other primary care residency programs to similarly unite and lead programs that amplify the future primary care workforce.  She is interested in further pursuing public health and advocacy work throughout her career as a family physician.

Congratulations to 2012 California Family Medicine Residents of the Year Randi, Alisha, and Charlene!

Read the official press release for Drs. Dyer, Hauser and Sokol.