Overview
The Davida Coady Gorham Medical Professional of the Year Award was renamed in 2019 from the NAADAC Medical Professional of the Year Award.
Dr. Davida Coady Gorham practiced medicine internationally before settling on addiction medicine. She was a first responder in humanitarian crises in Bangladesh, Cambodia, and India, where Mother Teresa invited her to be a medical director. Instead, she came back to America, specifically California, and founded Options Recovery Services as a diversion treatment program for the Berkeley Court in 1997, which expanded to provide evidence-based treatment and sober living opportunities to thousands of people. In 2006, Options Recovery Services expanded to work with the California prison system and trained hundreds of incarcerated individuals to become certified addiction treatment counselors.
The award is named in her honor, and eligibility requires a minimum of three years of work in addiction treatment, a medical professional license, a focus on fostering long-term recovery with direct patient contact, and adherence to NAADAC ethical codes.
Past Winners
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Javad Mashkuri, former medical director at the University of Vermont Health Network - Central Vermont Medical Center (2024)
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Abimbola Farinde, an addiction counselor focusing on treatment disparities from a psychopharmacological perspective (2021)
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Kevin Leyden, recognized for excellence in addiction nursing and recovery care (2020)