An Interview with OUR CMA President, Dr. Shannon Udovic-Constant April 15, 2025 CMA 0 SFMMS is extremely pleased and proud to have our own Shannon Udovic-Constant, MD as this year’s President of the California Medical Association. A pediatrician trained at UCSF and working at Kaiser San Francisco, she has long been well-known and respected at the SFMMS due to her long path through our leadership roles, starting as a delegate to the CMA House of Delegates through serving as president, then chairing the CMA board of trustees and then being elected President. She takes that lofty leadership position in an especially critical time and we wanted to have a talk with her here. – Michael Schrader, MD and Steve Heilig, MPH You are the current President of the CMA. What got you involved with leadership in organized medicine? Early in my pediatric practice I had 30% of my patients meeting the definition of childhood overweight and I was diagnosing Type 2 diabetes in adolescents. In talking with an elementary school patient about drinking water and not sugar sweetened beverages he said, “I can’t drink water”. It turned out his SF public school didn’t have potable drinking water. I knew how to address this with a single phone call to the AAP-CA executive director and legislation was passed requiring all California schools to have potable drinking water. Early on I saw the power of organized medicine to influence health policy and decision-makers to impact beyond my office walls the health of my patients and our community. Partnering with organized medicine thru the American Academy of Pediatrics, SFMMS and CMA would fast track the outcomes I was seeking. I pursued leadership because it allows you to create more impact. SFMMS is often a training ground for leadership at the CMA and in the community. What did you learn about leadership while being involved with SFMMS? The importance of having processes in place and a culture that celebrates and welcomes diverse perspectives whether it be specialty, gender, age, ethnicity, type of practice. This leads to better decisions and alignment of the group that then allows focus on strategic priorities. To continue reading our interview with Dr. Shannon Udovic-Constant, CMA President, CLICK HERE Comments are closed.
