Health Salute continues a rich tradition recognizing and celebrating those who serve

Since its inception in 2021, The St. Louis American Foundation’s annual Salute to Excellence in Health Care event has honored more than 200 outstanding African-American health care providers. This annual recognition event contributes to a deeper sense of pride in the community.

Previous Lifetime Achiever in Health Care awardees have included legendary physicians like Dr. James M. Whittico who served the community for more than 65 years, Dr. Bernard Randolph, Dr. Helen Nash, Dr. Homer Nash, Dr. William Smiley, Dr. Jonathan Reed and so many more. Then there was nationally-recognized Civil Rights activist Sister Mary Antona Ebo, the only African-American sister to march with the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. in the legendary protest for voting rights in Selma in 1965.

More than 100 nurses have been celebrated at the Health Salute, including several that walked the hallowed floors of Homer G. Phillips Hospital, including Zenobia Thompson, Lula Hall, Dorothy Thornton and Georgia Anderson.

All of the previous awardees have a lot in common with this year’s awardees, most importantly a deep commitment to the community.

This year, nine high-achieving, dedicated professionals will be honored Thursday, June 22nd at the Frontenac Hilton.

Dr. Michael Ward will be the recipient of the 2023 Lifetime Achiever in Health Care Award. He recently retired after 48 years of service with BJC HealthCare. Twenty-three of those years were devoted to the Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology at Barnes-Jewish Hospital, and the last 25 years were dedicated to Barnes-Jewish College in various leadership roles - most notably, as the Vice Dean for Student Affairs and Diversity & Professor for Goldfarb School of Nursing at Barnes-Jewish College.

Angelleen Peters-Lewis, vice president and chief operating officer of Barnes-Jewish Hospital, is the 2023 Stellar Performer in Health Care. 

Five outstanding, dedicated healthcare professionals will receive Excellence in Health Care Awards. They have diverse backgrounds in the medical field, ranging from an RN, to a doctor of internal medicine, a plastic surgeon, an assistant VP at a local Federally Qualified Health Center, and a native St. Louisan who came back to St. Louis to create one of the first culturally responsive pharmacies in the country.

The Excellence in Health Care recipients are: Dr. Anna Bailey, internal medicine at Mercy Clinic Primary Care; Roslyn Lockett Harvey, VP of health center operations at Affinia Health Care; Marcus Howard, Founder and CEO of GreaterHealth Pharmacy & Wellness; Dr. Melvin Maclin, plastic and reconstructive surgery at SSM SLUCare Physicians Group; and Constance Payne, clinical nurse consultant for Oracle Health.

This year, there are two recipients of the Dr. John Anderson St. Louis County Children’s Fund Mental Health Award. They are Latosha Fowlkes, president and CEO of the Core Collective at Saint Vincent and Lizette Smith, director of clinical programs at Our Little Haven.

These awardees are being applauded for their dedication, especially during a time when our region as well as the country as a whole is in dire need of more Black health care workers. Black people in counties with more Black primary care physicians live longer, according to a new national analysis that provides the strongest evidence yet that increasing the diversity of the medical workforce may be a key to ending deeply entrenched racial health disparities.

The study, published recently in JAMA Network Open, is the first to link a higher prevalence of Black doctors to longer life expectancy and lower mortality in Black populations. Other studies have shown that when Black patients are treated by Black doctors, they are more satisfied with their health care, more likely to have received the preventive care they needed in the past year, and are more likely to agree to recommended preventive care such as blood tests and flu shots. 

Tickets for The St. Louis American Foundation's Salute to Excellence in Health Care Awards Reception, presented by BJC HealthCare, on Thursday, June 22, 2023, at Hilton St. Louis Frontenac, 5:30-8 p.m. are $75 each and may be purchased here.