Newsome appointed dean of the School of Medicine

By Melissa Jones

RICHMOND, Va. — Today (May 12), the Virginia Commonwealth University board of visitors appointed Heber H. Newsome Jr., M.D., as dean of the School of Medicine. His three-year term will begin on July 1.

Since 1997, Newsome has held the position of senior associate dean of the medical school, with responsibilities as its chief operating officer and oversight of its day-to-day functions. His most intense focus has been on maintaining scholarship, teaching and research under institutional stresses imposed by the health-care revolution.

"Dr. Newsome is one of our most innovative and experienced administrators," said Dr. Eugene P. Trani, president of VCU. "You can’t separate the medical education and research mission from the patient-care mission. Dr. Newsome is well versed in how that relationship works and how the VCU Health System will enhance the clinical experience for our students."

Newsome has been named dean of the School of Medicine in anticipation of Hermes A. Kontos, M.D., Ph.D., being named chief executive officer of the new VCU Health System Authority, which will consolidate all the clinical services of the university, effective July 1. Kontos, who has served as dean since 1994, will continue in his current position as vice president for health sciences. The appointment of Kontos as CEO of the health system must be approved in a joint meeting of the MCV Hospitals Authority board of directors and the VCU board of visitors.

"Dr. Kontos and Dr. Newsome constitute a knowledgeable and committed team in implementing this ambitious and exciting new model for the academic health-care mission," Dr. Trani said.

Newsome, a professor of surgery specializing in endocrine, gastrointestinal and trauma surgery, has maintained an active practice over the past 28 years, even while taking on additional administrative duties. He served as vice chairman of the Department of Surgery for 19 years and as chief-of-staff at VCU’s Medical College of Virginia Hospitals for nine years, bearing responsibility for the quality of practice and credentials of 1,300 full- and part-time physicians.

In 1958, Newsome earned a bachelor’s degree from Wake Forest College, Winston-Salem, N.C., and he earned both a medical degree and a master’s of science degree in pharmacology from Tulane University, in New Orleans, in 1962. Afterwards, he interrupted his surgical training at MCV Hospitals to spend three years as a research associate in endocrinology at the National Institutes of Health. He returned to MCV Hospitals to complete his surgical training, and in 1970, joined VCU’s surgery department, where he carried out NIH-sponsored endocrine research and attained the rank of full professor in only 12 years.