Myra Muramoto, MD, MPH, chair of the Department of Family and Community Medicine at the University of Arizona College of Medicine, has been named Chair of the Department of Family Medicine at the University of Colorado School of Medicine, effective Oct. 1, 2021.
Muramoto has dedicated most of her career as an educator and researcher to substance-abuse education and treatment, with a particular focus on alcohol and tobacco use. As an educator, she has helped to develop national and international educational projects to train health care and human service providers in prevention, screening, and treatment of alcohol and tobacco use disorders.
Muramoto has been a faculty member at the University of Arizona College of Medicine since 1990, joining the faculty after serving as chief resident and as a research fellow in the college’s Department of Family and Community Medicine. She was appointed a tenured professor in 2010 and became the department’s chair in 2015. She earned her MD from the University of Arizona College of Medicine in 1985 and an MPH in Epidemiology from the University of Arizona in 2005.
Under her leadership, the Department of Family and Community Medicine is one of the top-ranked programs in the country, with a reputation for outstanding clinical education and innovative research. The department’s residency training program focuses on underserved and rural populations and offers an integrative medicine track, as well as a global health track for residents who aim to reduce health disparities world worldwide.
“Our clinical practice is the foundation for academic excellence in education, research, and community engagement,” said Muramoto. “I believe that an inclusive, transparent, and team-oriented approach to leadership is essential for an organization to grow, thrive, and excel in its mission.”
Muramoto has been principal investigator or co-investigator on 48 translational research studies, 30 involving testing of novel pharmacologic, behavioral, and system interventions for tobacco cessation. The majority of her community-engaged tobacco cessation translational research has focused on ethnic/racial minority groups (Spanish-speaking, American Indian, rural African American), low-income populations, and other special populations (rural, adolescents, pregnant women, military, behavioral health disorders, complementary and alternative medicine patients and practitioners, global health). She is the author of 69 peer-reviewed journal articles, five book chapters, five peer-reviewed published abstracts, and co-author of “Geriatric Nutrition Handbook.” She also has made more than 150 scholarly presentations. She has extensive teaching and mentoring experience, including medical student career-development counseling, research mentoring with post-doctoral fellows and junior faculty.
“Dr. Muramoto has an impressive record of advancing academic medicine, through progressive administrative leadership responsibility, establishing new clinical services, and leading a research program that has received over $26 million in extramural funding,” said CU School of Medicine Dean John J. Reilly, Jr., MD. “We are pleased to welcome her to our faculty and look forward to her contributions to our training, research, and clinical programs.”
The CU School of Medicine’s Department of Family Medicine is consistently recognized as one of the top family medicine programs in the country. In the U.S. New and World Report rankings released earlier this year, the School of Medicine’s program in family medicine was ranked No. 7 among all medical schools.
Muramoto succeeds Frank DeGruy, MD, MS, who has been chair of the department since 1996. DeGruy stepped down as chair on June 30 and Colleen Conry, MD, senior vice chair for quality and clinical affairs, will serve as interim chair until Muramoto’s arrival on campus.
