Elizabeth Nabel named NFL chief health and medical advisor

Elizabeth gives an acceptance speech for her appointment as the NFL's first chief health and medical advisor in 2015. In her role, she worked directly with Commissioner Goodell to provide strategic input to the NFL's medical and health efforts.

Elizabeth gives a speech at the TEDMED 2014 conference. Speaking as the President of Brigham and Women's Hospital, she discussed the importance of humility in future physicians and the need to accept that there will always be things they don't know.

As the President of Brigham and Women’s Hospital in October 2010, Betsy is given an influenza shot at the hospital’s employee vaccination clinic.

Elizabeth Nabel

OPKO Health, Advisory Board Chair

Dr. Elizabeth (Betsy) Nabel is Advisory Board Chair at OPKO Health, providing strategic counsel to ModeX Therapeutics, and is Professor of Medicine Emerita at Harvard Medical School. From 2010 to 2021, she served as the President of Brigham Health and its Brigham and Women’s Hospital, an academic medical center and network, and was Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. Prior to these positions, Dr. Nabel held a variety of leadership roles, including Director of the Heart, Lung and Blood Institute at the National Institutes of Health, and Chief of Cardiology and Director of the Cardiovascular Research Institute at the University of Michigan. At the NHLBI, one of her signature advocacy efforts was the Red Dress Heart Truth campaign, which raises heart awareness in women through unprecedented industry partnerships. Building on her lifelong commitment to improving health through science, Dr. Nabel was the first Chief Health and Medical Advisor to the National Football League from 2015 to 2018, where she provided strategic input to the league’s medical, health and scientific efforts. An accomplished physician-scientist, Dr. Nabel’s work on the molecular genetics of cardiovascular diseases produced 17 patents, over 250 scientific publications and two start-up companies.

She is an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine within the National Academy of Sciences. Her honors include the Distinguished Bostonian Award, the Kober Medal from the Association of American Physicians, two Distinguished Achievement Awards from the American Heart Association and 11 honorary doctorates, among others. She serves on the boards of Medtronic, Moderna, Lyell Immunopharma, Accolade and the Lasker Foundation.