AI and the Future of Med Ed: Recommendations from the Macy Foundation Conference - June 12

A practicing general internist, in her current leadership role, Dr. Aagaard oversees medical education across the continuum including undergraduate (UME), graduate (GME) and continuing medical education, as well as allied health professional and graduate training. This includes recently spearheading a large-scale curriculum reform effort in the MD program, revisioning PhD education, and promoting the development of multiple initiatives to promote the career development and success of educators on campus. Nationally she led development of the Society of General Internal Medicine TEACH Program and partnered to develop the MedEd Scholarship Faculty Development Program. Internationally she developed the Health Education Advanced Leadership Program in Zimbabwe (HEALZ).

Dr. Aagaard is a former member of the American Board of Internal Medicine Specialty Board, former Council Member for the Society of General Internal Medicine, and participates actively with the National Board of Medical Examiners as a reviewer for licensing exam content. She served as a core member of the Milestones in Internal Medicine Writing Committee and Milestones 2.0, leading to the Next Accreditation System at the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education. Her areas of interest include curriculum reform, competency-based education and assessment, particularly as it relates to the UME to GME transition, and remediation. She is passionate about mentoring, coaching and sponsorship, and speaks widely on these topics. She has won more than 16 awards for clinical excellence, teaching, and humanism in medicine, including the University of Colorado’s President’s Teaching Award, the Society of General Internal Medicine Mid-Career Mentoring Award, the Elizabeth Gee Award for the Advancement of Women, and the Washington University Distinguished Faculty Award.

Dr. James is an Assistant Professor in the Departments of Internal Medicine, Pediatrics and Learning Health Sciences at the University of Michigan (U-M). He is a general internist and a general pediatrician practicing as primary care physician. 

Dr. James has served in many educational roles across the continuum of medical education, including serving as the director of the University of Michigan Medical School evidence-based medicine curriculum, and an Associate Program Director for the U-M Internal Medicine Residency Program. He serves on the local and national committees, including the U-M Clinical Intelligence Committee and the International Advisory Committee for Artificial Intelligence. Additionally, he is a Co-Editor for the MedEdPORTAL Artificial Intelligence Collection, and he is on the Academic Medicine editorial board. 

In 2022, he received the Kaiser Permanente Excellence in Teaching award, the most prestigious teaching award given by the U-M medical school. He currently holds the James O. Woolliscroft, MD Endowment Award in Humane Patient Care. 

Dr. James was one of ten inaugural 2021 National Academy of Medicine Scholars in Diagnostic Excellence. In addition, as a 2025 Macy Faculty Scholar he is studying the collaboration of interprofessional health care teams using artificial intelligence. 

His research interests include augmenting clinical reasoning with artificial intelligence, and implementation of safe and effective digital health technologies into clinical practice.

Adam Rodman is a general internist and medical educator at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and an assistant professor at Harvard Medical School. He is the Director of AI Programs for the Carl J. Shapiro Center for Education and Research, and he leads the steering group for integration of AI into the medical school curriculum. He is also an associate editor at NEJM AI. His research focuses on medical education, clinical reasoning, integration of digital technologies, and human-computer interaction, especially with AI. His first book is entitled "Short Cuts: Medicine," and he is the host of the American College of Physicians podcast Bedside Rounds. 

Adam completed his residency in internal medicine at Oregon Health and Science University in Portland, OR, and his fellowship in global health at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center while practicing in Molepolole, Botswana. He lives in Boston with his wife and two young sons.

Robert M. Wachter, MD, is Professor and Chair of the Department of Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). Author of 300 articles and six books, Wachter coined the term “hospitalist” in 1996 and is often considered the “father” of the hospitalist field, the fastest growing specialty in the history of modern medicine. He is past president of the Society of Hospital Medicine, past chair of the American Board of Internal Medicine, and an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine. In 2015, Modern Healthcare magazine ranked him as the most influential physician-executive in the U.S. His 2015 book, The Digital Doctor: Hope, Hype and Harm at the Dawn of Medicine’s Computer Age, was a New York Times science bestseller. In 2020-23, Wachter’s tweets on Covid-19 were viewed more than 500 million times by 275,000 followers and served as a trusted source of information on the clinical, public health, and policy issues surrounding the pandemic. His new book, A Giant Leap: How AI is Transforming Healthcare – and What That Means for Our Future, will be published in late 2025.

Alison J. Whelan, MD oversees efforts that prepare and assist deans, faculty leaders, educators, and future physicians for the challenges of 21st century academic medicine. She leads a staff that addresses critical medical school data, administrative, and operational issues; explores new models of successful mission alignment; focuses on key student and faculty issues; transforms current models of education and workforce preparation across the full continuum of medical education; and supports medical school accreditation activities.

Prior to joining the association in 2016 as Chief Medical Education Officer, Dr. Whelan served as Professor of Medicine and Pediatrics at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. She held multiple education roles: course director, clerkship director, curriculum dean and ultimately was appointed the inaugural Senior Associate Dean for Education. In this role she oversaw the continuum of medical education from medical school admissions through CME.

Dr. Whelan received her bachelor’s degree from Carleton College in 1981. She earned her medical degree from Washington University in 1986 and completed her postgraduate work and residency at the former Barnes Hospital, now Barnes-Jewish Hospital. Dr. Whelan is an internist and clinical geneticist.