2024 Honoree

Chief Executive Officer and Dean
Robert I. Grossman, MD, is chief executive officer of NYU Langone Health and dean of NYU Grossman School of Medicine. Nationally recognized as a top healthcare executive, he leads one of the largest health systems in the Northeast—employing more than 48,000 people, including over 12,000 clinicians, stretching across six inpatient facilities and over 370 locations throughout the New York City region and in Florida. His visionary leadership has transformed NYU Langone into one of the best academic medical centers in the United States, as evaluated annually by independent organizations such as Vizient, Inc., the Leapfrog Group, U.S. News & World Report (Best Hospitals and Best Medical Schools), and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. Vizient recognized NYU Langone Health as No. 1 in the nation for quality and patient safety.

Innovation has been a hallmark of Dr. Grossman’s leadership of NYU Langone and NYU Grossman School of Medicine since his tenure began in 2007. This includes establishing an accelerated three-year MD pathway for select medical students—making NYU Grossman School of Medicine the first nationally ranked medical school to enable medical students to graduate in three years—and implementing full-tuition scholarships for medical students. For his achievements as dean, the school was named after him in 2019.

Most recently, Dr. Grossman was the driving force behind the creation of NYU Grossman Long Island School of Medicine—a partnership between NYU and NYU Langone—the only medical school in the U.S. that offers a three-year MD degree focused on primary care and full-tuition scholarships. In July 2023, the school was renamed in honor of Dr. Grossman’s leadership.

Dr. Grossman has been at the forefront of applying a data-driven approach to healthcare, with the aim of improving patient outcomes, streamlining clinical workflows, and enhancing medical decision-making. The institution uses a signature dashboard that tracks over 800 metrics, bringing transparency and accountability to everyone so that providers can achieve better outcomes for patients and for the health system overall.

Early in his tenure, Dr. Grossman launched a decade-long Campus Transformation Plan, an infrastructure modernization program that has expanded NYU Langone’s footprint to more than 14 million square feet of clinical, educational, and research space across its campuses throughout Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Long Island. Under Dr. Grossman’s leadership, Perlmutter Cancer Center achieved the status of a Comprehensive Cancer Center from the National Cancer Institute. He also propelled NYU Langone’s unprecedented growth into Brooklyn and Long Island, forging hospital affiliations that created NYU Langone Hospital—Brooklyn and NYU Langone Hospital—Long Island, now two of the highest rated hospitals for quality and safety in the nation. Most recently, NYU Langone affiliated with Long Island Community Hospital, creating a clinically integrated healthcare network between the two organizations.

Each of these groundbreaking initiatives was fueled by Dr. Grossman’s collaborations with the Board of Trustees and institutional leadership to increase NYU Langone’s revenue from $2 billion in 2007 to more than $13 billion today, including more than $5 billion in philanthropy since 2007. In 2018, Dr. Grossman—together with Kenneth G. Langone, chairman of NYU Langone’s Board of Trustees—was named to Time magazine’s inaugural Health Care 50 list of the 50 most influential healthcare leaders who changed the state of healthcare in America. Dr. Grossman’s transformative leadership, including his steely piloting of the institution as it recovered from the devastation of Superstorm Sandy, was chronicled in William A. Haseltine’s book World Class: A Story of Adversity, Transformation, and Success at NYU Langone Health.

A prolific and highly respected scientist and educator, Dr. Grossman was awarded the Javits Neuroscience Investigator Award by the NIH in 1999 for his work on multiple sclerosis. He was a member (1995–2000) and chairman (1997–2000) of the Diagnostic Radiology Study Section at the NIH, was appointed to the NIH’s National Advisory Council for Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (2003–2007), and, in 2004, became the first recipient of the Outstanding Contributions in Research Award, given annually by the Foundation of the American Society of Neuroradiology in recognition of lifelong accomplishment and consistent excellence in clinical neuroscience. He has trained more than 100 fellows, many of whom occupy prominent positions worldwide, and has authored 340 publications and five books, including Neuroradiology: The Requisites.

In 2010, Dr. Grossman received the International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine’s Gold Medal for his pioneering research in magnetic resonance in medicine and biology. In addition, he received the Lifetime Achievement of the Emeritus Class from Tulane University (2019), was named a Distinguished Graduate of the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine (2010) and was awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Bordeaux, France (2010). Most recently, Dr. Grossman received the American Society of Neuroradiology Gold Medal for his contributions to the field of neuroradiology (2021) and was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences for excellence and leadership (2022).

Dr. Grossman received his bachelor’s degree in biology from Tulane University and his medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania, where he was elected to Alpha Omega Alpha. He completed his internship at Beth Israel Hospital in Boston, two years of a neurosurgery residency at the University of Pennsylvania, a radiology residency at the University of Pennsylvania, and a two-year fellowship in neuroradiology at Massachusetts General Hospital. Dr. Grossman is board-certified in radiology and neuroradiology.