Second UI Health Care VP finalist has been at Illinois since 2014

IOWA CITY — A top executive with the University of Illinois College of Medicine and health system is the second finalist of two to succeed Brooks Jackson as vice president for medical affairs of University of Iowa Health Care and dean of its Carver College of Medicine.

Mark I. Rosenblatt — who has been with the University of Illinois Health system since 2014 — first as a professor and head of its Department of Ophthalmology & Visual Sciences — is scheduled to visit the UI campus Monday and Tuesday, participating in a public forum from noon to 1 p.m. Monday.

His visit comes a week after the campus welcomed the first named finalist for the job — Denise Jamieson, professor and chair for the Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics at Emory University School of Medicine and chief of gynecology and obstetrics for Emory Healthcare. Jamieson also spent nearly two decades with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Rosenblatt has been executive dean of the University of Illinois College of Medicine since 2019 and associate vice chancellor for physician affairs at University of Illinois Health since 2022. He also serves as chair in ocular research and professor of ophthalmology and visual sciences.

Before coming to the Midwest, Rosenblatt served as a vice chair and director of the Department of Ophthalmology and the Vision Research Institution, respectively, at Cornell Medical College at Cornell University.

He earned his bachelor’s and medical degrees from the University of Miami in Florida and got a master’s of business degree from the New York University Stern School of Business, before earning a master’s degree from the Illinois School of Public Health in 2017.

His scientific work focuses on investigating corneal peripheral nerve regeneration following injury and the use of nanoengineered biomaterials for use in stem cell delivery to the ocular surface.

A search committee charged with replacing Jackson — who has agreed to stay on until his successor arrives — will collect public feedback on its website.

This is the university’s second attempt to find a new vice president for medical affairs and medical college dean after the chosen finalist from a first search turned down the offer.

The original search brought four finalists to campus in August — a mix of two women and two men offering a range of medical and administrative experience from Dartmouth in New Hampshire to the University of North Carolina to the universities of Chicago and Nebraska.

UIHC officials didn’t share which of those first finalists declined the job offer “due to family obligations,” but administrators relaunched the search in December.

Jackson — who started at UI Health Care in late 2017 after establishing himself as an internationally recognized AIDS researcher — announced plans to step down and assume a role on faculty more than a year ago in February 2022. His UIHC salary in March was listed at $1.1 million.

Vanessa Miller covers higher education for The Gazette.

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