We are pleased to announce that John P. Santiago, M.D., Assistant Professor of Anesthesiology in the Division of Multispecialty Anesthesiology, has been named Associate Chair for Systems Integration.
In this new role, Dr. Santiago will lead our regional anesthesia programs, a key position as our department continues to take on regional anesthesia services as UF Health expands. He will be responsible for the oversight of the site facility medical directors at Leesburg Hospital, the Villages Hospital, Deltona Medical Center, and the Halifax Health system.
Dr. Santiago will be charged with developing and sustaining relationships that affect clinical strategies and workflows to promote best practices and patient satisfaction. He will have direct oversight of site medical directors and chief CRNAs to ensure they are fulfilling their duties, with the goal of enhancing value-based health care delivery.
Dr. Santiago has strong ties to our department, having completed his anesthesiology residency with us. He earned his medical degree at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School and completed a General Surgery Internship at St. Joseph/Columbus Hospital in Chicago. He also completed the U.S. Naval Aviation Preflight Indoctrination/basic flight instruction in Pensacola, Florida, and was forward deployed to Japan with the Carrier Air Wing Five as an active-duty flight surgeon.
He joined our department as faculty in September 2020 from Kaiser Permanente Mid-Atlantic Permanente Medical Group in Virginia, where he served as an anesthesiologist at Tysons Corner Ambulatory Surgery Center, Virginia Hospital Center, and Reston Hospital Center. He also served as Chief of the Department of Anesthesia at Northern Virginia Permanente Medical Group and Medical Director of Tysons Corner Ambulatory Surgery Center.
Before joining Kaiser Permanente, Dr. Santiago worked as a Clinical Instructor and Management Fellow at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business, where he researched IT solutions for perioperative medical management, national health care policy implementation, and pharmacy access for developing nations. Before that, he worked as an anesthesiologist at Tripler Army Medical Center in Honolulu, Hawaii, and at North Florida Regional Medical Center in Gainesville.