May 28, 2009

Grumbach to Receive Cone Award for Community Partnerships

Kevin Grumbach

Kevin Grumbach, MD, today will receive California Campus Compact’s 2009 Richard E. Cone Award for Excellence & Leadership in Cultivating Community Partnerships in Higher Education.

Grumbach, professor and chair of the UCSF Department of Family and Community Medicine, is being recognized for his significant contributions to community-campus partnerships in the fields of health, health care and medical education.

Grumbach, who is also chief of Family and Community Medicine at the UCSF-affiliated San Francisco General Hospital (SFGH), will receive the award today at the department’s colloquium at the Millberry Union Conference Center.

“Dr. Grumbach exemplifies the commitment, spirit and integrity that we seek to recognize, reward and highlight with the Richard E. Cone Award,” said Elaine Ikeda, PhD, executive director of California Campus Compact. “We appreciate his vision and leadership in reinforcing the importance of community-campus partnerships to the field of service learning and civic engagement.”

During his long career at UCSF, Grumbach has been a leader in supporting service-learning curricula to train the next generation of health providers, and has had a significant impact on community-campus partnerships.

Grumbach served as a member of the planning board for the UCSF Strategic Plan, unveiled in June 2007, which serves as a guide for global leadership in health sciences over the next decade. Serving the community is one of seven strategic directions outlined in that plan, which calls on the University to serve the local, regional and global communities and eliminate health disparities. The plan specifically states that UCSF should “promote civic engagement in all facets of activities at UCSF to strengthen partnerships between the campus and the community.”

Grumbach has been instrumental in planning for and leading the Community Partnership Resource Center in UCSF’s Department of Family and Community Medicine, the University Task Force on Community Partnerships, and the University Community Partnerships Council. He also led development of the new Community Engagement Program in UCSF’s Clinical and Translational Science Institute, and now co-directs the program.

Grumbach also has played a key role in leading the UCSF Program in Medical Education for the Urban Underserved (PRIME-US) and its service-learning curriculum. He led the effort to create PRIME-US, which implements strategies identified in his academic research on primary care physician supply in underserved communities, racial and ethnic diversity in the health professions, and health disparities.

Grumbach is considered a national expert on the health care workforce, access to care and minority health issues, and his studies have been widely published and cited by national public policymakers.

He applies this knowledge as a driving force in the Bayview-Hunters Point Health & Environmental Assessment Task Force, which conducted a community-based, participatory research survey to evaluate residents’ concerns, health problems, environmental exposure and access to health care. The research project has served to inform community-based interventions in Bayview-Hunters Point, an underserved neighborhood in the southeastern section of San Francisco that contains one-third of the city’s toxic waste.

Karen Pierce, a community partner in Bayview-Hunters Point, described Grumbach as “tireless in his efforts to build bridges with communities and provide services where gaps exist. The final test is that, after more than 10 years, he is still working with us, attending community meetings, and finding new and innovative ways to partner with communities.”

Grumbach moved to San Francisco with his family from New York in 1966, when his father, Melvin Grumbach, MD, left the Columbia University faculty to become chair of the Department of Pediatrics at UCSF. After earning a degree at Harvard University, the younger Grumbach graduated from UCSF in 1985, receiving the Gold-Headed Cane Award, which is bestowed on the graduate who best “symbolizes the ideals of the true physician.” He served his residency in family medicine at SFGH.

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