Archive of articles about Center for Aging and Health/Division of Geriatric Medicine faculty and staff
Quarter 4 of 2006

The following is quoted from the UNC-CH School of Medicine Office of Educational Development newsletter, Front Line, Vol. 12, Fall 2006, p. 2.

With permission from the editor of The Front Line, Katherine Savage

Dr. Debra L. Bynum of the Department of Medicine at the UNC-CH School of Medicine has been named course director for the AHEC Acting Internship Selective.

The course for fourth-year students provides off-campus experiences of direct and continuing care of patients in community-based hospitals.

After completing her undergraduate degree at Davidson College, Dr. Bynum attended medical school at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, remaining there for her residency in internal medicine. She was chief resident in 1997-1998. She joined the AHEC Department of Internal Medicine at WakeMed as a clinical assistant professor and in 1999 began the two-year Faculty Development Fellowship program in General Internal Medicine at UNC.

As she began to focus her career interest on geriatrics, Dr. Bynum accepted a fellowship in geriatric medicine at UNC and subsequently joined the faculty of the Division of General Internal Medicine. After the Division of Geritric Medicine was formed, she became an assistant professor based in that division and is now Director of Inpatient Geriatric Services.

Dr. Bynum has won a number of honors and awards, including the Faculty Teaching Appreciation Award in 2005 and the Faculty Teaching Award given by Internal Medicine residents in 2003. During residency she was selected for the David A. Ontjes Intern of the Year Award and for the Golden Boots Award, presented by the senior residents to the "junior resident who by example demonstrates superior clinical judgment." As a medical student, she was inducted into Alpha Omega Alpha medicine honor society and received the Janet M. Glasgow Achievement Award from the American Medical Women's Association.

The recipient of a $285,000 Geriatric Academic Career Award for career development, Dr. Bynum also received a grant from the Governor's Crime Commission to provide training and resources in the elder abuse component of UNC Hospitals' Beacon Program on family violence. In addition to journal articles, she has authored two chapters in Netter's Internal Medicine (2003 edition); Hypertension in the Elderly (with Jan Busby-Whitehead, MD) and Drug Treatment in the Elderly.

In her role as course director of the AHEC AI, Dr. Bynum has developed a new curriculum, competencies, evaluation form, and log card for the rotation and has worked with the departments represented in the AI to develop consistency in the rotation. She is now working with Kelly Swords, clinical vice president of curriculum affairs for the Whitehead Medical Society, the student government of the UNC-CH School of Medicine, to organize AI information on the student website.

Last updated 5/15/2008.