Congratulations 2025 Interest Group Award Recipients!
Edwin Bierman Lecture Award
Naveed Sattar, MD, PhD, is the recipient of the 2025 Edwin Bierman Award. This award recognizes a leading scientist who has made outstanding contributions to the field of diabetes-related macrovascular complications and their associated risk factors. Dr. Sattar will deliver the Edwin Bierman Award Lecture on Friday, June 20, 2025, at ADA’s 85th Scientific Sessions.
Naveed Sattar, MD, PhD, is a clinical academic in Cardiometabolic Medicine at the University of Glasgow, UK. He is clinically active and has been privileged to gain epidemiology and trial skills from some of the best minds internationally. His initial focus was on the epidemiology and mechanisms of diabetes and cardiovascular disease, working with some brilliant colleagues in the UK, Scandinavia, and elsewhere. More recently, his work has expanded to include obesity and research related to ethnicity. He has also contributed to several lifestyle intervention trials in diabetes, various international cardiovascular outcomes trials, and over 10 international guidelines. Such experiences have enabled Naveed to challenge certain aspects of conventional wisdom in numerous notable reviews and contribute to over 1,400 published papers. He has been amongst the top 1% of cited academics in Clinical Medicine for the last decade. Naveed has received several national and international awards in diabetes and is currently an Associate Editor for Diabetes Care, as well as a past Associate Editor for Circulation and Diabetologia.
Please join us in celebrating Naveed Sattar, MD, PhD, for outstanding contributions in the field of diabetes-related macrovascular complications.
Norbert Freinkel Lecture Award
Monique Hedderson, PhD, is the recipient of the 2025 Norbert Freinkel Award. This award honors a researcher who has made outstanding contributions to the understanding and treatment of diabetes in pregnancy. Dr. Hedderson will deliver the Norbert Freinkel Award Lecture on Friday, June 20, 2025, at ADA’s 85th Scientific Sessions.
Dr. Hedderson is the Associate Director of the Women’s and Children’s Health section of the Division of Research at Kaiser Permanente, Northern California. She is also director of Research Clinics and a professor at the Bernard J. Tyson School of Medicine. She is a prolific researcher in the field of diabetes in pregnancy, with more than 160 publications. Dr. Hedderson’s pioneering studies underscore the importance of the pre-pregnancy period in the etiology of gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM), the effects of pharmacological treatments, and the need for scalable, health system-based lifestyle interventions. Her work demonstrated that cardiometabolic risk factors and biomarker levels measured years before pregnancy were associated with an increased risk of GDM, informing the need for pre-pregnancy prevention efforts. She demonstrated excessive GWG in early pregnancy was associated with increased risk of GDM, highlighting the need to promote optimal GWG from the start of pregnancy. Her randomized controlled trial demonstrated that tailored patient communication improves gestational weight gain (GWG) and reduces large-for-gestational-age births in patients with gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM). Her work continues to evaluate the effectiveness of scalable mobile health interventions in promoting healthy gestational weight gain (GWG) in high-risk pregnant patients.
Please join us in celebrating Monique Hedderson, PhD for her outstanding contributions to the understanding and treatment of diabetes in pregnancy.
Roger Pecoraro Lecture Award
Joseph L. Mills, Sr., MD, is the recipient of the 2025 Roger Pecoraro Award. This award recognizes a researcher who has made significant scientific contributions and demonstrated an unwavering commitment to enhancing the understanding of the detection, treatment, and prevention of diabetic foot complications. Dr. Mills will deliver the Roger Pecoraro Award Lecture on Saturday, June 21, 2025, at ADA’s 85th Scientific Sessions.
Joseph L. Mills is presently the Reid Professor in the Division of Vascular Surgery and Endovascular Therapy in the Michael E. DeBakey Department of Surgery at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas, and Director of BCM STEP (Save The Extremity Program). After serving as the Division Chief for 10 years, he recently passed the baton of BCM Vascular Division Chief to Dr. Gustavo Oderich. Before coming to Houston in 2015, he was previously a Professor and Chief of Vascular Surgery, as well as Program Director at the University of Arizona College of Medicine (1994–2015) and Co-Director of the Southern Arizona Limb Salvage Alliance (SALSA). He has authored over 450 peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters (h-Index=77). Dr. Mills has been a co-editor of Rutherford's Vascular Surgery (7th - 9th editions). He serves on numerous editorial boards, including the European Journal for Vascular and Endovascular Surgery, as well as the Vascular Surgery Section Co-Chief Editor for UpToDate. He has been the principal investigator for over 45 clinical trials, covering a broad spectrum of vascular diseases with a focus on limb salvage, chronic limb-threatening ischemia, and diabetic foot ulcers. He is past president of the Peripheral Vascular Surgery Society and also served as Treasurer of the SVS (Society for Vascular Surgery), Chair of the SVS Distinguished Fellows Council, and Secretary-Treasurer of the Western Vascular Society. Dr. Mills is a former director of the ABS, past Chair of the Vascular Surgery Board (2010–2013), and completed a 7-year term on the RRC-S (2014–2021). He is also past president of the Association of Program Directors in Vascular Surgery (APDVS), the Rocky Mountain Vascular Society, and the Western Vascular Society. Most recently, he led the SVS PPO Committee, helping spearhead the SVS Branding Campaign. He has extensive clinical experience in multiple practice settings, including the military, VA, county, university, and private hospitals. In June 2021, he was elected Vice President of the Society for Vascular Surgery and served as SVS President from 2023 to 2024.
