Gretchen N. Holmes

Gretchen Holmes, PhD oversees Graduate Medical Education (GME) for Memorial Hospital @ Gulfport. As the Designated Institutional Official (DIO), Dr. Holmes has the authority and responsibility for all ACGME-accredited programs starting at Memorial. Previously, Dr. Holmes served as the GME Director of Research for multiple hospital systems and as the DIO/Director of GME for Orange Park Medical Center in Florida. As DIO, she started multiple new residency programs, achieved full accreditation for existing programs, and started three fellowships in Cardiology, Hematology/Oncology, and Hospice and Palliative Care. Prior to that role, Dr. Holmes served as research director for GME, trauma and the burn center at Kendall Regional Medical Center in Miami.  She also was the Research Director for the UK Center of Excellence in Rural Health in Eastern Kentucky where she led community and academic-based research projects. She has served as a professor of communication the University of West Florida where she oversaw the health care ethics graduate program and was the co-creator, co-producer, writer, and on-air talent for WUMR’s “Let’s Talk Health,” a radio collaboration, at the University of Memphis between the Department of Communication and the Lowenberg School of Nursing.

Dr. Holmes is an experienced researcher having published in numerous top-tier journals including Health Communication, Psycho-Oncology, and Injury Epidemiology. She also co-authored a well-received chapter, The Patient Experience, in a recent Health Communication textbook. Dr. Holmes’ research interests include: rapport, provider-patient communication, patient experience, and health disparities. She regularly teaches courses at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Behavior Change Theory and has served as a national-level patient advocate for the National Cancer Institute for 15 years. In 2007, she was awarded the “Spotlight on Female Scholars” from James Madison University and in 2014 was named as one of 14 National Rural Health Association Fellows in health policy.

Dr. Holmes holds a Bachelor of Science in Communication and a Master of Arts in Communication & Media Ecology from New York University and a PhD in health communication with a Graduate Certificate in Medical Behavioral Science from the University of Kentucky.