Elizabeth G. Nabel, MD
President, Brigham and Women's Hospital
Elizabeth G. Nabel, MD, is the president of the Brigham and Women's/Faulkner Hospitals, a position she assumed on Jan. 4, 2010. Prior to her position at BWH, Dr Nabel served as the director of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute at the National Institutes of Health. In this capacity, Dr. Nabel oversaw an extensive national research portfolio with an annual budget of approximately $3.0 billion to prevent, diagnose, and treat heart, lung, and blood diseases. A native of St. Paul, Minnesota, she attended Weill Cornell Medical College and conducted her internal medicine and cardiovascular training at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, followed by faculty positions at the University of Michigan Medical School where she directed the Division of Cardiology and the Cardiovascular Research Center.
As a physician-scientist, Dr. Nabel has made substantial contributions to our understanding of molecular genetics of cardiovascular diseases. She has delineated the mechanisms by which cell cycle and growth factor proteins regulate the proliferation of vascular cells in blood vessels, a process important for the development of atherosclerosis and other cardiovascular diseases. Her current work has focused on the rare premature aging disorder, Hutchinson-Gilford Progeria Syndrome, where she has characterized the smooth muscle cell defect leading to premature heart attack and stroke in children in their early teens.
Among her leadership efforts as NHLBI director, Dr. Nabel launched new scientific programs in genetics and genomics, stem and progenitor cell biology, translational research, global health, and support for young investigators.
Her awards include the Willem Einthoven Award; the Amgen-Scientific Achievement Award; the American Heart Association Distinguished Achievement Awards; the Eugene Braunwald Academic Mentorship Award; the Distinguished Alumni Award from Weill Cornell Medical College; the Lewis Katz Research Prize in Cardiovascular Research and four honorary doctorates. She is a member of the American Academy of the Arts and Sciences, the Institute of Medicine (Council) of the National Academy of Sciences, the Association of American Physicians (Council), and a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Dr. Nabel has served on the Board of Reviewing Editors for Science and currently is on the Editorial Board of the New England Journal of Medicine and Science Translational Medicine. She is a partner on 17 patents and the author of more than 250 scientific publications.
Dr. Nabel’s pledge is to strengthen the mission of the Brigham and Women’s/Faulkner Hospitals and their connections to the people and the communities that they serve, whether they live across street or around the world.
Anthony D. Whittemore, MD
Chief Medical Officer, Brigham and Women's Hospital
Anthony D. (Andy) Whittemore, MD, is chief medical officer (CMO) at Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH), a position he assumed January 1, 1999. Dr. Whittemore joined the medical staff of BWH in 1976 and served as the director of the Surgical Residency Training Program from 1980 until 1991. He then served as chief of the Division of Vascular Surgery and Director of the BWH Vascular Center. Dr. Whittemore also served as vice-chair of the Department of Surgery and is Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School. He maintains a surgical practice focused on aortic and carotid arterial reconstruction.
Dr. Whittemore has served as chairman of both the Medical Staff Executive and Quality Assurance/Risk Management committees at BWH. These roles provided an opportunity to initiate several hospital wide programs that have made BWH a national leader in patient safety, including the application of bar code technology for medication administration and implementation of a web-based medical error reporting system. He was instrumental in creating the BWH professionalism program, the Center for Bioethics, and a physician leadership program in conjunction with Harvard Business School.
A member of 20 professional societies including the American Medical Association, American College of Surgeons, American Surgical Association, and Society of University Surgeons, Dr. Whittemore has served as President of the Boston Surgical Society, New England Society for Vascular Surgery and the Society for Vascular Surgery. He was Treasurer and then Vice-President of the American Surgical Association and its Foundation. His publications exceed 100 peer-reviewed scientific papers and an equal number of textbook chapters. He served on the editorial boards of numerous publications including the Journal of Vascular Surgery, Journal of the American College of Surgeons, Vascular Surgery, and Cardiovascular Surgery. He served as editor-in-chief of Advances in Vascular Surgery from its inception in 1991 until 2001.
A graduate of Trinity College in Hartford, Dr. Whittemore received his MD from The College of Physicians and Surgeons at Columbia University in New York. Following a Vascular Fellowship at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital in Boston, he served in the US Navy as chief of Vascular Surgery for the Sixth Fleet at the Naval Regional Medical Center, Portsmouth, Virginia. He then returned to Boston and rejoined the faculty at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital.
