National Medical Association names Sanders president, and other newsmakers

Dr. Lawrence Sanders Jr. has been named president of the National Medical Association. The NMA, founded in 1895, promotes the collective interests of more than 32,000 physicians of African-American descent and advocates for parity in medicine and the elimination of health disparities.

Sanders is a practicing internist in Atlanta and also teaches internal medicine, business principles and patient safety/quality improvement at Atlanta's Morehouse School of Medicine.

Dr. Chris Beyrer has been named to a two-year term as president of the International AIDS Society.

Beyrer is a professor of epidemiology and international health at the Johns Hopkins' Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore and also serves as director of the system's training program in HIV epidemiology and prevention.

Kevin Thurm, a former official within HHS, is returning to the agency as a senior counselor, reporting to Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell.

Thurm, 53, previously was second in command as HHS deputy secretary from 1996 to 2001 under President Bill Clinton and former HHS Secretary Donna Shalala. Thurm also served as HHS chief of staff.

After leaving HHS, Thurm went to banking giant Citigroup, where he held several roles. Most recently, he was Citigroup's chief compliance officer.

Dr. Eric Lunn will take the helm next year of Altru Health System in Grand Forks, N.D., as president.

Lunn, 55, serves as Altru's chief medical officer and will assume the new role Jan. 1. Earlier this year, Dr. Casey Ryan said he would step down as president by the end of this year.

Lunn, a pediatrician, has been with Altru for 27 years. He also is an associate professor of pediatrics at the University of North Dakota School of Medicine & Health Sciences in Grand Forks.

Amy Vance has been named senior VP of population health at Winston-Salem, N.C.-based Novant Health, effective Sept. 2.

Vance, 50, is currently COO of Novant Health Presbyterian Medical Center, Charlotte, N.C. Her new role was created “in response to the move from volume-based to value-based care,” a Novant spokeswoman said.

Vance, a registered nurse, has been with Novant since 2002. She was director of SouthPark Surgery Center in Charlotte and then became director of nursing at Novant's Matthews (N.C.) Medical Center, where she also served as COO.

Revenue-cycle firm Accretive Health has named Peter Csapo CFO and treasurer.

Csapo, 43, joins a company that is facing several financial challenges, including delisting from the New York Stock Exchange and still-to-be-determined restatements of its finances.

Previously, Csapo was the CFO of VHA, a group-purchasing organization based in Irving, Texas, for two years. From October 2004 through January 2011, he also was the CFO of McKesson Health Solutions, the former employer of Accretive CEO Dr. Emad Rizk. Rizk took the helm at Accretive in July.