Jack S. Resneck Jr., MD, was inaugurated today as the 177th president of the American Medical Association (AMA). Resneck is a dermatologist, professor and vice-chair of the Department of Dermatology at UC San Francisco. Following a year-long term as president-elect of the nation’s premier physician organization, Resneck today assumed the office of AMA president.
Resneck was sworn in during the Annual Meeting of the AMA House of Delegates (HOD) and spoke in prepared remarks about the specific challenges of practicing medicine during COVID-19, including prior authorizations, physician burnout, and longstanding inequities in the U.S. health system. He also re-emphasized the importance of the AMA’s Recovery Plan for America’s Physicians, which was announced at the opening session of the meeting.
“For more than two years, physicians have put everything on the line,” Resneck said. “Today, we are reminding policymakers that it’s time our nation renews its commitment to doctors and the patients we serve. We will work to elevate and prioritize the voices of physicians over purveyors of misinformation. We will fight in legislatures and in court to keep politicians from inserting themselves into our exam rooms, and dangerously criminalizing evidence-based care, including contraception, abortion, and gender-affirming care. We are intentionally and deeply committed to the work of health equity and racial justice. And today, for our nation’s physicians who have bravely responded to a historic call without hesitation, we are a focused, science-based, nimble, influential, and powerful ally. We will always have doctors’ and patients’ backs.”
First elected to the AMA Board of Trustees in 2014, Resneck held the office of board chair from 2018 to 2019. Prior to his election, Resneck served as chair of the AMA Council on Legislation and as a delegate to the AMA House of Delegates. Additionally, he has held several leadership positions in organized medicine, including president of the California Society for Dermatology and Dermatologic Surgery, board member at the American Academy of Dermatology and active member at the California Medical Association.
Resneck holds a joint appointment as an affiliated faculty member at the UCSF Philip R. Lee Institute for Health Policy Studies. He also serves as the medical director for the dermatology clinics at UCSF where he previously ran the dermatology residency training program.
While his passion lies in caring for patients with a wide range of skin diseases at his California dermatology practice, Resneck continues to champion the modernization of medical education, innovation in digital health, and improved access to care in various roles. Resneck has testified in Congressional hearings on the topics of telemedicine, digital health, rising prescription drug prices, prior authorization, and other challenges facing the U.S. health care system.
Resneck also remains engaged in health services research. He has published numerous studies in prominent journals on patient access to care, telemedicine, quality metrics, prior authorization, and public health that have attracted national media attention. In addition, he is a member of the editorial board of the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology (JAAD) and sits on the board of directors of the National Quality Forum.
A Louisiana native, Resneck received his undergraduate degree in public policy from Brown University and his medical degree from UCSF, where he also completed an internship in internal medicine, a residency training program in dermatology, and fellowship in health policy. Resneck and his wife, who is also a physician, live in San Rafael, California, with their two teenage children.
About the American Medical Association: The American Medical Association is the physicians’ powerful ally in patient care. As the only medical association that convenes 190+ state and specialty medical societies and other critical stakeholders, the AMA represents physicians with a unified voice to all key players in health care. The AMA leverages its strength by removing the obstacles that interfere with patient care, leading the charge to prevent chronic disease and confront public health crises and driving the future of medicine to tackle the biggest challenges in health care.
About UCSF: The University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) is exclusively focused on the health sciences and is dedicated to promoting health worldwide through advanced biomedical research, graduate-level education in the life sciences and health professions, and excellence in patient care. UCSF Health, which serves as UCSF’s primary academic medical center, includes top-ranked specialty hospitals and other clinical programs, and has affiliations throughout the Bay Area. UCSF School of Medicine also has a regional campus in Fresno. Learn more at ucsf.edu or see our Fact Sheet.
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