2023 BOG Awards

2023 BOG Practitioner of Excellence Award

David R. Edelstein, MD
Manhattan Head and Neck Surgery

This year’s AAO-HNS Board of Governors (BOG) Practitioner of Excellence awardee is David R. Edelstein, MD. The BOG Practitioner Excellence Award recognizes the prototypical clinical otolaryngologist one wishes to emulate. Dr. Edelstein has served on over a dozen AAO-HNS committees and task forces including the Executive Committee and Board of Directors of the Academy, and as BOG Chair. He sits on the board of ENT PAC and founded PROJECT 535, which was established in 2015 by the BOG to create an avenue for AAO-HNS members to get involved in direct advocacy on issues that significantly impact our specialty.

Dr. Edelstein is a clinical professor at the Weill Medical College of Cornell University and has been the director of otolaryngology at the Manhattan Eye, Ear & Throat Hospital (MEETH), a part of Northwell/Lenox Hill Hospital (LHH), for over 25 years. He was instrumental in preventing the closure of MEETH in 1999 and was appointed to the LHH/MEETH board by the New York State Court.

He has won many awards including the AAO-HNS Distinguished Service Award, the Hal Foster Medal, the Distinguished Service Award from the Physician Attending Association of Northwell/Lenox Hill Hospital, the Chair’s Teaching Award in the MEETH otolaryngology department, the Distinguished Alumni Award from the Boston University School of Medicine, and the Distinguished Service Award from the Manhattan League of the Helen Keller Society.

A colleague described Dr. Edelstein’s typical day as not just taking care of patients, working on hospital business, and managing other medical projects and research, but he usually has at least one phone call from another doctor asking for medical and personal advice. He is compassionate, caring, impeccably moral, a great diagnostician, and possessing great wisdom.

2023 BOG Model Society Award

Georgia Society of Otolaryngology / Head & Neck Surgery (GSO-HNS)The Georgia Society of Otolaryngology/Head & Neck Surgery (GSO/HNS) is the recipient of the 2023 AAO-HNS Board of Governors (BOG) Model Society Award. The mission of the GSO/HNS is to improve patient care through the support of education and research by empowering otolaryngologists in achieving the highest possible standards of professional ability and integrity.

The GSO/HNS advocates on behalf of its patients and members as an active, influential state society and provides a robust slate of continuing medical education activities, including two major conferences each year. Their active participation with the Medical Association of Georgia has resulted in positive influence at the Georgia General Assembly.

The society maintains regular communications with its members through the “ENTertainer” newsletter. The newsletter is a valuable source of information, including a report from the president, reports from Emory University and Augusta University/Medical College of Georgia academic institutions, faculty and resident updates, and related case reports.

The GSO/HNS also maintains an active participation with the BOG and seeks ways to advance the mission of the Academy. Society BOG representatives give reports on both state and national issues.