Kate Walsh
Chief Operating Officer
Kate Walsh is executive vice president and chief operating officer of Brigham and Women's Hospital, a position she assumed Nov. 15, 2004.
Prior to her appointment at BWH, Walsh served as chief operating officer for Novartis Institutes for Biomedical Research, a position she held from 2002 to 2004. Before that, she was senior vice president of Medical Services and the Cancer Center at Massachusetts General Hospital beginning in 1994. She previously held other posts at Massachusetts General Hospital, including vice president for Medical Services and Primary Care, and assistant general director for Medical Services.
Walsh is currently treasurer of the board of directors for the Kenneth B. Schwartz Center and a member of the board of directors for Wellesley's A Better Chance Program. She also is a member of the Board of Visitors for Northeastern School of Business.
Walsh earned a bachelors degree from Yale University and masters in Public Health.
Mairead Hickey, PHD, RN, FAHA
Chief Nursing Officer
Senior Vice President of Patient Care Services
Mairead Hickey, PhD, RN, FAHA, is chief nursing officer and senior vice president of Patient Care Services at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH), a position she assumed October 3, 2005.
Nursing has been Hickey’s life's work since graduating from Boston College in 1972 when she became a staff nurse and nursing instructor at Peter Bent Brigham Hospital, which later merged with other Boston hospitals to form BWH. She then moved to Connecticut where she earned her PhD and studied risk related behaviors in myocardial infarction patients and was an associate Professor and chair of the Graduate Program for clinical nurse specialists at Yale University.
Hickey returned to BWH in 1992 to create the Nursing Research Program, and through 1999 she held several director-level positions, including Patient Care Services, Research and Outcome Measurement, and Quality Management Services. She was vice president of Women’s Health and Specialty Services from 1999 to October, 2005.
In addition to serving as Chief Nursing Officer at BWH, Hickey has held adjunct faculty appointments at Harvard Medical School, Harvard School of Public Health and Boston College School of Nursing. She is widely published with dozens of peer-reviewed papers on topics such as quality and safety in nursing care and the needs of families of critically ill patients to her credit.
Lisa S. Ponton, JD, MSW
Vice President of Human Resources
Lisa S. Ponton, JD, MSW, is vice president of Human Resources at Brigham and Women's Hospital, a position she assumed Nov. 1, 2005.
Prior to her appointment at BWH, Ponton served for eight years as senior director of Human Resource Programs at Vanderbilt University and Vanderbilt University Medical Center where she led the employee relations function, recruitment services, organizational effectiveness, human resources for the off-site physician practices and the international area.
A lawyer by training, Ponton began her career at United States Steel Corporation. She also was director of Employee Relations for Magee Women's Hospital, director of Human Resources for LEGENT, a software development company and was senior consultant at KCRS & HRU Consulting, offering customized human resource management for clients including University of Pittsburgh, Mercy Health System and Mellon Bank.
A graduate of Spelman College, Ponton earned her master's degree in Social Work and her JD from the University of Pittsburgh.
Michael Gustafson, MD, MBA
Senior Vice President for Clinical Excellence
Michael Gustafson, MD, MBA, is the senior vice president for Clinical Excellence at Brigham and Women's/Faulkner Hospitals (BW/F), a position he assumed on May 2, 2004.
Gustafson established the Center for Clinical Excellence in 2001 and since then has made enormous contributions to the BW/F community by developing and coordinating strategies for performance improvement, patient safety, quality of care, and performance measurement and analysis.
In addition to serving as the vice president for Clinical Excellence, Gustafson is also an instructor in the Department of Surgery at Harvard Medical School, with active research interests including the relationships between volume of surgical procedures and quality, measurement of risk-adjusted surgical outcomes, and the application of human factors and systems engineering concepts in the operating room.
Gustafson has published many original articles in peer-reviewed national journals on topics such as basic science research, clinical management, and quality improvement. He has been invited to speak at regional and national meetings on such topics as measuring healthcare quality, bringing a balanced scorecard approach to healthcare institutions, improving quality within surgery and introducing patient safety concepts into an academic medical center.
Gustafson received his MD degree at West Virginia University, and completed his General Surgery residency at Brigham & Women's Hospital. He later went on to become one of the first surgeons to ever receive an MBA degree from Harvard Business School.
Send Feedback to: 
