Patricia Gabow, MD

Dr. Gabow is a national healthcare leader. She spent her career at Denver Health starting as a clinical nephrologist and researcher and spending the last 20 years there as the CEO, retiring in 2012. She led the transformation from a city entity to an independent authority and created a national model for care of the most vulnerable.   The healthcare system that she revolutionized is an integrated health care system that includes the Denver Health Medical Center, a regional trauma center, the 911 system, a system of family health centers and clinics in public schools, the Rocky Mountain Poison and Drug Center, an inmate health care program, a public health institute, and more.  As a clinical researcher, she was known internationally for her scientific knowledge of polycystic kidney disease, a disease which affects 12.5 million worldwide.

In 2021, she is a professor emerita of medicine at the University of Colorado School of Medicine and a Master of the American College of Physicians. She has authored over 170 articles, book chapters, and two books, including “TIME’S NOW for Women Healthcare Leaders: A Guide for the Journey.”  She was a founding member of the federal Medicaid and CHIP Payment and Access Commission and serves on the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Board of Trustees and the Lown Institute Board (Chair). She has received numerous awards, including the National Academy of Medicine’s Gustav O. Lienhard Award and the American Medical Association Nathan Davis Award for Outstanding Public Servant. She is a graduate of Seton Hill University and the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.