Society of General Internal Medicine Names 2026 President and Council Members

The Society of General Internal Medicine (SGIM) has announced that Mark D. Schwartz, MD, FACP will be inducted as the 49th president of SGIM on May 8, 2026. Dr. Schwartz will serve a one-year term as president and a three-year term as a Council officer.

President: Mark D. Schwartz, MD, FACP

Mark D. Schwartz, MD, FACP is a Professor of Population Health and Medicine at NYU Grossman School of Medicine, where he serves as Vice-Chair for Education and Faculty Affairs in one of the nation’s first and largest Population Health Departments. As an RWJF Health Policy Fellow on the Ways and Means Committee, he contributed to drafting and passing the Affordable Care Act. He has served on New York State’s COGME and HRSA’s Accreditation Council for Training in Primary Care, and has received NYU’s Faculty of the Year award and the Association for Clinical Research Training’s Distinguished Educator Award.

For over 30 years, Dr. Schwartz has practiced and taught primary care in underserved, urban settings. His NIH- and VA-funded research focuses on diabetes prevention among at-risk populations. He has led numerous educational programs, including an MS in Clinical Investigation and HRSA- and AHRQ-funded research training programs, and has taught courses in Research Methods, Health Policy, and Writing Science.

Within SGIM, he has served as Chair of the Health Policy Committee, Treasurer, Chair of the Finance Committee, Council Member, Chair of the Philanthropy Committee, and Co-Director of the Leadership in Health Policy (LEAHP) Program. He is a recipient of the David Calkins Award in Health Policy Advocacy.

SGIM has also announced newly elected Council officers and members-at-large, who will begin three-year terms (2026-2029) on May 8, 2026.

President-Elect: Rita Lee, MD

Rita Lee, MD is a Professor and Associate Division Head for Education in the Division of General Internal Medicine at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. She earned her medical degree at UCLA and completed her Internal Medicine residency at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation. Dr. Lee serves as Director of HEAL for the Anschutz Medical Campus Office of Access and Engagement and has been instrumental in building an equity-focused health systems science curriculum at CU. Her advocacy work centers on LGBTQ+ health equity; she is a founding member of the UCHealth Integrated Transgender Program and serves on the National LGBTQIA+ Health Education Center Advisory Board.

Secretary-Elect: Mohan Nadkarni, MD

Mohan (Mo) Nadkarni, MD is Chief of the Division of General, Geriatric and Palliative Medicine and Harry T. Peters Jr. Endowed Professor of Medicine at the UVA School of Medicine, where he also serves as Harrison Distinguished Educator. A member of SGIM for over 30 years, he has focused his career on primary care for vulnerable populations, social determinants of health, and advocacy for GIM faculty. He has served as Chair of the Medical Residency Clinic Directors Interest Group and President of the Association of Chiefs and Leaders of General Internal Medicine (ACLGIM), and continues to mentor through the ACLGIM LEAD Program and Women and Medicine Commission Career Advising Program.

At-Large Member: Marisha Burden, MD, MBA

Marisha Burden, MD, MBA is Division Head of Hospital Medicine and Professor of Medicine at the University of Colorado School of Medicine, leading a hospital medicine group of over 250 faculty across three health systems. Her research focuses on administrative harm and evidence-based work design. She received the 2022 Society of Hospital Medicine Award of Excellence for Clinical Leadership and the 2024 ABIM Foundation’s John A. Benson Jr. Professionalism Article Prize. SGIM named her Distinguished Professor of Hospital Medicine in 2024.

At-Large Member: Sheetal Patel, MD

Sheetal Patel, MD is an Associate Professor of Clinical Medicine and Section Chief of the GIM Hospitalist Service at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School. Her clinical research focuses on innovative approaches to patient care, including AI-guided physical therapy for inpatient mobility and the CODE study on code status discussions. Within SGIM, she has served as President of the Mid-Atlantic Region, Chair of the Scientific Abstract Committee, and DEI Chair, and is a member of the Academic Hospitalist Commission.

Associate Member: Catherine W. Bennett, MD, MPH

Dr. Bennett is a fifth-year resident in the combined internal medicine and psychiatry residency program at Emory University. She received the 2025 Martin Fenton Award from the Association of Medicine and Psychiatry and placed first in the Inaugural Teaching Competition at the SGIM Southern Regional Conference in 2023. A Fulbright grant recipient, she earned her MD and MPH from Emory University and will serve as Ambulatory Chief Resident for the J. Willis Hurst Internal Medicine Program in 2026-2027. Her academic interests include primary care for patients with severe persistent mental illness and residency primary care education.

ACLGIM President: Alpesh N. Amin, MD, MBA, MACP, MHM, FRCP (L), FACC, FHFSA, CPE

Dr. Alpesh N. Amin is the Thomas & Mary Cesario Endowed Chair of the UCI School of Medicine’s Department of Medicine and a board-certified UCI Health internist specializing in hospital medicine. He created one of the nation’s first hospitalist programs at UCI in 1998. His research spans venous thromboembolism, pneumonia, diabetes, heart failure, and COVID-19, and he has authored or co-authored more than 100 peer-reviewed articles. He earned his medical degree from Northwestern University Medical School and holds an MBA in healthcare from UC Irvine.

Outgoing Council Members (2023-2026)

SGIM thanks the following Council members who will rotate off at the SGIM26 annual meeting in May:

• Jada C. Bussey-Jones, MD – Immediate Past President
• Elizabeth A. Jacobs, MAPP, MD – Treasurer
• Elizabeth W. Dzeng, MD, MPH, MPhil – At-Large Member
• Ryan Kane, MD, MPH, MHS – Associate Member
• Wei Wei Lee, MD, MPH – At-Large Member
• Mitchell D. Feldman, MD, MPhil – Outgoing ACLGIM President (2025-2026)
• Lenny López, MD, MDiv, MPH – JGIM Co-Editor in Chief (2025-2026)
• Michael D. Landry, MD, MSc – SGIM Forum Editor in Chief (2023-2026)

The Society of General Internal Medicine is a member-based international medical association of more than 3,500 academic general internists dedicated to improving access to care for vulnerable populations, eliminating health care disparities, and enhancing medical education. Learn more at sgim.org. Follow SGIM on X, BlueSky, Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn.