PAST WOMAN OF THE YEAR RECIPIENTS

Dr. Maria Ansari assumed the roles of CEO and Executive Director of The Permanente Medical Group (TPMG) and President and CEO of the Mid-Atlantic Permanente Medical Group (MAPMG) on June 1, 2023. TPMG and MAPMG are two of the largest and most accomplished medical groups in the country, and together they have more than 11,000 physicians and 44,000 staff delivering high-quality health care to more than 5.4 million Kaiser Permanente members in Northern California, Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C.

Dr. Ansari also became the co-CEO of The Permanente Federation, a consortium of all the Permanente Medical Groups in the nation. The Federation supports the work of more than 23,000 Permanente physicians and 80,000 staff who serve more than 12.6 million Kaiser Permanente members.

Dr. Ansari has served as the Physician-in-Chief for the Kaiser Permanente San Francisco Medical Center since 2014. Under her transformational leadership, KP San Francisco has designed and implemented numerous advances in medical practice in primary care and specialty care by empowering physicians and staff to create and sustain a culture of trust, teamwork and innovation. Dr. Ansari also serves on the TPMG and MAPMG Boards of Directors.

Dr. Maria Ansari, MD, FACC

WOMAN OF THE YEAR 2023

2018 Shoshana Ungerleider, MD - Physician, Philanthropist, Filmmaker, Writer and Activist; Founder, End Well Symposium & Ungerleider Palliative Care Education Fund
2017 Anna Dapelo-Garcia - Administrative Director of Patient Access Services, Stanford Health Care; Founder, Lean In Latinas
2016 Lily Sarafan - Chief Executive Officer, Home Care Assistance
2015 Bridget Duffy, MD - Chief Medical Officer, Vocera Communications
2014 Rena Pasik, DrPH - Director for Community Education & Outreach, UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center
2013 Elizabeth Edgerly, PhD - Chief Program Officer, Alzheimer's Association, Northern California & Nevada
2012 Sharon Levine, MD - Associate Executive Director of The Permanente Medical Group
2011 Sarah Krevans - Sutter Health Region President, Sacramento Sierra Region
2010 Tangerine Brigham - Deputy Director of Health, San Francisco Department of Public Health and Director, Healthy San Francisco Program
2009 Gene-Marie O'Connel - Former CEO, San Francisco GEneral Hospital and Trauma Center
2008 Kimberly Popvitz - President and CEO, Genomic Health Inc. 
2007 Sandra Hernandez, MD - CEO of the San Francisco Foundation previously served as director of public health for the City and County of San Francisco under Mayor WIllie Brown.
2006 Rachel Naomi Remen, MD - Clinician (UCSF School of Medicine), medical education reformer, pioneer in mind/body holistic health and New York Times Best Selling author. 
2005 Victoria Hale - CEO and founder of the Institute for OneWorld Health
2004 Senator Jackie Speier - California State Senator and Health Care Advocate
2003 Molly Joel Coye, MD - CEO and Founder Health Technology Center
2002 Andrea Martin - Founder and Executive Director of The Breast Cancer Fund
2001 Jenny Chin Hansen -Executive Director, On Lok

Dr. Maldonado, who is Professor and Chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Pediatrics at Stanford University School of Medicine, was selected among a distinguished group of Northern California women health care leaders and will be honored at our annual WOTY conference taking place virtually on Thursday, August 4th, from 6 to 8 p.m.

With the onset of the pandemic she has led several clinical, epidemiological and laboratory-based studies on COVID-19and has been involved in epidemiologic modeling at the University, state, and national level. She is the Chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Infectious Diseases, a member of the Infectious Diseases Society of America, the Society for Pediatric Research, the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Society, the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America, and the American Public Health Association. She is a former member of the Board of the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Society, a liaison to the USPHS Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) and previously a member of the Board of Scientific Counselors for the Office of Infectious Diseases at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Dr. Maldonado is also the Senior Associate Dean for Faculty Development and Diversity at the Stanford School of Medicine. Dr. Maldonado has published over 250 peer-reviewed articles in scientific journals and is co-editor of two textbooks.

Dr. Yvonne (BonNIE) Maldonado

WOMAN OF THE YEAR 2022

Dr. Noha Aboelata is the founder and CEO of Roots Community Health Center and Roots Community Health Alliance. She is a board-certified family practice physician, an experienced leader and manager of health care institutions, and an advocate committed to eliminating health disparities among low-income populations in East Oakland and surrounding communities. Dr. Aboelata’s professional career as an executive team leader, public advocate, and health care provider, is defined by her unwavering commitment to increasing access to health care for the residents of underserved communities. 

Dr. Aboelata serves on the Board of Governors for the Alameda Alliance for Health and is a past Chair of the Alameda Health System Board of Trustees. Dr. Aboelata has also served as Associate Medical Officer for Tiburcio Vasquez Health Center in Hayward and as Consultant Chief Medical Officer for the Native American Health Center in Oakland, which provides comprehensive services with respect for cultural and linguistic differences. 

One of Dr. Aboelata’s early initiatives was to obtain the official designation of the East Oakland communities of Fruitvale, Fremont, Eastmont, and Melrose as a Health Professional Shortage Area. This designation paved the way for increasing primary care services in these communities, including eligibility for state and federal loan repayment programs. She later worked to obtain the same designation for the Alameda County communities of Ashland, Brookfield Village, Castro Valley South, Elmhurst, Hayward Northeast, San Leandro North Central and San Lorenzo East. 

Dr. Aboelata received her B.S. degree from the University of California-Santa Barbara and her medical doctorate from Howard University, where she was honored as a Trustee Scholar. She served as Chief Resident of the Family Practice Residency Program Pomona Valley Hospital Medical Center and as a National Health Service Corps Fellow. In addition, Dr. Aboelata cares for her Spanish-speaking patients in their native language. 

Dr. Noha Aboelataa

WOMAN OF THE YEAR 2021

As One Medical's Chief Technology Officer, Kimber leads the Engineering, Product, IT, and Security teams, which are responsible for scaling the technology inovations that underpin One Medical's reinvented doctor's office experience. Kimber has also spearheaded the deveopment of the company's first-of-its-kind, fully connected health engagement platform. Prior to joining One Medical, Kimber was co-founder and CEO of Increo Solutions, which was acquired by Box in 2009. At Box, Kimber served as Senior Director of Engineering, leading a number of teams that directly accelerated the commercial success of the company. Kimber has been named in Business Insider's Top 30 Leaders Under 40 Changing Healthcare and Modern Healthcare's 25 Emerging Leaders for her leadership in healthcare echnology innovation. She holds a bachelor's degree in computer science from Stanford University. 

kIMBER LOCKHART

WOMAN OF THE YEAR 2020

Dr. Burke Harris is an award-winning physician, researcher and advocate dedicated to changing the way our society responds to one of the most serious, expensive and widespread public health crises of our time: childhood trauma. She was appointed as California’s first-ever Surgeon General by Governor Gavin Newsom in January 2019.

Dr. Burke Harris’ career has been dedicated to serving vulnerable communities and combating the root causes of health disparities. After completing her residency at Stanford, she founded a clinic in one of San Francisco’s most underserved communities, Bayview Hunters Point. It was there that Burke Harris observed that, despite the implementation of national best-practices for immunizations, asthma, obesity treatment and other preventive health measures, her patients still faced outsized risks for poor health, development and behavioral outcomes.  


Drawing in research from the CDC and Kaiser Permanente, Dr. Burke Harris identified Adverse Childhood Experiences as a major risk factor affecting the health of her patients. In 2011, she founded the Center for Youth Wellness and subsequently grew the organization to be a national leader in the effort to advance pediatric medicine, raise public awareness, and transform the way society responds to children exposed to Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) and toxic stress. She also founded and led the Bay Area Research Consortium on Toxic Stress and Health, to advance scientific screening and treatment of toxic stress. 

She currently serves as a member of the American Academy of Pediatrics’ National Advisory Board for Screening and on the Committee on Applying Neurobiological and Socio-behavioral Sciences From Prenatal Through Early Childhood Development: A Health Equity Approach for the National Academy of Medicine.

Her work has been profiled in best-selling books including “How Children Succeed” by Paul Tough and “Hillbilly Elegy” by J.D. Vance as well as in Jamie Redford’s feature film, “Resilience”. It has also been featured on NPR, CNN and Fox News as well as in USA Today and the New York Times. Dr. Burke Harris’ TED Talk, “How Childhood Trauma Affects Health Across the Lifetime” has been viewed almost 5 million times. Her book “The Deepest Well: Healing the Long-Term Effects of Childhood Adversity” was called “indispensable” by The New York Times.

Dr. Burke Harris is the recipient of the Arnold P. Gold Foundation Humanism in Medicine Award presented by the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Heinz Award for the Human Condition. She was named one of 2018’s Most Influential Women in Business by the San Francisco Business Times.

nadine burke harris, md, mph, faa

WOMAN OF THE YEAR 2019

Shoshana Ungerleider, M.D., is a physician, philanthropist, filmmaker, writer and activist. She founded the End Well Symposium and the Ungerleider Palliative Care Education Fund and is on the teaching faculty at Sutter Health’s California Pacific Medical Center as well as serves on the Foundation board of trustees.

As a writer and speaker, Shoshana has been featured in such places as Vox and STAT, and presented at Exponential Medicine 2017. As a producer, Shoshana’s forthcoming short documentary, End Game, by Academy Award winning directors Jeffrey Friedman and Rob Epstein was acquired by Netflix and premiered at Sundance Film Festival earlier this year. Recognized as one of SF Business Times 40 Under 40, Shoshana also funded Extremis, an Oscar and Emmy Award nominated short documentary about end of life decision making in the ICU in 2016.

Shoshana founded The End Well Project, the first interdisciplinary symposium on design and innovation for the end of life experience, and the Ungerleider Palliative Care Education Fund to support innovative programs that further palliative care education. She co-sponsored the OpenIDEO design challenge to re-imagine end of life, is on the Board of Zen Hospice Project and is a host of health and medicine programs at The Commonwealth Club of California. In her free time, Shoshana and her husband empower people to come together such as in the March For Our Lives event in SF.

Shoshana Ungerleider, M.D.         

WOMAN OF THE YEAR 2018

Care Administrator I Founder Lean In Latinas

About Anna:
Anna Dapelo-Garcia, MPA/HSA is currently the Administrative Director of Patient Access Services at Stanford Health Care in Palo Alto, California. She has over twenty-five years of experience in the healthcare industry specific to revenue cycle operations. She has a Bachelor’s of Arts in management from St. Mary’s College in Moraga, California and a Master’s in Public Administration, with a concentration in health services administration from the University of San Francisco.

In 2004, she was selected as the Stanford Hospital & Clinics (SHC) employee of the year, and Patient Access Services was the recipient of the Malinda S. Mitchell Award for Customer Service Quality at SHC in 2008. She was then selected as a SHC Fellow in the first class of the SHC Leadership Academy in 2009. In 2012, Anna was the recipient of the HFMA Future Financial Leaders Award and in 2013 received a “Women of Influence” award by the Silicon Valley Business Journal.

She serves on the board for the University of San Francisco Master of Public Administration program and is a California State Commissioner for the Senate Advisory Commission on Cost Control in State Government. Most recently, she became the founder of Lean In Latinas and was appointed as a Regional Program Leader by the Lean In Organization.

Anna Dapelo-Garcia

WOMAN OF THE YEAR 2017

Home Care Assistance, CEO

About Lily:
Lily Sarafan is the CEO of Home Care Assistance. Under Lily's leadership for more then a decade, Home Care Assistance has grown from startup to a venture backed growth company to industry champion and today employs more than 6,000 team members across 150 global markets. The copany is consistently recognized as an employer of choice and best-in-class consumer product, and Lily as a featured expert on digital health and the future of aging at the White Hosue and conferences around the world. 

Lily Sarafan

WOMAN OF THE YEAR 2016

Vocera Communications, Inc. Chief Medical Officer

About Bridget
Dr. Duffy was selected among an inspiring pool of women leaders in health care for her many achievements in the field, while serving as a role model by balancing professional and community commitments. Bridget Duffy, MD, is the Chief Medical Officer (CMO) of Vocera Communications, Inc., which provides integrated, intelligent communication that address critical communication challenges within healthcare and other mission-critical industries.

Prior to her appointment as CMO at Vocera, Dr. Duffy co-founded and served as Chief Executive Officer of ExperiaHealth, a company whose mission is to assist organizations in rapidly improving staff and patient loyalty through innovative technologies and solutions that restore the human connection in healthcare. ExperiaHealth was acquired by Vocera Communications and now drives the company’s thought leadership and research collaborative as the Experience Innovation Network.Dr. Duffy was an early pioneer in the creation of hospitalist medicine and launched programs to accelerate clinical discovery in the field of Integrative and Heart-Brain medicine, helping establish the Earl and Doris Bakken Heart Brain Institute. She previously served as Chief Experience Officer (CXO) of the Cleveland Clinic – the first senior position of its kind in the nation – leading the institution in improving patient experience as its top strategic priority. She is a frequent speaker on the subject of why patient experience matters and how it impacts clinical outcomes.

Her work has earned her the Quantum Leap Award for taking the risk to spur internal change in the field of medicine, and she was featured in HealthLeaders magazine as one of “20 People Who Make Healthcare Better.” In 2014, Dr. Duffy was named one of the “Top 50 in Digital Healthcare” by Rock Health and a “Healthcare Change Agent” by Health IT Outcomes. Dr. Duffy attended medical school at the University of Minnesota, and completed her residency in internal medicine at Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She currently serves on the advisory board for Creative Vascular and is a member of the board of directors for Essia Health and Children’s HeartLink.

Bridget Duffy, MD

WOMAN OF THE YEAR 2015

PAST WOMAN OF THE YEAR RECIPIENTS