Pediatrician to Lead Children’s Health Foundation

PALO ALTO – David T. Alexander, MD, will join the Lucile Packard Foundation for Children’s Health as president and CEO, effective Feb. 22.

Foundation Board Chairman George Pavlov today announced the appointment of Alexander, a pediatrician who most recently was the Medical Advisor for Public Policy for the National Association of Children’s Hospitals.

“Dr. Alexander has an ideal background for leading our foundation’s work in advancing children’s health,” Pavlov said. “He has cared for children as a pediatrician, served as president and medical director of children’s hospitals, and advocated at the national level for policies that promote the well being of children. He is well acquainted with the important issues that need to be addressed.”

Alexander, 52, was president of Devos Children’s Hospital in Grand Rapids, Michigan, from 2002 to 2005, and medical director of Blank Children’s Hospital in Des Moines, Iowa, from 1993 to 2002.

“I am very excited to have the opportunity to join an organization that is so clearly focused on the mission of improving children’s health,” Alexander said. “I look forward to serving with a group of incredibly dedicated community leaders and healthcare providers to ensure that our children have access to the resources and services they need to grow up healthy.”

As president and CEO, Alexander will lead a 10-year-old foundation that is devoted to promoting the physical, mental, emotional and behavioral health of children. The foundation is the fundraiser for Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital, and a grantmaker in San Mateo and Santa Clara counties. The foundation also operates an extensive program of public information and education.

Alexander earned his medical degree from Columbia University and a bachelor of science in biology at Yale. He completed his pediatric residency at Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center and also was a Robert Wood Johnson Fellow in the Division of General Pediatrics at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. He served on the academic faculties of both Jefferson Medical College and the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.

Alexander succeeds Stephen Peeps, who led the foundation from May 1997 to March 2006.

For more information about the foundation, visit www.lpfch.org.