As Vanderbilt University Medical Center’s (VUMC) CEO and medical school dean since 2009, Dr. Balser has led health system expansion from two to five regional campuses housing seven hospitals and nearly 2000 licensed beds. With over 40,000 employees, annual operating income has grown from $2 to nearly $9 billion, while visits at over 200 ambulatory locations now approach 3.5 million from communities nationwide. VUMC houses the nation’s largest volume heart transplant program and the third largest for all solid organs; the Mid-South’s largest NCI-designated comprehensive cancer center; and the Southeast’s highest ranked children’s hospital. As one of the nation’s largest and most distinguished academic medical centers providing training to over 1200 physicians in over 200 specialties, the medical school is ranked #5 in the 2024 Blue Ridge Institute for Medical Research rankings of NIH funding. The nation’s academic leader in health information technology and precision medicine, VUMC hosts the Data and Research Support Center for NIH’s “All of Us” program gathering DNA from one million Americans.

An engineering graduate of Tulane and 1990 MD/PhD graduate of Vanderbilt, Dr. Balser trained in anesthesiology, cardiac anesthesiology and critical care at Johns Hopkins. There he led an NIH-funded research program aimed at genetic causes of cardiac rhythm disorders. Returning to VUMC as Associate Dean in 1998, he was anesthesiology chairman from 2001-2004 and chief research officer from 2004-2009. In 2015-16, Dr. Balser led the medical center’s $1.2B public debt issuance and historic restructuring with Vanderbilt University to spin out VUMC as a legally and financially independent, not-for-profit corporation. As President and CEO, he is a director at VUMC, and also at CVS Health where he chairs the Medical Affairs & Technology committee. Elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2008, he served as a governing council member from 2018 – 2024.