Kirk A. Calhoun, MD, FACP

Dr. Calhoun earned a BS degree in Biology from the University of Illinois at Chicago and an MD degree from the University of Kansas School of Medicine. Following a residency in internal medicine at Northwestern University, he completed a fellowship in Clinical Nephrology, Hypertension, and Metabolism at the University of Chicago. After private practice and academic leadership positions at the University of Missouri Kansas City, he served 10 years at the UT Medical Branch at Galveston, as Associate Professor of Medicine and Corporate Medical Director of UTMB HealthCare Systems. He moved on to be simultaneously the Senior Vice President at Parkland Hospital and the Associate Dean for Clinical Affairs at the UT Southwestern Medical School.

In 2002 Calhoun was chosen President of The University of Texas Health Science Center at Tyler. The campus grew significantly and became a SACSCOC accredited academic health institution. Calhoun was named Board Chair for the UT Health East Texas Health System (UTHET), created after a large health system aquistion in March 2018. UTHET owns and operates 10 hospitals, an academic multi-specialty physician group practice, over 50 clinics, emergency transport services, a home health agency, and health enterprises across rural East Texas. In 2020, he was selected as the President of the newly consolidated UT Tyler, which merged the general academic and health science center campuses in Tyler under his leadership. He retired as President of UT Tyler and Board Chair of UTHET in May of 2024. He remains on the part-time faculty of UT Tyler, as Professor of Medicine, and serves on the Board of Directors of Southside Bancshares, Inc. and the W Fair Foundation.

Calhoun is former Board Chair of the American Association of Medical Colleges (AAMC). Served on the Executive Committee and as Chair of the AAMC Council of Teaching Hospitals. He is the only individual to have served two terms as Board Chair of America’s Essential Hospitals, formally the National Association of Public Hospitals. He served two terms on the DSHS Council (the Texas State Board of Health) and served on the Executive Committee of the Teaching Hospitals of Texas.

UT System Board of Regents approved and funded a new UT Tyler School of Medicine in 2020, a culmination of Calhoun’s healthcare vision for rural East Texas. The first class was admitted in 2023 under his leadership. Calhoun has received numerous awards for his work in healthcare, public health, higher education, and community service, including the prestigious Doctor Luke Society, where he was inducted in 2021. He and his wife, Jeanette, were awarded the T.B. Butler Citizens of the Year Award in 2021, honoring both their achievements for Tyler, Texas. His interests are healthcare delivery, finance, leadership, public/private partnerships, mergers and acquisitions.