*This is an archive page. The links are no longer being updated. 
 
1993.12.14 : Appointment of Deputy Assistant Secretary for Women's Health

CONTACT: Bill Grigg, PHS
Tuesday, Dec. 14, 1993                         (202) 690-6867

HHS Assistant Secretary for Health Philip R. Lee, M.D., announced
today that Susan J. Blumenthal, M.D., M.P.A, a national expert in
women's health, will become deputy assistant secretary for women's
health, a new post in the U.S. Public Health Service.

Lee, who administers the PHS, said, "Dr.  Blumenthal is an
outstanding physician, a leader in women's health issues who has
been recognized with several of the highest PHS medals and awards
in 1989, 1990 and 1992 for her distinguished national leadership,
dedicated public and health care professional activities, and her
scientific excellence.  HHS Secretary Donna E. Shalala and I are
creating a major position to demonstrate the administration's will
to advance the health of women through research, education and
service."

She will supervise the PHS Office of Women's Health and coordinate
PHS-wide policies to ensure that women's health needs are fully
met.

Dr. Blumenthal currently is chief of the behavioral medicine and
basic prevention research branch at the National Institute of
Mental Health where she directs a multimillion dollar research
program at the National Institutes of Health.  She chairs the NIH
health and behavior coordinating committee that oversees
behavioral and social science research at NIH.

She is also clinical professor of psychiatry at Georgetown
University School of Medicine, a co-founder and scientific
director of the Society for the Advancement of Women's Health
Research and a member of the board of directors of the National
Women's Health Resource Center.

She is a captain in the U.S. Public Health Service's commissioned
corps and, as such, is being reassigned to the new post, effective
at the beginning of the new year.  She will work with Surgeon
General Joycelyn Elders, M.D., who has been given special
responsibilities for oversight of several PHS offices as well as
the commissioned corps.

Dr. Blumenthal serves on the workgroups on mental health and
academic health centers of the President's Task Force on Health
Care Reform, the President's Interagency Committee on Physical
Fitness, and PHS and NIH coordinating committees on violence,
chronic fatigue syndrome, diabetes, digestive diseases,
transplantation and sleep research.

She is the author of Suicide over the Life Cycle.  She has written
a mental health column for First and Woman magazines and serves of
the editorial boards of the Journal of Women's Health and
Depression.

Dr. Blumenthal has a medical degree from the University of
Tennessee School of Medicine and a master's in public
administration from Harvard University.