SHM’s Awards of Excellence program honors members who’ve made exceptional contributions to hospital medicine in various categories. Congratulations to the 2025 award winners.
Clinical Leadership for Physicians
Joanna Bonsall, MD, PhD, SFHM
Dr. Bonsall
Dr. Bonsall is an associate professor of medicine at Emory University School of Medicine and the chief of Emory Medicine Services at Grady Memorial Hospital, both in Atlanta. She completed her undergraduate training at Emory University and her medical and graduate training at Emory University School of Medicine.
She completed her Internal Medicine residency at Emory and was hired as a hospitalist at Emory University Hospital Midtown in 2009, before transferring to Grady Memorial Hospital in 2017 to establish a direct care service line.
Since that time, she has steered hospital medicine from a service that worked only with residents and students to one that cares for hundreds of general medicine patients with and without trainees, collaborates with surgical colleagues around co-management, runs a complex observation unit, and has ensured robust faculty development. Dr. Bonsall has made multiple valuable contributions to SHM, including as chair and member of the Academic Committee, and remains an active member of the Digital Learning and Annual Conference Committees.
Clinical Leadership for NPs and PAs
Elise Haupt, PA-C, MPH, FHM
Ms. Haupt
Ms. Haupt has been a hospital medicine physician assistant (PA) for 10 years and a leader of the hospital medicine NP/PAs for HealthPartners for more than five years. Her philosophy is: the backbone of hospital medicine is connection and collaboration, which ultimately leads to innovation.
With this philosophy, Ms. Haupt has fostered the growth of the hospital medicine NP/PA team across HealthPartners, doubling its size. She has faced the challenge of uniting disparate cultures and forging a culture of mutual respect and trust throughout the department. Ms. Haupt co-led the development of the “HP Direct” HealthPartners transfer center. Her team successfully locates beds for thousands of patients per year within the 10-hospital system across Minnesota and western Wisconsin.
Ms. Haupt enjoys building relationships with hospitalists across the state of Minnesota and beyond. She was the first PA to be elected as president of SHM’s Minnesota chapter. She also connects and innovates with NPs and PAs as a leader on the SHM NP/PA Special Interest Group and as the liaison for the American Academy of PAs to the Society of Hospital Medicine.
Research
Stephanie Parks Taylor, MD, MS
Dr. Taylor
Dr. Taylor is the J. Griswold and Margery Hopkins Ruth Research Professor of Medicine and the chief of hospital medicine at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. Dr. Taylor leads a first-of-its-kind research program improving outcomes for patients with sepsis.
Her work’s key innovation has been embedding research questions into routine clinical care, using rigorous methods to develop and test interventions in pragmatic randomized controlled trials. Dr. Taylor’s work includes using advanced modeling to understand pathways to accurate diagnosis of sepsis, understanding and mitigating health disparities in care for sepsis, and improving recovery for sepsis survivors.
Her team’s innovative Sepsis Transition and Recovery program, tested in a large randomized controlled trial, is the first intervention ever shown to improve mortality and rehospitalization among sepsis survivors.
Since 2018, Dr. Taylor has continuously held NIH funding for her work, as the PI of five R-series awards from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ). Her work has generated more than 100 publications in high-impact journals including JAMA, NEJM, and Annals of Internal Medicine. She is a first-generation college student and is dedicated to mentoring the next generation of physician-scientists in hospital medicine.
Humanitarian Services
Michael Herscher, MD
Dr. Herscher
Dr. Herscher is a hospitalist and associate professor in the departments of medicine and medical education at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York. His work focuses on expanding access to addiction care, developing innovative treatment programs, and educating current and future physicians on the treatment of patients with substance use disorders.
To address gaps in hospital-based addiction care, Dr. Herscher founded the REACH-IN program, a volunteer-led initiative that identifies hospitalized patients with opioid use disorder, initiates buprenorphine treatment, and links them to outpatient care.
He also follows many of these patients at REACH, a primary care practice for people who use drugs, where he has provided care for over four years.
Dr. Herscher’s additional initiatives include virtual naloxone education and distribution during the COVID-19 pandemic, founding an inpatient naloxone distribution program, and collaborating with hospital leadership and the emergency department to improve addiction treatment protocols.
Dr. Herscher also developed the Addiction Medicine Longitudinal Clinical Experience for first-year students. His teaching contributions have earned him multiple awards for education and humanitarianism.
Beyond addiction medicine, Dr. Herscher serves as course co-director for the art and science of medicine doctoring course and core faculty for the internal medicine residency.
Excellence in Teaching
Dustin T. Smith, MD, SFHM
Dr. Smith
Dr. Dustin T. Smith is a hospitalist and section chief for inpatient medicine at the Atlanta VA Medical Center, an associate program director for the J. Willis Hurst Internal Medicine Residency Program, and an associate professor of medicine at Emory University in Atlanta. He carries the clinical distinction of Emory “Eminent Physician.” Dr. Smith is a graduate of the Emory School of Medicine.
He completed his internal medicine residency at the University of California, San Francisco, with distinction in the primary medical education program, where he was awarded the G. Thomas Evans resident teaching award.
Throughout his career, Dr. Smith has been recognized for teaching excellence among a variety of learners, including students, trainees, and faculty. Additionally, he has received awards for service, leadership, education, and mentorship in hospital medicine.
He served on SHM’s Annual Conference Committee and was the course director for SHM’s annual conference in 2019. Dr. Smith is currently a member of SHM’s Education Committee.
