Bio

DR. ABHA AGRAWAL

MD, FACP, FACHE
Chicago IL, USA

Email: agrawal.abha@gmail.com

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drabhaagrawal/

Dr. Abha Agrawal currently serves as Chief Medical Officer at Humboldt Park Health, Chicago IL, a mission-driven hospital with the purpose of advancing health equity on the West side of Chicago. She is a board-certified physician in Internal Medicine and Clinical Informatics.

She is an accomplished, highly energetic and dedicated healthcare executive, a practicing Internal Medicine physician and a Fulbright Scholar with a proven track record of success in private and public healthcare sectors. Her executive leadership focus includes turn-around and transformation of a failing hospital and leading it to clinical and financial excellence and as a model community hospital. She has over twenty years of experience as an effective physician leader as COO, CMO and CMIO. Her key strengths include:

  • Leadership and cultural transformation / team building at all levels
  • Strategic direction and planning
  • Clinical and Financial operations, P&L
  • Board-management relationship
  • Quality and patient safety with focus on clinical excellence
  • Health IT / Informatics
  • Hospital -physician alignment and integration
  • Leadership in community, social and professional organizations
  • Superb communication and interpersonal skills.
  • Frequent speaker at national, local and international meetings

She is uniquely positioned for healthcare leadership in today’s world with her formal training and board certification in Medical Informatics. She has led numerous IT / EHR implementations, and cybersecurity plans and has provided overall IT strategy to hospitals. She is an internationally recognized leader in quality and safety with over 20 years of experience in improving quality and safety of care, building a culture of safety and just culture, and implementing quality governance. She chairs the Health Equity Committee at Humboldt Park Health and provides national thought leadership on health equity. Dr. Abha Agrawal has served in numerous leadership roles in the US. She served as Chief Medical Officer and Chief Medical Informatics Officer at New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation – Kings County Hospital, a 700-bed academic teaching center in NY.  

She is the founder of A4 CLINICS (www.a4clinics.com), a positive social impact venture to launch a chain of clinics with the aim to reduce the burden of unnecessary disability in India through advanced robotic and technology-enabled rehabilitation made affordable to an average citizen. It was recognized at the Global Entrepreneurship Summit 2017, inaugurated by Indian Prime Minister Modi and Advisor to the US President, Ivanka Trump, held in Hyderabad, India.

In 2011, in recognition of her role as a rising healthcare leader, she was invited to the White House to meet with President Obama’s health and economic policy advisor and to provide testimony at the US Senate. In 2019, she received a special invitation to the 4th Global Health Ministers Summit on Patient Safety in Saudi Arabia to speak to Health Ministers of 63 countries.

She is an alumna of Yale University, a former faculty at Harvard Medical School, a Fulbright Scholar, an editor of several books on patient safety and health information technology, and an international leader in healthcare and health technology.

She has received numerous accolades with some notables including:

  • Fulbright Scholar (2011)
  • Top 20 Global Women of Excellence – US Congress, Chicago (2019)
  • Make in India award by Bharat Nirman Foundation, New Delhi (2017)
  • Woman of the Year award by Congressman Danny Davis, Chicago (2015)
  • “130 Women Hospital and Health System Leaders to Know” national list by Becker’s Hospital Review three years in a row, USA (2015/2014/2013)
  • Healthcare leadership award by the American College of Healthcare Executives (2014)

Some selected board/leadership roles include:

  • Board of Trustees, The American College of Medical Quality
  • Founding Member and Board of Directors, The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE – MP chapter)
  • Board of Governors, The Institute of Medicine, Chicago
  • President of the Board, Chicago Physicians for Social Responsibility
  • Member, National Medical Informatics Committee, American College of Physicians
  • National Medical Leadership Committee, America’s Essential Hospitals
  • Member, Governor’s Council, the American College of Physicians, Northern Illinois Chapter
  • Commissioner, Certification Commission for Health Information Technology
  • Board member, NYCLIX, a regional health information exchange organization
  • Director, ProCOR, a Brookline, MA-based organization, founded by Nobel Laureate, Dr. Bernard Lown

Her books include:

  • EndNote 1-2-3: Reference Management for the Professional (Author), published by Springer. 1st edition 2003, 2nd edition 2008, 3rd edition 2019. 4th edition expected in Fall 2023.
  • “Patient Safety: A Case-based Comprehensive Guide” (Editor), published by Springer and released in October 2013. The second edition is expected to be released in Spring 2023.
  • “Health IT and Patient Safety: A Clinical Case Series” (Editor), published by Springer and released in September 2016.

She was teaching faculty at Harvard Medical School, Northwestern University, and State University of New York in Brooklyn. She received her post-graduation in Medicine at the State University of New York and a fellowship in Medical Informatics at Yale School of Medicine. She obtained her M.B.B.S. degree from SN Medical College, Agra, India, and was a gold medalist in all professional exams.