Nancy Dickey (born September 10, 1950) is an American
physician
A physician (American English), medical practitioner (Commonwealth English), medical doctor, or simply doctor, is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through th ...
. She was the first female president of the
American Medical Association
The American Medical Association (AMA) is a professional association and lobbying group of physicians and medical students. Founded in 1847, it is headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. Membership was approximately 240,000 in 2016.
The AMA's sta ...
(AMA), serving in 1997–98. Previously she had served as chair of the board of trustees of the AMA and chaired its Council on Ethical and Judicial Affairs.
For eleven years she was president of the
Texas A&M Health Science Center
Texas A&M Health, also known as Texas A&M University Health, and Texas A&M University Health Science Center, is the medical education component of Texas A&M University, and offers health professions research, education and patient care in dentistr ...
, the first woman to hold that position.
Biography
She was born in
Clark, South Dakota on a family farm. Her parents were Ed and Mary Wilson. When she was 9 years old her family moved to
Sacramento, California
)
, image_map = Sacramento County California Incorporated and Unincorporated areas Sacramento Highlighted.svg
, mapsize = 250x200px
, map_caption = Location within Sacramento ...
; five years later they moved to
Katy, Texas
Katy is a city in the U.S. state of Texas within the Greater Katy area, itself forming the western part of the Greater Houston metropolitan area. Homes and businesses may have Katy postal addresses without being in the City of Katy. The city o ...
, near
Houston
Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 i ...
. She earned bachelor's degrees in psychology and sociology from
Stephen F. Austin State University. A high school counselor had told her it was impossible to be a physician and have a family too, but her husband Frank said "go for it" and encouraged her to go to medical school.
She earned her M.D. from the
University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston
The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth) is a public academic health science center in Houston, Texas, United States. It was created in 1972 by The University of Texas System Board of Regents. It is located in the T ...
, where she also completed her residency training. She is board certified in
Family practice
Family medicine is a medical specialty within primary care that provides continuing and comprehensive health care for the individual and family across all ages, genders, diseases, and parts of the body. The specialist, who is usually a primar ...
; she estimates that she has delivered more than 4,000 babies in her private practice career. She was the founding director of the Family Practice Residency of the
Brazos Valley
Brazos Valley ( ) is a region of the U.S. state of Texas comprising the following 7 counties in Central Texas: Brazos, Burleson, and Robertson (which collectively comprise the Bryan–College Station metropolitan area), and the neighboring coun ...
.
In recent decades her focus has been on "health policy, health care delivery solutions, medical ethics, and professionalism."
She developed the AMA's Patient Bill of Rights. She frequently speaks to professional and civic organizations and testifies before Congress on issues involving medical care in America.
In 1999 she was appointed a professor in the Department of Family and Community Medicine at the Texas A&M Health Science Center, and in 2002 she was named president and vice-chancellor for health affairs,
a position she held until 2012. During her term as president, the Center added three campuses, grew from four to six colleges (adding a College of Pharmacy and a College of Nursing), and more than doubled enrollment from 880 students to more than 2000. Her resignation in October 2012 was prompted by the decision by the
Texas A&M University System
The Texas A&M University System is a state university system in Texas and is one of the state's six independent university systems.
The Texas A&M University System is one of the largest systems of higher education in the United States, with a bu ...
to transfer control of the Health Science Center to Texas A&M University.
In 2013-2014 she was a Senior Scholar for the Association of Academic Health Centers.
In 2010 she was inducted into the Texas Women's Hall of Fame.
She is married with three children.
See also
*
Lillian H. South (first woman vice-president of American Medical Association)
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Dickey, Nancy
People from Clark, South Dakota
Physicians from Texas
Stephen F. Austin State University alumni
1950 births
American women physicians
Living people
People from Katy, Texas
21st-century American women
Members of the National Academy of Medicine
Presidents of the American Medical Association