Division of Cardiac Surgery

R. Morton “Chip” Bolman, MD, has decided to step down as chief of Cardiac Surgery at the end of his contract period. He will remain in place as chief through September 2012 to assist in the search for his successor and to ensure a smooth transition of leadership. Bolman will remain in the division as a staff surgeon once a new chief has been identified.

Bolman has accomplished a great deal since his arrival in the spring of 2005. He was intimately involved in the planning and opening of the Shapiro Cardiovascular Center, and has nurtured the integration in clinical care that has occurred in the Watkins Clinic and in the Shapiro Center. He has also been instrumental in the creation of innovative new programs, such as the structural heart disease program, in which cardiologists and cardiac surgeons work side-by-side seeing complex patients and participating in state-of-the-art trials of transcatheter valve delivery. Under his leadership, the Cardiac Surgery ICU has integrated with the Surgery ICU Service. This has resulted in 24 hour-a-day, 7 days-a-week intensivist coverage available for patients who have undergone heart surgery.  

Another major highlight during his tenure as chief is the founding of Team Heart Rwanda - a volunteer group of surgeons, nurses, perfusionists, therapists and others from BWH and other hospitals that work with the Rwanda Ministry of Health and the Rwanda Heart Foundation to build a comprehensive, sustainable cardiovascular medicine and surgery program in Rwanda. With the leadership of Bolman and his wife Ceeya Patton Bolman, who serves as volunteer executive director, Team Heart will carry out its fifth annual cardiac surgery mission in Kigali, Rwanda, in February, operating on 15-20 Rwandan patients, mostly afflicted with rheumatic valvular heart disease.  

Department of Medicine

Joseph Frolkis

Joseph Frolkis, MD, PhD, was appointed vice chair for Primary Care for the Department of Medicine, effective Nov. 1, 2011.

As vice chair, and in his continuing roles as director of Primary Care and associate chief of General Medicine for BWH, Frolkis is responsible for the design, implementation, evaluation and oversight of our crucial primary care strategy, and for ensuring excellence and consistency across all BWH primary care practices in access, quality, patient satisfaction and cost-effective care. These responsibilities will increasingly include practice redesign, the movement toward team-based care and helping the institution prepare for the changes already beginning to take shape as a consequence of health care reform both in Massachusetts and nationally. He will also continue to see patients in The Jen Center for Primary Care.

Department of Neurosurgery

A. John Popp

A. John Popp, MD, FACS, is stepping down as chair of the Department of Neurosurgery.

In addition to serving as chairman, Popp is the residency training director and serves on the executive committee of the Neurosciences Institute and chairs the education committee of the institute. In 2011, he received the Cushing Medal - the American Association of Neurological Surgeons' highest honor. Currently, he is president of the World Academy of Neurosurgeons and serves on the Residency Review Committee for Neurological Surgery.

An expert in the treatment of brain tumors, vascular disease and degenerative spine disease, Popp practiced at Albany Medical Center for more than 20 years, where he was the Henry and Sally Schaffer Chair of the Department of Surgery, head of the Division of Neurosurgery, program director of the Neurosurgery Residency Training Program and director of the Neurosciences Institute. In 2004, the Schaffer Foundation endowed a chair in Popp's honor. In 2009, he received the Pillars Award, Albany Medical Center's highest recognition. 

A committee, led by Department of Neurology Chair Marty Samuels, MD, is conducting a search for the next chair of Neurosurgery. The recruitment period is anticipated to last 12 to 18 months.

Department of Emergency Medicine

Rich Zane Rich Zane, MD, vice chair of Emergency Medicine, has accepted a position as the first professor and chair of the newly formed Department of Emergency Medicine at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. He will begin his new position on April 1, 2012. In his new position, Zane will be based at the University of Colorado School of Medicine and University of Colorado Hospital. He will have oversight of all emergency medicine academic programs. “We in the BWH Department of Emergency Medicine have been very fortunate to have benefited from Rich’s talent and dedication as a senior leader—traits that were abundantly clear immediately upon his arrival as a young faculty member in 1998,” said Ron Walls, MD, chair of the Department of Emergency Medicine.