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Date: Tuesday, April 9, 1996 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: HCFA Press Office (202) 690-6145
Bruce C. Vladeck, administrator of the Health Care Financing Administration, today announced the appointment of Richard W. Besdine, M.D., as director of HCFA's Health Standards and Quality Bureau.
"Richard has devoted his career to the development and advancement of teaching and research programs for health care. His dedication to our beneficiaries and his expertise on health care and health care quality for older Americans will be a tremendous resource to all of HCFA," Vladeck said.
The Health Standards and Quality Bureau assures high quality health care for Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries through the implementation and enforcement of health quality and safety standards for health care providers and suppliers.
Dr. Besdine has been serving as special medical adviser to the administrator, working on multiple projects concerning quality of care issues, since the summer of 1995. He was initially on a one-year sabbatical from the University of Connecticut where he has held several leadership positions since 1986, including professor of medicine, director of the Travelers Center on Aging, chief of the Division of Geriatrics in the Department of Medicine, and director of the University of Connecticut Geriatric Education Center.
Prior to joining the University of Connecticut, Dr. Besdine was a member of the Harvard Medical School faculty for 15 years. During that time, he helped build Harvard's Division on Aging and established one of the nation's first geriatrics fellowship training programs (1977).
Throughout his career, Besdine has served on numerous scientific review panels for the federal government and private foundations. He served as a panelist on the elderly for President Carter's Commission on Mental Health and is currently on the board of directors for the American Federation for Aging Research and the American Geriatrics Society.
Dr. Besdine graduated from Haverford College (cum laude) and the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. He trained at Boston's Beth Israel Hospital, Harvard Medical School, and the University of Glasgow. He is board certified in internal medicine, geriatrics, and infectious disease.