Dr. Mills received both his Bachelor of Science (1977) and his Doctor of Medicine (1981) degrees cum laude from Georgetown University. He subsequently completed residency programs in General Surgery at Wilford Hall USAF Medical Center (Lackland Air Force Base), Vascular Surgery at Oregon Health Sciences University (Portland), and a Senior Endovascular Surgery Fellowship at Texas Tech University (Lubbock). He and his wife, Margaret Schneider Mills, are the proud parents of three sons (Joseph Jr., Daniel, and Andrew) and six grandchildren (Edward, Thomas, Joseph III, Lucas, Ruth, and Nolan).
Please join us in recognizing Joseph L. Mills, Sr., MD, for outstanding contributions and commitment to improving the understanding of the detection, treatment, and prevention of diabetic foot complications.
Richard R. Rubin Lecture Award
Edwin B. Fisher, PhD, is the recipient of the 2025 Richard R. Rubin Lecture Award. This award recognizes a researcher who has made significant scientific contributions and demonstrated an unwavering commitment to enhancing the understanding of the detection, treatment, and prevention of diabetic foot complications. Dr. Fisher will deliver the Roger Pecoraro Award Lecture on Saturday, June 21, 2025, at ADA’s 85th Scientific Sessions.
Edwin B. Fisher, PhD, is the Global Director of Peers for Progress and Professor in the Department of Health Behavior in the Gillings School of Global Public Health at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He received his PhD in Clinical Psychology from Stony Brook University in 1972. For 33 years, he was a member of the faculty at Washington University, where he directed the Division of Health Behavior Research in the Departments of Medicine and Pediatrics. In addition to his work in diabetes, Dr. Fisher’s research has addressed asthma, cancer, cardiovascular disease, mental health, smoking and smoking cessation, and weight management.
At Washington University, he served as associate director for prevention and control of the University’s NIDDK-funded Diabetes Research and Training Center (DRTC) from 1981 to 2005. Through the DRTC, he particularly promoted research addressing the psychosocial and contextual/community dimensions of diabetes, collaborating with leaders in developing these perspectives, including Barbara Anderson, Wendy Auslander, Alan Delamater, Debra Haire-Joshu, Michael Harris, Julio Santiago, and Neil White.
Also, at Washington University, he led prevention and control efforts in cancer as the Associate Director of the NCI-designated Siteman Comprehensive Cancer Center.
From 2002 to 2009, he served as National Program Director of the Diabetes Initiative at The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, demonstrating diabetes self-management programs in key contexts, including communities and primary care settings.
In 2005, Dr. Fisher joined the Gillings School of Global Public Health at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill as chair of the Department of Health Behavior. In 2008, he assumed the role of Global Director of Peers for Progress, promoting peer support for diabetes and other chronic conditions worldwide. Peers for Progress awarded grants to 14 projects in 9 countries across six continents, all of which are developing and documenting varied approaches to peer support tailored to the needs, circumstances, and healthcare systems of individuals with diabetes. Peers for Progress has continued to promote peer support in diabetes internationally, including in China, where Professor Weiping Jia and Yuexing Liu lead the Shanghai Integration Model.
Since 2016, Peers for Progress has joined with colleagues in the NIDDK-funded Michigan Center for Diabetes Translational Research (including Martha Funnell, Jaqueline Hawkins, Michele Heisler, William Herman, Gretchen Piatt, John Piette, Patrick Tang, Daphne Watkins) in a joint UNC-Michigan National Community, Family and Peer Support Research Core. Through this Core and Peers for Progress, Dr. Fisher has continued his 40+ year dedication to promoting attention to the behavioral, social, community, family, and peer dimensions of diabetes and their importance in prevention, management, and well-being.
Dr. Fisher is a past president of the Society of Behavioral Medicine and served as Senior Editor, along with Linda Cameron, Alan Christensen, Ulrike Ehlert, Yan Guo, Brian Oldenburg, and Frank Snoek, of the 38-chapter Principles and Concepts of Behavioral Medicine: A Global Handbook (Springer, 2018). Among his honors are the 2019 Award for Education and Integrated Care of the International Diabetes Federation and the 2019 Research to Practice Award of the Society of Behavioral Medicine.
Please join us in celebrating Edwin B. Fisher, PhD, for outstanding scientific achievement in the understanding of the behavioral aspects of diabetes.
Congratulations 2025 WIN ADA Award Recipient!
Jill Weissberg-Benchell, PhD, CDCES, is the recipient of the 2025 Lois Jovanovic Transformative Woman in Diabetes Award. This award recognizes a woman who has made a significant impact in diabetes care, research, education, or public health. Dr. Weissberg-Benchell will give remarks at the Women’s Interprofessional Network of the American Diabetes Association (WIN ADA) reception on Friday, June 20, 2025.
Jill Weissberg-Benchell, PhD, CDCES, is a Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and an Attending Pediatric Psychologist and the Psychology Director of Integrated Care at the Ann and Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago. She is also a Certified Diabetes Care and Education Specialist. She has over 30 years of research experience and clinical work with children, adolescents, and families with diabetes, as well as their families. Her academic position is Professor of Psychiatry at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine. She has funded eight postdoctoral fellows and has served as a mentor to other scholars worldwide. She has authored over 100 articles. She is on the editorial board of the Journal of Pediatric Psychology. She is a co-author of two books: one focuses on transitioning from pediatric to adult care, and the other on working with adolescents with type 1 diabetes. She offers workshops and lectures to colleagues and families living with diabetes, addressing issues such as family adaptation and coping, building adolescent resilience, the use of technology (CGM, Pumps, and the Artificial Pancreas), and transitioning from pediatric to adult care. She has served in a variety of leadership roles, including past president of the Behavioral Research in Diabetes Group Exchange (BRIDGE) and chair of the American Diabetes Association’s Youth Strategies National Committee.
Please join us in celebrating Jill Weissberg-Benchell, PhD, CDCES, for her significant contributions to diabetes care, research, education, and public health.