Announcing the Dean for Georgetown’s New School of Health

May 12, 2022

Dear Members of the Georgetown University Community:

It is with great pleasure that I write to announce that our colleague, Christopher J. King, Ph.D., MHSc, FACHE, Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Health Systems Administration at the School of Nursing & Health Studies (NHS), will lead the new School of Health as Dean when it launches on July 1.

Dr. King has devoted his career to improving health and addressing health disparities through a health justice and systems based approach. As chair of health systems administration, he has led undergraduate and graduate academic programs and has made important contributions as a scholar, focused on the creation of equitable systems of care.

Prior to joining Georgetown in 2015, Dr. King served as the inaugural Assistant Vice President of Community Health for MedStar Health, where he launched and managed processes to strengthen rigor and evidence around community-based planning, implementation, and evaluation.

During his prior tenure as a Director for Greater Baden Medical Services, Inc., a federally qualified health center (FQHC) in southern Maryland, he secured more than $7 million in public and private grants to promote health equity and improve the health of vulnerable and underserved populations. Dr. King is a fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives and has written numerous articles for Healthcare Executive magazine. In 2019, he was appointed as a Commissioner for the District of Columbia Commission on Health Equity.

He has published several important articles, most recently as lead author of “Race, Place and Structural Racism in the District of Columbia” published in Health Affairs journal, exploring how structural racism and historical events have led to stark differences in health outcomes for Black residents. Last year, the Department of Health Systems Administration, under Dr. King’s leadership, helped to establish a new educational module on implicit bias for the DC Department of Health, which offers providers Continuing Education Credit to explore their personal biases and how biases may be harmful in health care settings.

Dr. King will serve for a two-year term as we develop our new School of Health and will also Co-Chair a new task force, along with David Edelstein, Ph.D., Vice Dean of Faculty for Georgetown College and Professor in the Department of Government and School of Foreign Service. This task force will be charged with exploring opportunities and making recommendations to help shape the School’s identity and mission. We look forward to sharing more about this work in the coming months.

I would like to express my deep gratitude to the members of our School of Nursing & Health Studies for their engagement, with special appreciation to John Monahan, JD, (C’83 L’87), Interim Dean at NHS, and Edward B. Healton, MD, MPH, Executive Vice President for Health Sciences, for leading this process.

Please join me in welcoming Dr. King to this vital role for our Georgetown community.

Sincerely,

John J. DeGioia