Message from the Vice President for Health Sciences

DAVID L. DUNN, MD, PhD

 

A sea-change related to health care in Western New York is occurring.

The coalescence of the University at Buffalo Academic Health Center in downtown Buffalo bringing together and thereby fostering our teaching, research, and clinical care missions may be seen by many as the cornerstone of the bold plan called UB2020.

 

Coinciding with UB’s strategic plan is the formation of the newly named Great Lakes Health System of Western New York which is a culmination of the work of the New York State Commission on Health Care Facilities in the 21st Century (aka “Berger Commission”).  Great Lakes Health System will reconfigure and consolidate clinical service lines of two of the community’s largest hospital systems. 

 

Concurrently, the process to create a unified, multispecialty faculty physician practice plan known as UBMD is well underway.  UBMD will allow us to achieve economies of scale in our business operations and administrative efforts and act in concert to provide outstanding care to the citizens of our region and beyond.

The time horizon for implementing all of these strategic initiatives extends out to the year 2020 and well beyond.  Together, these three closely interrelated plans will create the opportunity for downtown Buffalo to be a “go to” destination for health science student education and training, cutting-edge research in biosciences, and superb state-of-the art clinical care engendering huge synergies between and among these facets of our tripartite academic mission.