Henri R. Ford, MD

Vice President & Chief of Surgery
Vice Dean, Medical Education, Professor & Vice Chair for Clinical Affairs, Department of Surgery
Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California

Henri R. Ford, M.D., M.H.A., is vice president and chief of surgery at our hospital, as well as Vice-Dean of Medical Education, Professor and Vice chair for clinical affairs in the Department of Surgery and at the Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California.

Dr. Ford was professor and chief of the Division of Pediatric Surgery and surgeon-in-chief at Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh and the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine prior to joining our hospital in January 2005.

Dr. Ford is a member of the Executive committee of the hospital's board of trustees and a member of the board of directors of the University Children’s Medical Group.  He is also a member of the hospital's Executive Leadership Team and the medical executive committee.  As surgeon-in-chief and vice president for perioperative services, he oversees the entire perioperative services area at our institution.  Under his leadership, the hospital has developed a robust, state of the art minimally invasive surgery program.

As a professor in the Department of Surgery at the Keck School of Medicine, he has been an important role model for young physicians and medical students.  As the newly appointed Vice Dean for Medical Education at the Keck School, Dr. Ford tries to advance the medical school’s educational mission by promoting excellence in medical education as one of its highest priorities.  Dr. Ford counts among his early priorities: developing a strategic plan for medical education; reviewing and revising the Year III/IV medical student curriculum; strengthening research opportunities for medical students; and increasing the proportion of students who spend a fifth year doing full-time research and developing new sources for medical student financial aid.

Dr. Ford has demonstrated “…truly exceptional leadership…” in pediatric surgery and has conducted the definitive studies on pediatric trauma in the United States and his investigative studies have generated new insights into the pathogenesis of necrotizing enterocolitis, the most common and the most lethal disorder affecting the gastrointestinal tract of newborn infants.

Dr. Ford has been active on local and national professional and scientific committees:

• Association for Academic Surgery, including service as secretary (1999-2001); president-elect (2001-02); and president (2002-03).  He is a member of the AAS/SUS relations committee (2002-present).
  
• Society for Black Academic Surgeons, including service on the program committee 2000-02) and secretary (2002-present).
  
• Surgical Infections Society, including service on the education and fellowship committee (1998-01); councilor (2001-04); and Treasurer (2006-present).
  
• American College of Surgeons, Southwestern Pennsylvania Chapter, including service on the program committee (1998-01; chair, 2000-01) council chair (2001-04); president-elect (2003-2004); Board of Governors (2006-present); Nominating Committee of the Board of Governors (2006-present); Surgical Forum Committee (2007-present).
  
• Eastern Association for the Surgery of Trauma, including service on the bylaws committee (2000-present) and the publications committee (2004-present).
  
• American College of Surgeons Committee on Trauma (2004-present).
  
• American Pediatric Surgical Association nominating committee (2006-present)
  
• American Board of Surgery (2007-present)
  
• Los Angeles Surgical Society (2006-present)
  
• The Halsted Society (2007-present) 
  
• American Pediatric Surgical Association Board of Governors (2008-Present)

Dr. Ford’s research has been funded by the National Institutes of Health, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation through the Injury Free Coalition for Kids, the National Trauma Registry for Children and the American College of Surgeons. He also has received industry support for his research from Ethicon, Inc., Medinox Corporation and the H.J. Heinz Co.

He is the author of more than 300 publications, book chapters, invited manuscripts, abstracts and presentations.

Dr. Ford is a member of the editorial board of numerous professional publications, including Pediatric Critical Care Medicine (2001-04), Surgery (2001-04), the Journal of Surgical Research (2001-2005), the Annals of Medical Sciences (2000-present) , Surgical Infections (1998-present), the Journal of Pediatric Surgery (2005-present), Pediatric Surgery International (2005-present).

He has been an ad hoc reviewer for numerous other professional publications, including Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology (2002-present), the Journal of Leukocyte Biology (2002-present), the Canadian Journal of Gastroenterology (2002-present), Cancer Detection and Prevention (2001-present), the Journal of the American Medical Association (2001-present), Gastroenterology (2000-present), the American Journal of Physiology: Gastrointestinal & Liver Physiology (2000-present), the Journal of Trauma (2000-present), the Journal of Immunology (2000-present), Shock (2000-present), the Journal of Surgical Research (2000-present), Digestive Diseases (1999-present), the Journal of Pediatric Surgery (1997-present) and the Archives of Surgery (1996-present).

Dr. Ford is a fellow of the American Association for the Surgery of Trauma, the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American College of Surgeons.

He is a member of numerous professional and scientific societies, including the Surgical Biology Club, the American Surgical Association, the American Physiological Society, the British Association of Pediatric Surgeons, the American Trauma Society, the Society of Critical Care Medicine, the American Pediatric Surgical Association, the Society of University Surgeons, the Shock Society, the Surgical Infection Society, the Society of Black Academic Surgeons and the Association for Academic Surgery.

Dr. Ford received his bachelor’s degree in public and international affairs, cum laude, from Princeton University in 1980.  He received his M.D. from Harvard Medical School in 1984.

Dr. Ford did his internship (1984-85) and residency (1985-87; 1989-91) in general surgery at New York Hospital Cornell Medical College. He completed a research fellowship in immunology (1987-89) in the Department of Surgery at the University of Pittsburgh.

Dr. Ford completed a clinical fellowship (1991-93) in pediatric surgery at Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh.