Albany County's Health Commissioner is leaving her post this month.
After 20 years with the County Health Department, eight and a half as Commissioner, Dr. Elizabeth Whalen says it's time to move on. "You know, I think throughout the, the course of my career, I've always loved a new challenge. I'm a huge proponent of lifelong learning. So, you know, the job as county health commissioner, this is actually the longest job that I've held," said Whalen, who grew up in Albany. She attended Fairfield University, the National University of Ireland, and completed residency in Internal Medicine at Albany Medical Center and graduated from medical school in 1992.
She started working with the health department as Medical Director in 2003. "I had formerly been an internist in primary practice," Whalen said. "And I developed an interest in population health, and at the time was referred to the then-Commissioner, Dr. Jim Crucetti, who I spoke to, and he offered me an opportunity to come down here and work with him. And that really did spur my interest in continuing to work in public health and to continuing to work and study in public health."
In 2015, County Executive Dan McCoy appointed Whalen after Crucetti resigned. Whalen says because its population is above 250,000, Albany County’s commissioner must be a physician. With the job comes medical oversight and Whalen says there's never a dull moment.
"We have within the health department divisions of environmental services. They are responsible for doing all the restaurant inspections, and permitting and being out and looking at environmental causes of disease, looking at lead in housing and the need for remediation there amongst many other things. We have public health educators that are out in the community, providing information on prevention of chronic disease and many other things, tick borne disease, etc. We have a nursing division, which has our clinical services in that and we have clinics for sexually transmitted infections, tuberculosis, immunizations, and a pediatric dental clinic. We have our epidemiology staff who take all reports of communicable diseases and look and monitor very closely for disease outbreaks. Every day there is something different that's going on," said Whalen.
Whalen says the biggest challenge of her career was responding to COVID.
"That was an unprecedented response in public health. And I think that it is a time that I'll always look back on as, I think, the highlight of my career, and also, the highlight of the teamwork that this, this staff was able to accomplish. Working with so many community partners in, in Albany, and our partners in the state, and really, you know, federally as well, so it was a tremendous challenge. It was very long hours, and there was so much collaboration and so much extra, above and beyond work that we'd done at the time," Whalen said.
Whalen says the lessons learned from COVID-19 will help authorities deal future pandemics. "It really does require a lot of infrastructure reinforcement that I am hoping, continues to get stressed and given attention to for public health in particular in in the coming years. We know that there's a tremendous workforce shortage in health in general these days, and a lot of that is from pandemic fatigue and other considerations. But public health certainly isn't left out of that. So it is going to be important to look at how we reinforce public health infrastructure on a local, state and federal level," said Whalen.
One thing that became part of Whalen's decision to move on: American's health outcomes. "It is a real jumpstart for me to what my future plans are. And I think a large reason for that is that we don't focus enough on prevention," Whalen said. "We have an incredibly reactive system of medical care in this country. So people go to the doctor when they feel they need something fixed. And there is a perception that there is a pill for every ill. And really, we need to shift that perception to prevention, and how people can manage their health throughout the course of their lives, so that they can optimize health? "
Which brings Whalen to the next chapter in her life. "I'm going back to study something kind of complementary to my current board certification, which is in public health and preventive medicine, which is lifestyle medicine," said Whalen. "And it really is much more carefully focused on prevention. There are six pillars of lifestyle medicine, which include whole food, plant predominant eating patterns, and physical activity, restorative sleep, stress management, avoidance of risky substances and positive social connections."
Whalen says the public and health care providers need to understand that focusing on prevention is key. "One other thing that's very important is that we need to consider this also through an equity lens. And, you know, when I talk about things that can reduce stress, that might not be the same for someone that is living in a comfortable financial environment versus someone living in poverty. So I think that really looking at the larger picture of meeting people where they are in life and providing the supports that they need to enable a healthy lifestyle is critical to us, turning around the real reactivity of the healthcare system and the cost in the healthcare system," Whalen said.
Whalen's last day as commissioner is October 26th. The position remains a County Executive appointment and a spokesperson for McCoy says it is posted online.
