Lila Kagedan, MTS, MEd

Lila Kagedan is the Dean of Ethics and Professionalism at New York Medical College School of Medicine. She sits on the ethics committee at Westchester Medical Center as well as Cambridge Health Alliance where she serves as an ethicist and chaplain. Kagedan also holds appointments at the New York Medical College School of Health Sciences and Practice and the Touro School of Dental Medicine. Kagedan is a clergy person, bioethicist and a professional mediator.

Geoffrey Talmon, MD

Professor, UNMC Department of Pathology, Microbiology, and Immunology; Associate Dean, Medical Education, UNMC College of Medicine; inaugural director of the UNMC Interprofessional Academy of Educators; and co-editor of “Mind the Gap: Generational Differences in Medical Education.”

Samuel Mathis, MD, MBA

Samuel Mathis is an Assistant Professor of Family Medicine at the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) in Galveston, Texas, where he serves as the Director of the Integrative & Behavioral Medicine Fellowship and Co-Director of the UTMB Doctoring and Clinical Skills Course for pre-clerkship students and the Family Medicine Clerkship. In these roles, he mentors and teaches medical students, residents, and fellows in professional development, clinical reasoning, and patient care. Dr. Mathis is the current Chair of the AMA's Young Physicians Section and has previously served on the boards of the Texas Medical Association and the American Academy of Family Physicians. He has been involved in the AMA for the past 12 years, starting when he was a medical student. When not involved in advocacy work, he enjoys camping, playing music, and spending time with his spouse and 5-year-old daughter. His academic interests involve curriculum design and integrative therapies such as acupuncture.

Priya Desai

Priya Desai, a medical student at Boston University Chobanian and Avedisian School of Medicine, serves as delegate of the Medical Student Section (MSS) Governing Council for the 2024-2025 term. Desai has been a member of the AMA since 2020, serving in various national, regional, state and local leadership roles, including as a MSS regional delegate in the AMA House of Delegates, an MSS caucus co-lead for medical education, public health and medical service, co-chair of the MSS Reference Committee, a member on the MSS Standing Committee Task Force, MSS Archive Task Force and MSS Committee on Economics & Quality in Medicine. She also previously served as delegate to the MSS Assembly from the American College of Surgeons and BU Chobanian and Avedisian School of Medicine. She has served as chair and vice chair of the Massachusetts Medical Society (MMS) Medical Student Section, and has been a member of numerous MMS committees.

Jacob Altholz, MD

Jacob Altholz, MD, serves as speaker for the Resident & Fellow Section Governing Council and as delegate for the Resident & Fellow Section at the American Medical Association for the 2024-2025 term. Dr. Altholz is a toxicology fellow at Rocky Mountain Poison & Drug Safety in Denver, Colorado and has completed a residency in emergency medicine at the University of Nevada—Las Vegas.

Neel Shah, MB, ChB

Dr. Shah is a consultant hospitalist and core faculty physician in the Mayo Clinic Rochester internal medicine residency. He serves as the Director of Clinical Education for the Mayo Clinic Alix School of Medicine and oversees the clinical phase of the medical school curriculum with chief interest in development of clinical reasoning and metacognition. He is a Senior Fellow in the Mayo Academy of Educational Excellence and Chair-Elect of the Academic Physicians Section of the American Medical Association.