One of American radiology’s highest honours was presented to a CAR member at ACR 2025 earlier this month.
The CAR is pleased to congratulate Dr. Stephen Herman on becoming a Fellow of the American College of Radiology (FACR).
“Getting this recognition from your peers is nice to receive for sure,” said Dr. Herman, “but to be honest, the reward is more from the sense of satisfaction you get from completing various activities than it is from getting any sort of recognition.”
Dr. Herman is a thoracic radiologist and Associate Professor at the University of Toronto (U of T), as well as co-founder of the Clinical Decision Support (CDS) software company called MedCurrent, maker of OrderWise.
He has fulfilled an impressive career, with highlights that centre on creating new academic programs, writing important papers, and teaching medical undergraduates.
“For example, I created, and led for 10 years, the Radiology Resident Research Program at the University of Toronto and became the first Head of the Division of Thoracic Imaging. I established the AI Program at the Joint Department of Medical Imaging (JDMI), and was its co-director for three years,” he recalled. “I contributed to the early literature on CT staging of lung cancer and was fortunate to work at the Toronto General Hospital when lung transplantation was first successful, which led me to write the first papers in the world on imaging of lung transplantation. I also founded and was CEO of two software companies that developed radiology related systems, both of whom were acquired by publicly traded firms.”
One of Dr. Herman’s key initiatives has been to raise awareness of the need streamline the referral process in Canada by implementing CDS systems, and how doing so can greatly improve patient care and physician workloads.
“These systems have the potential to significantly improve patient care by ensuring the right test gets done the first time. This shortens queues for procedures which reduces wait times and exposure to ionizing radiation for patients,” he said in 2022. “They also have the potential to save healthcare systems labour and resources by avoiding performing studies that do not provide patient benefits.”
He thanked two of his colleagues for their encouragement in his pursuit of the FACR.
“I’d like to very much express appreciation to Ania Kielar, who first encouraged me to apply for the fellowship and who, along with Martin Reed, wrote reference letters. Clearly, I wouldn’t have this received this award without their support.”
Congratulations to Dr. Herman on this well-deserved award.