Dr. Thar is a physician who has experience in many sectors of health care. A graduate of Michigan State University College of Human Medicine, he did his residency at the University of Michigan, where he also received his MPH in Health Care Administration and Epidemiology. He has operated a private primary care practice, been the Medical Director of rural public health programs, directed epidemiology programs at a major U.S. corporation, where he also provided medical consultation to their health care benefits programs, and was a developer and Medical Director of a health care management company before his retirement. Dr. Thar has seen the fragmented, expensive, and highly variable care provided in the United States and is committed to the development of a National Health Program based on HR 676 that can serve all of the people of the United States.
Alan L. Kenwood, MD, FACEP
MD, FACEP
Dr. Alan Kenwood has been a practicing emergency physician for over 30 years. More than any other specialists, emergency medicine physicians see the faults of our health care system. Prior to becoming an emergency physician, he served in the US Army Special Forces at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. As a member of PNHP-NJ Dr. Kenwood has spoken all over the state about the benefits of single payer healthcare.
Sean Lehmann, DPM
Dr. Sean Lehmann attended the College of Podiatric Medicine and Surgery at Des Moines University (Iowa) where he earned both a Doctor of Podiatric Medicine and a Master’s degree in healthcare administration. He then completed a surgical residency program at Lakewood Regional Medical Center near Long Beach, California. Soon after opening his practice in the summer of 2000, Sean and his wife Michelle bought a home in Carson City, Nevada. Sean is an avid runner, currently coaches track at Carson High School, and particularly enjoys running with his wife and their two sons. He is also a member of the Carson City Parks and Recreation Commission, and further enjoys skiing, hiking, basketball, traveling, and flying.
John D. Bower, MD
Dr. John Bower is Chief of the Division of Nephrology at the University of Mississippi in Jackson, Mississippi. His practice includes many patients in the publicly financed and highly successful end-stage renal disease program. Dr. Bower has been a PNHP member for six years, and is the founder of PNHP’s Mississippi chapter. He brought a single-payer resolution before the the state medical society, and is active in speaking and writing editorials and letters on the need for universal access to health care.
James F. Hart, MD
Dr. Hart serves as the Director of the Executive Program in Public Health Practice in the School of Public Health at the University of Minnesota. Prior to that he worked for 26 years in primary care medical practice and management both independently and with HealthPartners Inc. He was on the faculty of the Regions Hospital Family Medicine Residency Program from 2002-2005. Dr. Hart has also had a long interest in global health issues – he served on the board of Minnesota International Health Volunteers for 13 years and now serves on the board of Global Health Ministries.
Elizabeth Frost, MD
Elizabeth Frost, M.D., is a family practice doctor working at the Hennepin County Medical Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota. After graduating from residency at the University of Minnesota, Elizabeth spent almost a year volunteering with Doctors for Global Health in Chiapas, Mexico. She currently works with a heavily Latino and mostly uninsured population in Minneapolis, and is confronted daily with economic barriers to basic care. She co-founded Physicians for a National Health Program – Minnesota along with Dr. Ann Settgast.
Laurel Gamm, MD
Dr. Laurel Gamm is trained in family medicine and has worked as both a family medicine primary care doctor and more recently in the emergency department in rural Minnesota (New Ulm). She is a long-time PNHP member and has been involved in the single-payer movement in MN since the early 1990s. Starting this fall, Laurel is making a career change and has taken a job with Health Care for the Homeless in St. Paul. She will be splitting her time between New Ulm and St. Paul. She is a past co-chair of PNHP-Minnesota.
Inge De Becker, MD
Dr. Inge De Becker was born in Belgium. She trained there as a pediatric ophthalmologist, and then practiced for the next 25 years in Canada. She came to the US about 5 years ago, and she has been practicing at the U of MN in the pediatric ophthalmology department. Inge’s personal experience working in and out of a single-payer system will prove invaluable in her new role. As she says, being a doctor and a patient in our system makes her repeatedly, “just shake my head”. She is a past co-chair of PNHP-Minnesota.
Tim Lambert, DO
Dr. Lambert is a family physician and faculty member of the Munson Medical Center Family Practice Residency Program in Traverse City. He has worked in the community with the migrant health clinic, the Grand Traverse Band Native American health clinic and most recently with the Grand Traverse Regional Health Care Coalition Board (Vice-President 2004-2006)
John Cavacece, DO
Dr. James Mitchiner is currently an attending emergency physician at St. Joseph Mercy Hospital in Ann Arbor, Michigan. In addition, he has an academic appointment at the University of Michigan Medical School. He is Past President of the Michigan College of Emergency Physicians and has served in the American College of Emergency Physicians as the Chair of its State Legislative and Regulatory Committee, and as a member of the Task Force on Health Care and the Uninsured. A longtime single-payer advocate, he is active in Physicians for a National Health Program, which has 18,000 members nationwide. Dr. Mitchiner received his M.D. from the University of Illinois College of Medicine and received a master’s degree in health management and policy from the University of Michigan School of Public Health.
Rachel Nardin, MD
Dr. Rachel Nardin is chief of neurology at Cambridge Health Alliance, an assistant professor of neurology at Harvard Medical School, and chair of the MA chapter of Physicians for a National Health Program. She is active in educating others about single payer, gives frequent grand rounds and community talks, and appears frequently in the media.
Jim Recht, MD
Dr. Recht is the past chair of the MA chapter of Physicians for a National Health Program. He is a staff psychiatrist at Cambridge Hospital and an Instructor in Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School.
