SARASOTA, Fla. – (Oct. 19, 2022) – The medical staff of Sarasota Memorial Hospital’s Sarasota campus honored two physicians for outstanding ser
vice and installed its new slate of physician leaders for 2022-2023.
Herbert Silverstein, MD, was awarded 2022 Lifetime Achievement Award, and Wilhelmine Wiese-Rometsch, MD, was named 2022 Physician of the Year. Selected by a committee of physician leaders from the Sarasota campus, Drs. Silverstein and Wiese-Rometsch were recognized at its annual medical staff meeting Oct. 18.
In addition to the physician awards, the SMH-Sarasota Medical Staff also appointed the 2022-2023 officers for its Medical Executive Committee: Jonathan Hoffberger, DO, was named Chief of Staff, serving as the top representative of SMH-Sarasota campus’ 1,800-plus medical staff members and advanced practice providers; Dr. Hoffberger succeeds Richard Lichtenstein, MD, whose one-year term as Chief of Staff ends this month. Sarah Temple, MD, was appointed Chief of Staff-elect.
SMH Lifetime Achievement Award
Dr. Silverstein was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award for decades of research, innovation and dedicated service to Sarasota Memorial and countless patients who suffered from ear, nose and throat conditions across the nation. A longtime otolaryngologist in the community, Dr. Silverstein has spent more than 50 years evaluating and treating patients with hearing loss and tinnitus, otosclerosis and inner ear disorders, hyperacusis, Meniere’s disease, dizziness and balance disorders. His pioneering research and innovative treatment techniques have earned him a place among the most recognized specialists in Otology-Neurotology in the world.
Dr. Silverstein completed his residency and started his medical career in 1966 at the Harvard teaching hospital Mass Eye and Ear in Boston. He also spent several years on the faculty at University of Pennsylvania Medical School before relocating to Sarasota in 1973 and joining the medical staff at Sarasota Memorial Hospital. He founded the Sarasota-based Ear Research Foundation in 1979 and established a fellowship program in Otology-Neurotology in 1983 that has provided advanced training to nearly 50 specialists in the field. Throughout the years, his research and innovations have made him a leading authority on Meniere's disease and Otosclerosis. His surgical skill, instructional courses and leadership expanded lateral skull base surgery at SMH and helped lead to the creation of the North American Skull Base Society. He has authored and co-authored three books and more than 250 peer-reviewed publications, and some of the procedures he invented and pioneered, such as retrolabyrinthine vestibular neurectomy, continue to be used today. A talented composer and jazz pianist, Dr. Silverstein also has recorded 16 CDs and entertained many with live performances around town.
SMH Physician of the Year
Wilhelmine Wiese-Rometsch, MD, chief academic officer for Sarasota Memorial’s Graduate Medical Education (GME) program, was awarded Sarasota Memorial’s 2022 Physician of the Year. A nationally recognized leader who has built more than 100 GME programs in the United States, Dr. Wiese-Rometsch joined Sarasota Memorial in 2015 as the founding director of the health system’s first GME program for physicians. She helped build the Internal Medicine residency program from the ground up, in partnership with FSU’s College of Medicine, earning continuous accreditation with multiple commendations from the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education. She also helped SMH develop the Internal Medicine residency practice in Newtown - the first medical home for a historically underserved population.
Dr. Wiese-Rometsch’s passion for academic and medical excellence helped set SMH on the path to become one of the top 40 teaching hospitals in the country, according to a 2022 Fortune/Merative study. In September, she was promoted to Chief Academic Officer and Associate Designated Institutional Official/Florida State University - SMHCS Graduate Medical Education Programs. In her expanded role, Dr. Wiese-Rometsch, who also is a professor of clinical medicine, oversees all of SMH’s graduate medical education programs, which encompass not only the Internal Medicine program, but also the SMH/FSU Emergency Medicine Residency and Hospice/Palliative Medicine Fellowship programs. She also oversees education programs for undergraduate medical education and outside resident rotations at SMH, and helps ensure the health system’s physician training programs meet the constantly changing requirements set by professional, educational and regulatory entities.
“Dr. Silverstein and Dr. Wiese-Rometsch exemplify the qualities every doctor should strive for,” said Sarasota Memorial Health Care System Chief Medical Officer James Fiorica, MD. “Both are excellent clinicians who have demonstrated extraordinary care for their patients and extraordinary commitment to academic research and discoveries that improve care and address unmet healthcare needs.”
About Sarasota Memorial Health Care System
Founded in 1925, Sarasota Memorial Health Care System is a regional medical center offering Southwest Florida’s greatest breadth and depth of care, with more than 1,900 physicians and advanced practice providers and more than a million patient visits a year across its network of care. Sarasota County’s largest employer, the health system includes two full-service hospitals in Sarasota and Venice, a freestanding ER in North Port, and a comprehensive network of outpatient centers, urgent care clinics and physician practices that stretch from Manatee County to North Port. As the region's only public health system and not-for-profit health care provider, SMH serves as a critical safety net for the uninsured in Sarasota County. Visit smh.com for information.