Leading the way
Two new department chairs appointed in Jacksonville
By Matt Galnor
Emergency medicine
Steven A. Godwin, M.D.
Anational search for the next chair of emergency medicine at the UF College of Medicine-Jacksonville turned up the best candidate in its own backyard.
Steven A. Godwin, M.D., was named chair of the department he has been running as interim chair for a year. Godwin has been assistant dean for simulation education since 2007 and is an associate professor of emergency medicine.
Godwin said the more than two dozen full-time emergency medicine faculty have a breadth of knowledge in various aspects of practicing and teaching medicine —not just emergency medicine — and he wants to leverage that knowledge in building programs.
“We have faculty that are already doing great work,” Godwin said. “We just want to continue to build on that foundation and improve the quality of our programs and education.”
He wants to continue to focus on research and training in patient safety, which he says is a cornerstone to all aspects of the academic medical center. Godwin is one of the creators of Sim Wars, a simulation team competition that has been highlighted at conferences across the country.
Godwin was previously the emergency medicine residency director from 2000 to 2008. Godwin has been in charge of the simulation program for emergency medicine since 2001 and has been medical director of the Center for Simulation Education and Safety Research since its inception in 2004.
Pediatrics
Mark L. Hudak, M.D.
Longtime professor and prolific neonatology researcher Mark L. Hudak, M.D., is the new chair of pediatrics at the UF College of Medicine-Jacksonville.
The department of pediatrics is the largest department within the UF College of Medicine-Jacksonville and has specialty practices and pediatric centers across Northeast Florida.
Hudak succeeds Thomas Chiu, M.D., M.B.A., who stepped down as chair but remains on faculty.
“It is an extraordinary privilege to have been given this opportunity. I am humbled to be succeeding Dr. Tom Chiu, whose vision and innovation over more than 20 years have resulted in tremendous growth of our clinical, educational and research missions,” Hudak said. “So I feel a very keen responsibility to our faculty, staff and partners and certainly to the patients and the community we serve.”
Hudak said he wants to expand the educational mission and the clinical quality and depth of the department. He also envisions growth of existing partnerships and creation of new collaborations as essential for augmenting the research and discovery missions of the department.
Hudak joined the UF College of Medicine-Jacksonville in 1995 as a professor of pediatrics and chief of the division of neonatology. He has been associate chair of the pediatrics department since 2007 and is also the college’s assistant dean for managed care.
He is the site principal investigator for the National Institutes of Health National Children’s Study at Baker County, and was named the first Robert C. Nuss Researcher/Scholar of the Year in 2011.