Ryung Suh is the Chief of Staff of the Veterans Health Administration at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. He provides senior executive leadership supporting the largest integrated health care system in the United States, which delivers care to more than 9 million enrolled Veterans at 1,298 health care facilities with an annual budget of over $100 billion.
Dr. Suh brings three decades of executive management and organizational leadership experience and expertise at the nexus of clinical care, business strategy and operations, and health care management and policy. Prior to this role, he directed the Aegis Lab and Aegis Fund, an incubator and social impact investment fund; led Atlas Research, a health care management consultancy serving federal health agencies; managed a commercial consulting company serving the life sciences industry; and founded several health care advisory firms. He serves on the faculty and as the former Chair of the Department of Health Management and Policy at Georgetown University, was a Senior Fellow at NORC at the University of Chicago, and served on the faculty of the F. Edward Hébert School of Medicine at the Uniformed Services University.
Colonel (retired) Suh served as an infantry and medical corps officer for 26 years in the U.S. Army with a diverse set of operational, special operations, and military health system responsibilities. He is a combat Veteran who served as a Task Force Surgeon during Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan, where he was awarded the Bronze Star Medal, and served with 1st Special Forces Group (Airborne), 75th Ranger Regiment, 5th Infantry Regiment, Joint Task Force Bravo, 10th Mountain Division, Defense Threat Reduction Agency, 20th Special Forces Group (Airborne), 450th Civil Affairs (Airborne), and other units and has had multiple overseas deployments throughout his Army career. His military qualifications include airborne, ranger, jumpmaster, and flight surgeon. He is a service-connected disabled Veteran who has gratefully received care and support from the VA upon his military retirement.
Dr. Suh is board-certified in Occupational Medicine and is a Fellow of the American College of Preventive Medicine and a Fellow of the American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine. He is the President-Elect of the American College of Preventive Medicine (ACPM) and serves on the Board of Governors of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine (AJPM). He has served as President and on the Board of Directors of the American Association of Public Health Physicians (AAPHP); on the Board of Regents of the American College of Preventive Medicine; on the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) Committee on Ensuring the Readiness of the Military Medical Workforce; and in other leadership positions within organized medicine. He served on the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights State Advisory Committees for Washington and for Virginia and was a Term Member on the Council on Foreign Relations.
Dr. Suh was commissioned through the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. He completed his medical, public policy, and business management studies at Georgetown University and his public health studies at the F. Edward Hébert School of Medicine at the Uniformed Services University, with additional studies at the Yonsei University School of International Studies and Trinity College, Oxford University. He received an honorary doctorate from the Centro Universitário Dinâmica Das Cataratas in Brazil. He remains a lifetime member of the Association of Military Surgeons of the United States, the American Association of Public Health Physicians, the Special Forces Association, and Disabled American Veterans. He proudly hails from Texas and New Jersey.
Dr. Tacci is the Medical Director and Executive Medical Policy Director for the New York State Workers’ Compensation Board. He holds a part-time teaching and clinical appointment at the University of Rochester Medical Center, where he serves as the Program Director for the Preventive Medicine Residency and Medical Director of the Travel Medicine Program. He is also an Attorney of Counsel at the law firm of Barclay Damon, LLP.
Dr. Tacci is board certified in Public Health & General Preventive Medicine, as well as Occupational Medicine. He is a past President of the American College of Occupational & Environmental Medicine (ACOEM) and he has served on the governing boards of ACOEM, ACPM, the American Journal of Preventive Medicine and the Occupational & Environmental Health Foundation. Dr. Tacci is a former Chair of the AMA Preventive Medicine Section Council and former member of the Monroe County (NY) Board of Health.
Dr. Tacci received his B.S. from Cornell University, M.D. with distinction from the University of Rochester and J.D. magna cum laude from the Syracuse University College of Law. He completed residency training in General Preventive Medicine and Public Health at the New York State Department of Health, and residency and research fellowship training in Occupational and Environmental Medicine at Harvard University.
Jill Waalen, MD, MS, MPH, FACPM, is Senior Scientist and Co-Director of Biostatistics at the Scripps Research Translational Institute where she has conducted research in genetics and digital medicine and served as a statistical consultant for a variety of projects for Scripps colleagues for 22 years, resulting in more than 120 peer-reviewed publications. She is also course director of the Introduction to Biostatistics course for Scripps Research Graduate School.
In addition, Dr. Waalen has been Associate Director of the General Preventive Medicine Residency Program at the University of California San Diego/San Diego State University (SDSU) for 17 years, is current Director-Elect and Adjunct Associate Professor in the School of Public Health at SDSU. She has held several prior leadership positions within ACPM and received the College’s Distinguished Service Award in 2010. She has done extensive work as the developer of the Certification Examination for the American and International Boards of Lifestyle Medicine, since the examination’s start in 2016.
She holds a degree in Scientific Communication and has been active as a freelance writer and editor throughout her career for entities such as the CDC and NIH, as well as medical journals, including JAMA Student Section, Annals of Internal Medicine, and Journal of the National Cancer Institute and as Deputy Editor of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine 2010-2013 and current Associate/Statistics Editor of the Nature Journal Digital Medicine.
Michael Crupain, MD, MPH is board certified preventive medicine physician. He is the co-author of the national best seller What to Eat When and The What to Eat When Cookbook. Dr. Crupain has had a unique career path first training in Neurosurgery, then switching to preventive medicine. He started one of the first farm-to-table cooking video blogs The Dairy Show, served as the Director of the Food Safety and Sustainability Center at Consumer Reports, was medical director at the Doctor Oz show where he won two Emmy Awards and the Chairman’s Pillar award, is on faculty at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, and is a member of the board of the American College of Preventive Medicine.
Dr. Crupain recently worked as the Executive Vice President of Clinical Services at Sharecare and currently is President of Population Health Strategy Inc and Chief Medical Officer of leading health analytics company, Certilytics. He is a constant student of culinary traditions around the world and has trained with top chefs in New York, at cooking schools in Europe and Asia, and with mothers and grandmothers from different cultures. He makes a point of visiting the farmers market in every city he goes to and cooks every day. Dr. Crupain has served as a frequent expert guest for the national and local media including Good Morning America, The Today Show, and The Doctor Oz Show. The theme that connects all of Dr. Crupain’s work is his mission to make the world a healthier and more delicious place.
