HIVMA Recognizes Excellence in HIV Clinical Education and Research with 2021 Awards
Recognizing preeminent contributions to the field of HIV medicine in clinical education and research, the HIV Medicine Association (HIVMA) presented its 2021 Awards for Excellence to Roger Bedimo, MD, MS, FIDSA, and Colleen Kelley, MD, MPH during IDWeek 2021.
The HIVMA Clinical Educator Award was presented to Dr. Bedimo, in recognition of his dedicated and exemplary service contributions as an HIV clinician and researcher, as well as his deep commitment to mentoring the next generation of infectious diseases professionals and increasing equity and access in the field. Despite the challenges of the pandemic, his contributions to medicine and academia have only grown in the last year, as he has taken on four COVID-19 related national research studies and was selected as a member of the Department of Health and Human Services and National Institutes of Health Panel on Guidelines for the Management of COVID-19.
Dr. Bedimo is a professor of medicine at the University of Texas Southwestern, the Section Chief of Infectious Diseases at the Veterans Affairs North Texas Health Care System in Dallas and the AIDS Clinical Trials Group Clinical Research Site Leader at Trinity Health and Wellness Center. He is also a chair of the Board of Directors of the American Conference for the Treatment of HIV and has served on the DHHS Panel on Antiretroviral Guidelines for Adults and Adolescents since 2015 and the AIDS, Clinical Studies, and Epidemiology study section of the NIH since 2013. He is regarded as a leading authority in HIV infection, particularly in the realm of non-AIDS complications of HIV disease. He has spent much of his career focused on veteran health and currently serves as a principal investigator for a VA Merit grant on bone health in HIV patients.
Dr. Bedimo is a past director of the Infectious Diseases Fellowship Training Program at the University of Texas Southwestern, a member of the IDSA Leadership Development Committee, past member of the IDSA Gender Disparities in ID Task Force, and past HIVMA representative to the IDSA Research Committee. He received his medical degree from the University Yaoundé in Cameroon, completed his residency in internal medicine at Wright State University Medical School, and completed his ID fellowship training at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Dr. Bedimo also earned a Master of Science in parasitology from Tulane University.
The HIVMA Research Award was presented to Dr. Kelley, a clinician and physician-scientist, for her work on HIV and STI transmission among men who have sex with men and racial and ethnic disparities in HIV prevention and intervention uptake in Atlanta and across the United States. She has made significant contributions to the scientific community’s understanding of the rectal inflammatory milieu as an important mediator of HIV acquisition for MSM and has spearheaded innovative studies exploring the differences due to hormone exposure for transgender women who have sex with men. She has led numerous NIH network studies at Emory University and is currently the principal investigator of four simultaneous NIH Research Project Grants. Dr. Kelley has a deep understanding of laboratory-based research, clinical trials, community based participatory research and has been a tireless champion for underserved populations in both clinical care and research participation.
Dr. Kelley is a tenured associate professor of medicine at Emory School of Medicine, an associate professor of Epidemiology at Rollins School of Public Health, an attending physician in the Infectious Diseases Consult Service at Grady Memorial Hospital, an affiliated scientist at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center at the Emory Vaccine Center, and an investigator and co-director for Prevention Sciences at the Emory Center for AIDS Research. She also serves as an investigator at the Emory/CDC Clinical Trials Unit, the Vaccine Treatment and Evaluation Unit, and the COVID-19 Prevention Trials Network.
Dr. Kelley is a past member of the HIVMA Board of Directors, past member of IDSA’s Education Committee, and founder of the Atlanta nPEP/Prep Implementation Working Group. Dr. Kelley received her joint MD/MPH from Emory University, completed her residency at the University of California, San Francisco, and returned to Emory to complete her ID fellowship training.
About the Infectious Diseases Society of America and HIV Medicine Association
IDSA is a leader on issues of importance to ID professionals, including education and training, policy and advocacy, setting guidelines for patient care and developing resources for clinical practice. It remains at the forefront of global health issues such as COVID-19, antimicrobial resistance and HIV/AIDS. Housed within IDSA is the HIV Medicine Association, (HIVMA) which represents medical providers and researchers working on the front lines of HIV. More than 12,000 IDSA and HIVMA members work across the United States and in nearly 100 other countries on six different continents. For more information visit www.idsociety.org. Follow IDSA on Facebook and Twitter.