TIEC is working with medical experts from across the U.S. to advise the Prince Mohammad bin Fahd University (PMU) Teaching Hospital Project Plan. The hospital will offer the highest quality healthcare services for the local population in the Eastern Province of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, while simultaneously serving as a national and international destination for education, research, and healthcare.
Dr. Stephen Spann, Dr. Brigham Willis, and Harris Benny are the Hospital Model Advisory Board members, and they are focused on creating the overall strategy, mission, vision, and values of the future hospital. They are working in concert with the PMU project team to connect the College of Medicine to the hospital, ensuring a world-class teaching hospital in the Eastern Province of KSA.
As a Hospital Model Advisory Board member for the PMU Teaching Hospital Project, Dr. Stephen Spann, MD, MBA, brings a tremendous wealth of experience as a seasoned founding dean of several academic medical centers to the project.
Dr. Spann is currently the founding dean of the Tilman J. Fertitta Family College of Medicine and vice-president for Medical Affairs at the University of Houston. Prior to joining the University of Houston, Dr. Spann served as chief medical officer of Tawam Hospital, a tertiary care teaching facility in the United Arab Emirates, and as senior advisor on primary care and academic affairs to SEHA, the Abu Dhabi Health Services Company.
Dr. Spann has dedicated his illustrious career to improving health and health care around the world by training future health care professionals, contributing to the scientific knowledge base of primary care and by leading medical school faculty, physician medical groups and hospital staff to practice high-quality, evidence-based family medicine. A graduate of Baylor University and Baylor College of Medicine, Dr. Spann completed his residency training in Family Medicine at Duke University Medical Center and received an MBA degree from the University of Texas at Dallas.
Dr. Brigham Willis, MD, MEd, FAAP, is the founding dean of the University of Texas at Tyler, School of Medicine. He is a longtime educator, scholar, and leader in academic medicine, and has been widely lauded for his commitment and service to medical education. Prior to joining the University of Texas at Tyler, he served as senior associate dean of medical education at the University of California, Riverside School of Medicine. Previously, he was associate fellowship director for pediatric critical care medicine at The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, and chief medical education officer at Phoenix Children’s Hospital.
Dr. Willis is a graduate of the University of California, Los Angeles and received his graduate degree from Arizona State University. He earned his medical degree from the University of California, San Francisco School of Medicine, completed his residency at Children’s Hospital and Research Center, Oakland, as well as a pediatric critical care medicine fellowship at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles.
Harris Benny, MBA, presently serves as CEO and co-founder of Medpoint Health Partners, where he leads all company strategy and operations. He brings to the project over 20 years experience in strategy, business development, and operations leadership experience in various healthcare systems in the United States, Asia and the Middle East. Prior to joining Medpoint, Harris was an executive at Johns Hopkins Medicine (JHM), serving as a vice president of the Johns Hopkins Health System and CEO of Johns Hopkins Medicine International, overseeing six hospitals managed by Hopkins internationally.
Before his appointment at Johns Hopkins, Harris was COO of a group of Tenet Healthcare hospitals in Singapore, which now constitute the flagship of IHH Healthcare, one of the largest hospital groups in the world. Harris completed both his undergraduate and graduate studies at Baylor University, where he received a Bachelor of Science degree in Biology and a Master of Business Administration degree. He also obtained a Fellowship in Healthcare Administration from Tenet Healthcare Corporation.