Reed Tuckson, M.D.

Chairman of the Board of Director, ViTel Net, LLC | Co-founder, Black Coalition Against COVID | Former President, American Telemedicine Association | Former Executive Vice President & Chief of Medical Affairs, UnitedHealth | Former Senior Vice President, American Medical Association

Reed V. Tuckson, MD, FACP, is the Managing Director of Tuckson Health Connections, LLC, a health and medical care consulting business that brings people and ideas together to promote optimal health outcomes and value through innovation and integration across the fields of prevention; public health; consumer activation; quality care delivery; the translation of science and technology into value producing interventions; and optimization of big data and analytics. Currently, Dr. Tuckson is Chairman of the Board of Directors for ViTel Net, LLC, a leading innovator in telehealth solutions; and, he is the immediate past President and a Board Member of the American Telemedicine Association.

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Previously, he enjoyed a long tenure as Executive Vice President and Chief of Medical Aﬀairs for UnitedHealth Group, a Fortune 20 health and wellbeing company, which includes the nation’s largest health insurer and the industry’s most comprehensive health services company. A Section 16 oﬃcer of the company, Dr. Tuckson was a member of the Executive Operating Committee and responsible for oversight of the company’s Foundation.

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A recognized leader in his field, he is proud to have been recognized several times by Modern Healthcare Magazine within its listing of the “50 Most Powerful Physician Executives” in healthcare and by Black Enterprise Magazine as one of the “Most Powerful Executives in Corporate America”.

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He serves on the Board of Directors of LifePoint Health, a leading hospital company dedicated to providing high-value care and services to growing regions, rural communities and vibrant small towns across the nation; Cell Therapeutics, Inc., a public corporation concerned with the development of cancer pharmaceuticals; and Inform Genomics, Inc., a private company focused on developing novel platforms of genomic-based personalized medicine products for cancer supportive care. He is also a special advisor to the CEO of ViTel Net, LLC, a leading innovator in telehealth solutions and he continues to provide consulting services with UnitedHealth Group.

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Dr. Tuckson is the author of The Doctor in the Mirror, an ongoing book and online senior patient activation and education project. Additionally, he serves on the National Advisory Council for Complementary and Integrative Health of the National Institutes of Health; he is an elected member of the Institute of Medicine, serving in a leadership position on the use of data and analytics in healthcare; an Advisory Board Member at Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics; a Board Member of The Arnold P. Gold Foundation, which is concerned with advancing humanism in medical care; and a Trustee of the Board at Howard University.

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Previously, Dr. Tuckson was a member of the Advisory Committee to the Director of the National Institutes of Health; served as Chairman of the Secretary of Health’s Advisory Committee on Genetics, Health and Society; and he has served on several U.S. Government cabinet level health advisory committees concerned with health reform, infant mortality, children’s health, violence, and radiation testing. He also served on the Board of Directors of Baxter International and the Board of Trustees of Rockefeller University.

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Dr. Tuckson’s career accomplishments include serving as the Commissioner of Public Health for the District of Columbia; Senior Vice President for Professional Standards of the AMA; Senior Vice President of the March of Dimes Birth Defects Foundation; and President of the Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science.

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He is a graduate of Howard University, Georgetown University School of Medicine, and the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania’s General Internal Medicine Residency and Fellowship Programs, where he was also a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Clinical Scholar studying at the Wharton School of Business.

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Credentials

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Chairman of the Board — ViTel Net
Co-founder, Black Coalition Against COVID (BCAC)
Advisory Board Member, Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics
Former President, American Telemedicine Association
Board Member, Health Sciences Policy — Institute of Medicine
Roundtable Member, Value & Science-Driven Health Care — Institute of Medicine
Forum Member, Medical and Public Health Preparedness for Catastrophic Events —Institute of Medicine
Committee Member, Prepositioned Medical Countermeasures — Institute of Medicine
Member, Board of Directors — American Telemedicine Association
Member, Board of Directors — Cell Therapeutics, Inc.
Member, Board of Directors — LifePoint Hospitals
Member, Board of Directors — Inform Genomics, Inc.
Member, Board of Directors — Center for Medical Technology Policy
Member, Board of Governors — Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies
National Advisory Committee Member — Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Aligning Forces for Quality
Commissioner — Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s, 2013 Commission to Build a Healthier America
Member — NASA LAUNCH: Health Council
Member, Board of Directors — Alliance for Health Reform
Audit Committee Chairman — Alliance for Health Reform
Advisory Board Member — HealthTrac Foundation

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Topics

The Doctor in the Mirror

Talking to Doctors, Talking to Patients

In this talk, Dr. Tuckson addresses perhaps the most important element of effective healthcare: the doctor-patient conversation. It is the key to effective diagnosis, to building trust, to discussing options for care, and so much more — but neither doctors nor patients receive training for this conversation on par with its importance. Dr. Tuckson’s talk walks both doctor and patient groups through the best ways to approach and conduct this crucial dialogue.