Credentials
In collaboration with the Georgia Research Alliance (GRA), Health-e-Station has perfected its model with input from several GRA eminent scholars, including Lars Mathiassen PhD, Director, Center for Process Innovation, Georgia State University, GRA Eminent Scholar in Business Process Innovation; Nikil Jayant, PhD, Director, Georgia Center for Advanced Telecommunication Technology, Georgia Institute of Technology, GRA Eminent Scholar in Wireless Systems; and Max E. Stachura, MD, Director, Center for Telehealth, Medical College of Georgia, GRA Eminent Scholar in Telemedicine.
The Health-e-Station Advisory Board includes qualified professionals who assist Health-e-Station principals: Andrew Agwunobi, M.D., Chairman of the Board; Elizabeth Nega, M.D., Chief Medical Officer; and Robert Russell.
Andrew Agwunobi, M.D., serves as Chairman of the Board and operational advisor for Health-e-Station. "Dr. Andy," as he likes to be called, currently serves as chief operating officer for St. Joseph Health System, a 14-hospital nonprofit, Catholic healthcare ministry located in Orange, Calif.
Born in Scotland, Dr. Andy moved to the States in 1992 and graduated as a pediatrician from Howard University Hospital in Washington, D.C. in 1995.
During the course of his career, he has:
worked with Quality of Life Health Services in Gadsden, Ala., where he designed and implemented initiatives to improve patient service and quality of care;
served as chief of the main pediatric urgent-care department of Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates in Boston;
worked as a primary care instructor for Harvard medical students and ambulatory pediatric fellows;
graduated from Stanford Graduate School of Business with an MBA;
served as president and CEO of Tenet Health Care's South Fulton Medical Center in East Point, Ga., which he led from a financially bankrupt hospital to financial stability; and
served two years as president and CEO of Grady Health System in Atlanta, Ga., one of the largest community healthcare systems in the Southeast, where he led a financial turnaround, improved quality of care, and fostered community trust for the organization.
Agwunobi's leadership skills have brought him numerous accolades, including being named to Georgia Trend magazine's annual "40 Under 40 Rising Stars" and Modern Healthcare's annual "Up & Comers Award for Rising Stars in Health Care Management," as well as being featured on the Atlanta Business Chronicle's list of "Most Influential Atlantans," Atlanta Magazine's "Atlanta's Top 40 Most Influential People," and Georgia Trend magazine's 2005 "100 Most Influential Georgians." He also has been named to "Who's Who in Black Atlanta."
Dr. Andy and his wife Elizabeth, a practicing internist and Chief Medical Officer for Health-e-Station, have two daughters, Rebekah, 4, and Hannah, 2.
Prior to this new endeavor, Russell most recently served as vice president and senior project manager for Grady Health System in Atlanta, Georgia, where he coordinated multiple projects and implemented many customer service initiatives to improve the patient's overall healthcare experience.
Before that, he served as associate administrator at Tenet Health Care's South Fulton Medical Center in East Point, Georgia. During his tenure there, he assumed the role of ED Workflow Taskforce chair and was project manager for redesign of Pharmacy Services. He also led the successful transition of Rehabilitation Services from contract services to in-house services.
Russell earned his bachelor's degree in respiratory therapy in 1978 and is a registered respiratory therapist and certified pulmonary function technologist. He earned his masters degree in health care administration in 1995 and afterwards served as senior vice president of Operations for MedRehab Services in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
As Chief Medical Officer for Health-e-Station, Elizabeth Nega, M.D., brings invaluable experience to the table.
Dr. Nega completed her internship and residency at Howard University Hospital in Washington D.C. in 1995 and received an MBA from North Eastern University in Boston in 1999.
From 1995 to 1999, she worked at Harvard Vanguard Associates and also served as an instructor at Harvard Medical School where she supervised and taught medical students when treating patients. She worked as a hospitalist, overseeing care of patients at Easton Memorial Hospital in Easton, Maryland, from May 2000 to June 2001.
Dr. Nega served as Center Medical Director at Concentra Medical Centers in Lawrenceville, Georgia, from 2002 to August 2005. Responsible for the quality of clinical care and patient satisfaction, Dr. Nega worked with Concentra's leadership team to ensure their operation ran smoothly. Since 2005, she has worked part-time with Concentra while also working with Health-e-Station.
Over the years, Dr. Nega has received recognition for excellence in patient care and patient satisfaction. She and Health-e-Station Chairman of the Board Andy Agwunobi have two children, Rebekah, 4 and Hannah, 2.
Director of the Center for Telehealth in Augusta, Ga., and an Eminent Scholar in Telemedicine with the Georgia Research Alliance, Max E. Stachura, M.D., has been intimately involved in the development of Health-e-Station.
A professor in the Departments of Medicine and Physiology at the Medical College of Georgia in Augusta, Dr. Stachura earned his MD from Harvard Medical School in 1965 and served his medical residency at the State University of New York at Buffalo. As a University of Chicago faculty member (1973-81), he initiated a basic research program in Neuroendocrinology with a five-year National Institute of Health (NIH) Research Career Development Award.
Dr. Stachura moved to Augusta in 1981 as chief of the Section of Metabolic and Endocrine Disease at the Medical College of Georgia and its affiliated Veterans Administration (VA) Medical Center. There he continued neuroendocrine and clinical diabetes research, supported by 16 years of continuous funding from the NIH and VA Merit Review systems.
He has published more than 120 papers and abstracts and has given numerous presentations at national and international meetings. Since 1996, he has been listed in Woodward and White's "Best Doctors in America."
In 1996, Dr. Stachura joined the Medical College of Georgia's Center for Telehealth (then Telemedicine Center) as its director. From 1995 through 2001, the system experienced a 14-fold increase in consultative activity and, in 1998, was named to the "Top 10" list of American telemedicine programs by Telehealth Magazine. The program is now being redesigned under the auspices of the Georgia Technology Authority and WellPoint, Inc., allowing the Center and Dr. Stachura to focus on research, development, and consultation activities.
In 1998, Dr. Stachura was named the Georgia Research Alliance Eminent Scholar in Telemedicine. In 2000, he was appointed to the Board of Directors of the Alliance for Public Technology and has served as its president since 2005.
A member of the Health-e-Station Advisory Board, Elena Khasanshina, M.D., is a PhD on staff at the Medical College of Georgia's Center for Telehealth where she has worked for several years to improve healthcare access and medical services by integrating information and telecommunication technology into practice.
Among the many information and telehealth projects with which she has worked include a Colorectal Cancer Screening Program based on kiosk technology and an in-depth study regarding the sustainability of telehealth programs.
As assistant professor with the Department of Public Health and Healthcare at Siberian Medical University from 2001 to 2004, Dr. Khasanshina created and led courses related to telemedicine, including "Medical Informatics," which deals with using information technology in the Healthcare system and use of the Internet in medical education and professional activities.
As the lead IT specialist at Siberian Medical University Hospitals from 1994 to 2004, her duties included providing high-level expertise in the application of information technologies and telecommunication in hospitals and creating and delivering educational presentations for heads of clinical departments about using telehealth in clinical practice.
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