Barbara Stoll: China Medical Board's charismatic new President

Abstract

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These permissions are granted for free by Elsevier for as long as the COVID-19 resource centre remains active. “Taking on a new adventure” is how Barbara Stoll views her recent appointment as President of the China Medical Board (CMB), a US-based philanthropic foundation for health development in China and southeast Asia. “I'm incredibly lucky to be given this opportunity, and will try my best to fill the large shoes of outgoing CMB President Lincoln Chen, who has done an extraordinary job over the past 14 years, building partnerships and extending CMB's reach”, she says. It was Chen who helped open Stoll's eyes to the wider world of global health, encouraging her to pursue research opportunities in Bangladesh early in her career. “Moving to CMB feels like coming full circle, back into the arena of global health, having spent most of my career in academic medicine in the US”, she says. Her journey into medicine stemmed from the influences of her physician father, and the strength of her mother, who had emigrated from Poland to the USA in World War 2. Stoll graduated from Yale Medical School and began a paediatrics residency at Columbia University in New York City, before moving to Atlanta with her husband, Roger Glass, who was about to join the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). After her time training in neonatal and perinatal medicine at Atlanta's Emory University School of Medicine, the couple started work at the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (icddr,b) in 1979. She recalls being a fish out of water at icddr,b: “I had come from a high-tech environment of neonatal ICU care in Atlanta, and found myself working in what seemed like an enormous field hospital”. In what was a new era of oral rehydration therapy for diarrhoeal disease, Stoll, with no training in epidemiology, helped to introduce disease surveillance in the Dhaka hospital. “There were no systematic data about patients, and I soon realised that icddr,b was sitting on a goldmine of scientific and medical information that could be transformative for Bangladesh's future health”, she says. In Stoll's 4 years at icddr,b, her research included the early use of ELISA testing for rotavirus infection, monitoring changes in diarrhoeal disease pathogens, and assessing the malnutrition that was a driver of poor child health in the country. Back in the USA, Stoll spent a couple of years as a laboratory scientist at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, before Emory University offered her a faculty position in their Department of Pediatrics in 1986. As a neonatologist, her work focused on the acute and chronic effects of early preterm birth, which were often linked to the social determinants of health. “Health disparities are rife across many spheres, especially related to race, ethnicity, and poverty. A patient's zip code, a surrogate for socioeconomic status, is often directly related to their health outcomes”, Stoll says. Her research aspirations were boosted by early funding from the NICHD Neonatal Research Network. “This network was hugely important, allowing me to participate in a range of research projects, and to become part of a community of stellar figures within the specialty”, she says. It was on a year's sabbatical with WHO that Stoll rekindled her passion for global health, studying the effect of neonatal infections on mortality in low-income settings. “25 years ago, the world was just starting to understand the importance of neonatal mortality on overall child survival, the advent of a huge explosion in interest around maternal and child health”, she says. Stoll later became the first female Chair in Pediatrics at Emory, having initially filled in for a year. “I never had any aspirations about taking a senior leadership position, but realised that if I did not take the permanent offer of Chair, whoever replaced me was unlikely to be a woman”, she says. “During my 12 years as Chair, I came to realise that there was huge satisfaction from mentoring others and working to build an outstanding research-intensive department”, she says. In 2015, Stoll became Dean of the McGovern Medical School at the University of Texas Health Science Center. “It was fascinating to keep learning, a change from knowing a lot about a little to knowing a tiny amount about quite a lot. I had a privileged position to help shape the outlook and culture of the school during my 5 years there”, she says. Jeffrey Koplan, former CDC Director and Vice President for Global Health at Emory University and CMB trustee, has known Stoll for over 20 years, and says: “Throughout her career, Barbara has maintained the highest levels of productivity and accomplishment; as a clinician, retaining a hands on presence in patient care, as an educator, teaching students and mentoring paediatric residents and neonatology fellows, as a researcher, advancing the knowledge base for reducing child morbidity and mortality, especially in low-income communities, and as a leader in medical education, child advocate, champion and inspiration for women in medicine. CMB will continue to thrive and likely will expand into new areas and accomplishments under her leadership.” Stoll took up the position as CMB's President-Designate this month and will assume her role as full President at the start of next year. Looking ahead, Stoll comments: “While being a relatively small foundation in monetary terms, CMB, with a distinguished history going back over a century, is very well respected and trusted in the region. I very much look forward to building on existing partnerships and establishing new collaborations to leverage expertise and further develop health programmes in the region, continuing health equity and leadership development. And when COVID-19 restrictions permit, I will spend meaningful time on the ground in Asia.”