Contact: Richard P. Gulla
781-434-7101
rgulla@mms.org
Waltham/Worcester -- February 22 -- Shrewsbury resident and Worcester physician Warren J. Ferguson, M.D. has been honored by his peers of the Worcester District Medical Society as the district’s 2016 Community Clinician of the Year, an award recognizing his professionalism and contributions as a physician. He will receive the award at the district’s annual meeting April 13 at the Beechwood Hotel in Worcester.
The Community Clinician of the Year Award was established in 1998 by the Massachusetts Medical Society to recognize a physician from each of the Society’s 20 district medical societies who has made significant contributions to his or her patients and the community. The Worcester District has more than 2,100 physician members.
In nominating him for the award, his colleagues noted that Dr. Ferguson’s “rigorous academic career has focused on the health care needs of vulnerable populations, with strategies ranging from the classroom to the clinic to behind prison walls.” With years of leadership roles at the Family Health Center of Worcester, the University of Massachusetts Medical School’s health care consulting division Commonwealth Medicine, and the UMass Health and Criminal Justice Program, which previously provided health services for the Massachusetts Department of Correction, Dr. Ferguson has made “significant contributions to patients, the community, and the profession of medicine.”
Dr. Ferguson is Vice Chair of the Department of Family Medicine and Community Health at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, a Professor in the Department, and Medical Director of the school’s Massachusetts Area Health Education Centers (AHEC) Network. He was appointed to those positions in 2004, and in 2007 was named Director of Academic Programs of the school’s Health and Criminal Justice Program. From 1999-2004, he was Associate Chairman for Commonwealth Medicine at UMass Memorial Health Care, implementing health professional training, quality improvement, and policy research focusing on underserved populations in the Commonwealth.
Previous honors accorded Dr. Ferguson include the Chancellor’s Award for Advancing Institutional Excellence in Diversity and the Educational Achievement Award from the University of Massachusetts Medical School; Family Physician of the Year from the Massachusetts Academy of Family Physicians; Outstanding Physician of the Year from the Massachusetts League of Community Health Centers; and the Andy Nichols Award for Social Justice by the National AHEC Organization.
A widely published author of peer-reviewed articles on a variety of medical topics, Dr. Ferguson has also delivered scores of presentations to groups locally and nationally on topics ranging from patient care to medical education to multiculturalism in medicine.
Dr. Ferguson is summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of Massachusetts with a B.S., and he received his M.D. from the Boston University School of Medicine. He is a member of Alpha Omega Alpha, the national medical honor society.
The Massachusetts Medical Society, with some 25,000 physicians and student members, is dedicated to educating and advocating for the patients and physicians of Massachusetts. The Society, under the auspices of NEJM Group, publishes the New England Journal of Medicine, a leading global medical journal and web site, and Journal Watch alerts and newsletters covering 13 specialties. The Society is also a leader in continuing medical education providing accredited and certified activities across the globe for physicians and other health care professionals. Founded in 1781, MMS is the oldest continuously operating medical society in the country. For more information please visit www.massmed.org, www.nejm.org, or www.jwatch.org.
