2010 Annual Scientific Meeting and Exposition 2010 Annual ...

Special LectureMonday, May 3, 2010, 1:15 PM - 4:15 PM • East BallroomMarvin Moser Clinical Hypertension Award LectureJoel Handler, MDCritical Care Committee.Joel Handler has been an attending physicianfor the Southern California KaiserPermanente Medical Group (SCPMG)since 1979. Board certified in internalmedicine, critical care medicine, geriatricmedicine, and an ASH Specialist,he is a full time clinician seeing patientsin an office based practice as well as thehospital and emergency department. In1992 he initiated a hypertension clinicfor difficult to control patients and seesreferrals from throughout the SouthernCalifornia Kaiser system. Since 1992, hehas chaired the Kaiser Orange CountyHe has been section editor of the Journal of Clinical Hypertension since2001 writing a Case Studies in Hypertension series based mostly on difficultto control hypertension patients seen in the clinic and hospital. Hehas given lectures throughout the Southern California Kaiser system aswell as the national Kaiser meetings, and has also participated in ASHand NHLBI sponsored hypertension symposia. Dr. Handler developedan interactive educational module for physicians, which was creditedwith improving hypertension control performance.Since 2003, Dr. Handler has led the Southern California Kaiser hypertensionprogram, and since 2006 has been the national Kaiser PermanenteCare Management Institute clinical hypertension lead. Kaiser has eightnational regions with 8 million members, and the Southern Californiaregion contains 13 hospital based service areas with more than 3 millionmembers. As national clinical lead, he heads the hypertension treatmentguidelines development team. A simple drug treatment algorithm iscredited as an important factor contributing to a hypertension controlrate of 80% for the California regions, compared to 55% five years ago.He is also a member of the national Kaiser Integrated CardiovascularHealth Care Management Institute core group developing national prioritiesand implementation strategies for cardiovascular health initiatives.In 2008, Dr. Handler was appointed to the expert panel of the 8th JointNational Committee on High Blood Pressure (JNC8), and also to theNHLBI Guidelines Implementation Work group. Dr. Handler completedhis undergraduate work at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvaniafollowed by medical school at the University of Pittsburgh, and residencyat the University of California, San Diego.33