National Doctors Day 2026
National Doctors Day 2026
Each year on March 30, hospitals across the United States celebrate National Doctors’ Day, a day dedicated to honoring the physicians who devote their lives to healing, comforting, and saving others.
Doctors play a unique role in our lives. From routine checkups to life-saving interventions, they are often present during our most vulnerable moments. Their work requires not only years of rigorous training and clinical expertise, but also compassion, resilience, and a deep commitment to patient care.
Doctors’ Day is more than a celebration, it’s an opportunity to pause and acknowledge the dedication and humanity that define the medical profession. Today and every day, we thank doctors for their skill, their compassion, and their unwavering commitment to care.
Join us in recognizing four physicians championing resuscitation excellence through clinical practice, continuing education, and community advocacy:
Kristin Jacob, MD, FACP
Corewell Health West
Medical Director of Physician and APP Well-Being
“We do not have a resiliency deficit.”
Physicians and nurses consistently score among the most resilient people in the population. Yet even the most resilient are still at risk of burnout.
Dr. Jacob leads a team that advocates for and designs programming to support the well-being of physicians and APPs, implements targeted interventions, and measures impact using validated tools.
Through her leadership in well-being, Corewell Health has been recognized by the American Medical Association’s Joy in Medicine Recognition program at the Silver level in 2021 and 2023. Corewell Health is also recognized as a National Academy of Medicine Changemaker organization and a Well-Being First Champion through the Lorna Breen Heroes Foundation.
Audrey Blewer, PhD, MPH
Duke University School of Medicine
Epidemiologist and Assistant Professor of Family Medicine and Community Health
“Policy is where science becomes real.”
Dr. Blewer’s recent research proposal, Building Interdisciplinary Research Careers in Women’s Health (BIRCWH) will extend this work by comprehensively examining the mechanisms that influence the receipt of bystander CPR by females in the prehospital setting to inform the design of an evidence-based intervention.
She is a member of the American Heart Association’s Emergency Cardiovascular Care Education Science and Programs Subcommittee and Lay Responder Task Force.
She served as a contributor to the 2025 American Heart Association Guidelines writing group for Resuscitation Education, and serves on the Editorial Board for the journal Resuscitation Plus.
Sylvia Owusu-Ansah, MD, MPH, FAAP
University of Pittsburgh Medical Center
Associate Professor of Pediatrics and Emergency Medicine
“We need to empower our community members to recognize [cardiac arrest] and learn how to do CPR.”
Dr. Owusu-Ansah is a board-certified pediatrician and pediatric emergency medicine physician, recognized for her clinical excellence and bedside manner.
In the 2023–2024 academic year, she taught CPR to over 2,000 individuals, including community members and athletes, with her work published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
As a national expert in pediatric prehospital emergency care, Dr. Owusu-Ansah has held various leadership roles and is dedicated to educating EMS clinicians. She has positively impacted the community and co-leads a pathway program for middle school students. She secured funding for a loan repayment program focused on equity, justice, diversity, and inclusion, earning the inaugural Department of Pediatrics JEDI Award.
Dr. Marina Del Rios, MD, MS, FAHA
University of Chicago, Biological Sciences Division
Professor of Medicine
“This is why we have debriefs after doing resuscitations in the Emergency Department.”
Dr. Del Rios’ approach is deeply community-oriented: she does not just study disparities, she actively works to reduce them through partnerships with community organizations and advocacy.
She serves as a member of the Coordination Team of Illinois Heart Rescue, an Illinois state sponsored quality improvement program which has successfully increased survival from out of hospital cardiac arrest in Illinois and is reducing race and gender inequities in survival outcomes.
Dr. Del Rios has also played a prominent role in guideline development and policy translation. She is the immediate past Chair of the Science Subcommittee of the Emergency Cardiovascular Care Committee of the AHA and provided oversight to evidence evaluation and development of the 2025 AHA Guidelines for CPR and ECC.
Her involvement in these works highlights the importance of community-level and policy change, not just clinical interventions, to ensure that issues of equity and quality are embedded in national standards of cardiac arrest systems of care.
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