Outstanding Service in HM
Nilam J. Soni, MD, MSc, SFHM
Dr. Soni
Dr. Soni is a professor of medicine and academic hospitalist at the University of Texas Health San Antonio and the South Texas Veterans Health Care System. He is trained in internal medicine and is a leader in point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS).
Dr. Soni proposed the first POCUS workshop at the 2010 SHM annual meeting. The workshop was designed for 24 learners but sold out with more than 90 learners! This led to the establishment of the POCUS Advanced Learning Course, which has been extremely popular since its inception. Through his leadership, the POCUS community has expanded greatly within SHM. Now, there is an SHM POCUS Special Interest Group, POCUS Certificate of Completion Program, and several unique educational offerings, including an escape room at Converge 2025.
Dr. Soni has chaired the POCUS Task Force that published several SHM position statements that are highly cited in the Journal of Hospital Medicine. He is the visionary and chief editor of the book, Point-of-Care Ultrasound, which was awarded the 2015 British Medical Association’s President’s Choice Award. More than 30,000 copies of the book have been distributed worldwide in eight languages.
Dr. Soni leads POCUS implementation for the Department of Veterans Affairs, has directed the VA’s POCUS Patient Safety Center, and was awarded a VA Quality Improvement grant to evaluate implementation of POCUS use in the VA healthcare system.
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Leadership
Keshav Khanijow, MD
Dr. Khanijow
Dr. Khanijow is a hospitalist and assistant professor of medicine at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center in Baltimore. He has a proven record of clinical excellence, winning the distinguished JHBMC Hospital Medicine Clinical Excellence Award in 2019 and the JHBMC Hospitalist of the Year Award in 2022. He is very active in research and advocacy for LGBTQIA+ health and has lectured on LGBTQIA+ health in the inpatient setting internationally, published on LGBTQIA+ health topics for hospitalists, including in The Hospitalist, and helped create the LGBTQIA+ Health Series on the SHM Learning Portal.
Beyond LGBTQIA+ health, he led efforts to write the SHM DEI statement in 2020, served as an inaugural member of the SHM DEI Committee, and was appointed the chair of the SHM DEI Special Interest Group in 2023. He maintains a position as director of patient safety as well as director of DEI at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center’s Division of Hospital Medicine.
Leadership for Practice Managers
Regina Kauffman, BA
Ms. Kauffman
Ms. Regina Kauffman is a program specialist at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. She graduated from the College of Notre Dame of Maryland and joined Johns Hopkins shortly thereafter as a neuropsychometrician. She began her work in hospital medicine in 2006 and has played a crucial role in the implementation of several patient care and system-centered initiatives resulting from research projects. She has published 31 research papers in journals like the Journal of Hospital Medicine, the Journal of General Internal Medicine, and more.
As an educator, Ms. Kauffman works with the research elective, Student Hospitalist Academic Research Program, and Focused Accelerated IMG Training in Healthcare. She has played a key role in the establishment and continued success of these programs for undergraduates, medical students, and international medical graduates. She is responsible for the oversight and onboarding of these learners, engages them in research and clinical roles, and facilitates program advancements.
Teamwork in Hospital Medicine
Cleveland Clinic Hospital Medicine
Cleveland Clinic’s Department of Hospital Medicine spans two states, works clinically at 11 hospitals, sustains more than 300 physicians and NPs, and PAs, and discharges more than 115,000 patients annually. Cleveland Clinic Hospital Medicine brings in roughly 12,000 HCAHPS surveys per year. Called to action by their low HCAHPS Doctor Communication ratings as benchmarked against hospitals nationally, the Cleveland Clinic’s Department of Hospital Medicine banded together to improve the Top Box Doctor Communicating rating.
First, they accentuated the positive and sent personalized laudations to the individual doctors who achieved the benchmarked target quarterly. In addition, they “shouted it from the rooftops” with name recognition at every group gathering and town hall meeting. Secondly, they worked with local groups. Many hospitals have Patient Experience teams, and the Department of Hospital Medicine leveraged those teams’ expertise to bring Patient Experience tips to clinician groups. They also provided 1:1 coaching for those clinicians who needed extra help. This allowed us to give feedback and lean into the question of what exactly our team members could do differently to move their own metrics.
Together, although this team is diverse in geography and locations, they have been able to work together, improving the HCAHPS Doctor Communication Top Box scores, month over month.
Junior Investigator Award
Blair Golden, MD, MS
Dr. Golden
Dr. Blair Golden is an assistant professor at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, where she also serves as the director of academic development for the division of hospital medicine. She is a health services researcher and hospitalist clinician whose work focuses on system-based interventions to improve clinician communication with hospitalized patients and caregivers and optimizing hospital care for older adults who are at risk for or experiencing delirium. Dr. Golden is supported by a K23 Career Development Award from the National Institute on Aging that is examining collaborative identification and prevention of delirium superimposed on dementia between family caregivers and clinicians. Her research and viewpoints have been featured in the Journal of Hospital Medicine, the Journal of General Internal Medicine, JAMA Internal Medicine, and the British Medical Journal.
Dr. Golden completed her residency and chief residency at Northwestern University in Chicago, where she also received a master’s in health services in outcomes research. Since joining SHM, she has presented at multiple SHM Converge conferences and currently serves on the Research Committee. She is a former Journal of Hospital Medicine editorial fellow.
Award submissions for 2026 will open in July 2025. Visit hospitalmedicine.org/awards for information.