National Leadership Conference for the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists

About the ACOG National Leadership Institute

ACOG National Leadership Institute
Faculty Emeritus

Contact Information


The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Gillings School of Global Public Health

CB #7445

407A Rosenau Hall

Chapel Hill, NC 27599-7445

Herbert_Peterson@unc.edu

Herb PetersonHerbert B. Peterson, M.D., FACOG

Kenan Distinguished Professor, Department of Maternal and Child Health; Gillings School of Global Public Health, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, School of Medicine


Herbert Peterson, the William R. Kenan, Jr. Distinguished Professor, is the past chair of the Department of Maternal and Child Health at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Gillings School of Global Public Health and has a joint appointment in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the UNC School of Medicine. He also serves as Director of the World Health Organization Collaborating Centre for Research Evidence for Sexual and Reproductive Health, based in the Department of Maternal and Child Health at UNC.

 

Certified by both the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology and the American Board of Preventive Medicine, Dr. Peterson served for 20 years at the Centers for Disease Control, where he was Chief of the Epidemiologic Studies Branch and the first Chief of the Women’s Health and Fertility Branch of the Division of Reproductive Health. In 1999, he was assigned by CDC to the World Health Organization (WHO) in Geneva, Switzerland where he served until coming to UNC in 2004. He retired from the Commission Corps of the U.S. Public Health Service at the rank of Captain (Navy) having received awards that include the Distinguished Service Medal and the Surgeon General’s Exemplary Service Medal.

 

Dr. Peterson’s major research interests are at the interface of clinical medicine and public health and are increasingly focused on global reproductive health, most recently on implementation science. His work has been assuring that policies, programs, and practices-- and their implementation-- are based on the best available science. He has authored over 200 peer-reviewed manuscripts, editorials, book chapters, and other publications.

 

He has been elected to membership in the National Academy of Medicine (formerly the Institute of Medicine) and the American Gynecological and Obstetrical Society. Dr. Peterson is a Fellow of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the American College of Preventive Medicine, and the American College of Epidemiology. In 2004, he was awarded the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists Distinguished Service Award. In 2010, he received the Allan Rosenfield Award for Lifetime Contributions to International Family Planning from the Society of Family Planning and was awarded Honorary Fellowship in the Faculty of Sexual and Reproductive Healthcare of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists.