Posted on June 27, 2002 at 5:10 p.m.

BIRMINGHAM, AL — Dr. Kirby I. Bland, chairman of the UAB (University of Alabama at Birmingham) department of surgery, was appointed to hold the Fay Fletcher Kerner Chair of Surgery in action taken by the University of Alabama System Board of Trustees at its recent meeting in Tuscaloosa.

Bland is an Alabama native who received his undergraduate degree from Auburn University and medical degree from UAB. He is renowned as a cancer surgeon and as author of textbooks, including one on surgical treatment of breast disease.

Prior to joining UAB as professor and surgery chairman in 1999, he was professor and chairman of the department of surgery at Brown University.

At UAB, he also is surgeon-in-chief of both UAB Hospital and The Kirklin Clinic, deputy director of the Comprehensive Cancer Center, senior scientist in the division of gene therapy, and director of the division of general surgery and its training program.

He has been awarded numerous national and regional contracts and grants and has made important contributions to the surgical literature in the areas of surgical oncology, shock, trauma, and metabolism.