HIVMA Names Rajesh Gandhi, MD, FIDSA as Chair of its Board of Directors

New Leadership Affirms Commitment to Working to End the HIV Epidemic

Arlington, Va.—Oct. 8, 2020--The HIV Medicine Association is pleased to announce the election of six members to its Board of Directors and to name Rajesh Gandhi, MD, FIDSA as its new Chair. HIVMA is dedicated to promoting quality HIV care and advocating for policies that ensure a comprehensive and humane response to the global AIDS pandemic.

Dr. Gandhi is Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, and the Director of HIV Clinical Services and Education at Massachusetts General Hospital.

Dr. Gandhi has been actively involved in HIV care and research since 1996. He is the Co-Director of the Harvard Center for AIDS Research and the site leader of the MGH Clinical Research Site in the Harvard/Miriam AIDS Clinical Trials Unit. He is a scientific member of the Department of Health and Human Services Panel on Antiretroviral Guidelines for Adults and Adolescents and the International Antiviral Society USA Panel on Antiretroviral Drugs for Treatment and Prevention. More recently, he has served on the COVID-19 Treatment Guidelines Panels for the National Institutes of Health and the Infectious Diseases Society of America. He has been active in HIVMA since its inception in 2002.

“During this unprecedented time as we confront the challenge of COVID-19, we must redouble our efforts to end the HIV epidemic in the US and around the world. We’ve come so far in this quest and must seize this historic opportunity,” says Dr. Gandhi.

Michelle Simone Cespedes, M.D., MS, is Associate Professor of Medicine, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, Medical Director, HIV Inpatient Service at Mount Sinai Hospital Center, Co-Director, Clinical and Translational Research Center at Mount Sinai and Co-Director of the ID Fellowship Research Curriculum at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. She has been a strong advocate for populations disproportionately affected by HIV to have access to prevention strategies and receive optimal care. As a clinician, Dr. Cespedes has been a community activist promoting HIV education and demystifying clinical trials to make them more inclusive. She brings a broad perspective on patient care delivery and vast experience treating diverse populations. She will serve as Vice Chair of the association.
John Fangman, M.D., is Senior Medical Director of Ambulatory Services for Froedtert and Medical College of Wisconsin; Director for Collaborative Urban Programs Froedtert and Medical College of Wisconsin; Associate Professor of Medicine, Division of Infectious Disease, Medical College of Wisconsin. Dr. Fangman has spent most of the past two decades focusing on the care of underserved patients living with HIV. He values the importance of population health and team-based care in addressing the complex medical, behavioral health and social needs patients face and recognizes the implications of health policy decisions. He will use his time on the HIVMA Board of Directors to advocate for better use of available clinical and operational data to drive outcomes.
Mamta K. Jain, M.D., MPH, FIDSA, is Professor of Infectious Diseases and Geographic Medicine and Director of HIV and Infectious Diseases Research at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center. Dr. Jain brings 20 years of treating patients living with HIV to the HIVMA Board of Directors. She looks forward to bringing her unique perspective of serving in an underserved area of the South, where she has become familiar with the problems of fragmented care, inadequate access, and racial inequality leading to too many young men and women of color acquiring HIV. Dr. Jain also looks forward to bringing her experience as an advocate on Capitol Hill and in her local district to the board.
Anna K. Person, M.D., FIDSA, is Associate Professor of Medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases, Clinical Director of the Southeast AIDS Education and Training Center, co-chair of the Ryan White Medical Providers Coalition and Director of Education and Faculty Development for ID at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Dr. Person will bring her passion for advocacy to the board, having visited Capitol Hill on many occasions to bring awareness of issues that affect HIV providers and patients each day. She is particularly focused on care of patients living with HIV who identify as transgender, as well as HIV medical education and HIV outcomes in Latin America.
Tyler B. Evans, M.D., MS, MPH, DTM&H, is Chief Medical Officer for the NYC Office of Emergency Management COVID-19 Medical Section, Associate Professor at the Leonard Davis School of Gerontology, University of Southern California and Assistant Professor at the Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science. He has always focused his career on the support and advocacy for the largely socially-determined needs of vulnerable populations, namely political migrants, i.e. refugees, asylees and victims of human trafficking, the LGBTQ community (leading transgender/nonbinary projects across the country), Native Americans, the housing insecure, injecting drug users, as well as victims of sexual and gender-based violence. Dr. Evans’s work has spanned both the global north and south, including sub-Saharan Africa, Latin American, South Asia and the Middle East, working on complex humanitarian emergencies. He hopes to bring his deep commitment to humanitarian issues (focusing on health inequalities (including HIV and its associative risk factors) to the board
Jeri Sumitani, MMSc, PA-C, is Senior Clinical Manager/primary care provider, Grady Health System Infectious Disease Program. Ms. Sumitani brings unique domestic and global health experiences to the HIVMA Board of Directors having worked with the South Africa with the International Training and Education Center for Health overseeing PEPFAR-funded TB/HIV programs as well as working in an isolation unit in Freetown, Sierra Leone during the West Africa Ebola epidemic. She looks forward to sharing the unique perspective of the unique needs of the advanced practice provider workforce to the association.

Joining Drs. Gandhi and Cespedes on the HIVMA Board of Directors Executive Committee will be: Chair-Elect Rochelle Walensky, MD, FIDSA, Immediate Past Chair Judith Feinberg, MD, FIDSA and the HIVMA Representative to the IDSA Board Wendy Armstrong, MD, FIDSA.

The following members will continue their service on the HIVMA Board:

Allison Agwu, MD, ScM, FAAP, FIDSA, Director of the Pediatric Adolescent Young Adult HIV/AIDS Program at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine
Ernie-Paul Barrette, MD, Medical Director, HIV and Virology Clinic, Division of Infectious Diseases, Principal Investigator, Ryan White Part C Grant, Washington University School of Medicine
Rachel Bender Ignacio, MD, MPH, Acting Assistant Professor, Division of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, University of Washington
Jennifer Chang, MD, HIV/AIDS Primary Care Provider, Department of Infectious Diseases, Kaiser Permanente at Los Angeles Medical Center.
• Michelle Floris-Moore, MD, Associate Professor of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases; Program Director, Infectious Diseases Fellowship and Associate Director, Simmons Scholars Program, University of North Carolina School of Medicine.
Kimberly Scarsi, PharmD, MS, Associate Professor, University of Nebraska Medical Center Department of Pharmacy Practice and Science.
Donna Sweet, MD, Professor, Internal Medicine at the University of Kansas School of Medicine-Wichita, Director, Ryan White Programs at the University of Kansas School of Medicine, Wichita Medical Practice Association

HIVMA is the professional home for more than 5,000 physicians, scientists, and other health care professionals dedicated to the field of HIV/AIDS. The Infectious Diseases Society of America created HIVMA to promote quality in HIV care and advocates policies that ensure a comprehensive and humane response to the AIDS pandemic informed by science and social justice. See more at: http://www.hivma.org.