LITTLE ROCK, AR (News release) - Governor-Elect Asa Hutchinson announced on Tuesday that Dr. Greg Bledsoe will be the state's new Surgeon General.

Dr. Bledsoe is a board certified Emergency Medicine physician and Chairman of the Department of Emergency Medicine of Marshall Medical Center South in Alabama, a department that oversees the care of approximately 40,000 patient visits each year.

After completing medical school and residency at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, Dr. Bledsoe spent five years on faculty in the Johns Hopkins Department of Emergency Medicine completing a two-year fellowship in International Emergency Medicine and a Masters in Public Health (MPH) from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. In 2005, he received the Teacher of the Year award from the Johns Hopkins Department of Emergency Medicine.

Dr. Bledsoe has extensive experience in international travel having visited over 50 countries. His international medical experience includes serving as a field physician in Honduras, teaching disaster preparedness in Tanzania, leading a nutritional survey among the Beja tribe in northeast Sudan, working as a medical consultant in Beijing, China, teaching Emergency Medicine in Qatar, and acting as the medical officer for ships in both Antarctica and the Arctic, including the North Pole.

In addition to his clinical duties, Dr. Bledsoe has been an instructor and medical consultant for the United States Secret Service. He was the personal physician to former President Bill Clinton during Clintons tour of Africa in September 2002, and served in Uganda and Senegal on the advance team of President George W. Bush when the President visited the African continent in July of 2003.

Originally posted here:

Governor-Elect Hutchinson Names New Surgeon General