About CentrEast Regional Extension Center

Dr. Robert Morrow is the medical director of quality for the Texas A&M Health Science Center Rural and Community Health Institute (RCHI). He is a graduate of the Memorial Hermann Southwest Family Practice training program in Houston and The University of Texas Medical School at Houston. He completed his undergraduate studies at Texas A&M University.

Dr. Morrow also serves in the House of Delegates of the Texas Medical Association and the American Medical Association. He is a member of multiple boards, given multiple public presentations on health care quality improvement and is still in clinical practice. He received a Master of Business Administration (M.B.A.) from the University of Tennessee.

Ms. Mechler has over 25 years of health care experience, with over 15 years in senior leadership. She has served as hospital CEO, and directed the Joint Commission's, External Quality Review Organization (EQRO), in Texas and has recently she was appointed to the Texas Health Services Authority. She now serves as the Co-Director and Chief Operating Officer for the Texas A&M Health Science Center Rural and Community Health Institute (RCHI). At RCHI she has worked tirelessly bridging the gap of rural Texas health care and as a Certified Professional in Healthcare Quality(CPHQ) and an examiner for Quality Texas she is ready to help you improve your healthcare.

Amarnath Banerjee is an Associate Professor in the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering in Look College of Engineering at Texas A&M University. He holds a BS in Computer Science from Birla Institute of Technology and Science in India, and a Ph.D. in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research from University of Illinois at Chicago. His primary research interests are in modeling, simulation, and visualization; and their applications in areas such as manufacturing systems, healthcare systems, and information systems. He teaches graduate and undergraduate level industrial engineering courses in these areas.

He is involved in planning and implementation of practice and workflow redesign, education, interoperability and HIE for the CentrEast REC.

Arun Sen is a Full Professor in the Department of Information and Operations Management in Mays Business School at Texas A&M University. He holds a M.Tech. in Electronics (from Calcutta University, India in 1971), a M.S. in Computer Science (from Penn State University in 1976) and a Ph.D. in Information Systems (from Penn State University in 1979). He has published fifty research papers in journals like MIS Quarterly, Information Systems Research, Journal of MIS, IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man and Cybernetics, IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management, Decision Sciences, Communications of the ACM (CACM), Information Systems, and others. His research interests include decision support systems, data base management, repository management and software reuse, data warehousing, CRM, and E-Commerce.

Teneka Duke is a program manager with Texas A&M Health Science Center Rural and Community Health Institute. She holds a BAAS degree from Texas A&M University – Commerce. She has 22 years in administrative leadership, working with physician groups and healthcare organizations. She has provided consultative services in medical practice management for 10 years. Additionally, the last four years have been focusing on providing project consultative services to medical providers implementing electronic health records and information management systems. Ms. Duke has worked on strategy and innovation of product offerings with a major healthcare system and national EHR vendors to assist physicians in achieving greater technology levels in their medical practices. She has been a member of the Medical Group Management Association for 22 years.

Dr. Peter Yu is an Associate Research Scientist and Manager of Information Security and Research at Rural Community Health Institute (RCHI), Texas A&M University Health Science Center. His research areas are information security, privacy, electronic record exchange platform and database systems. He is a member of IEEE and ACM and author of several publications include both papers and book chapters. He also has over 10 years of technical experience in system programming, networking, database and on-line web application development.

He joined RCHI in 2005 as part of the research and development group and oversees the IT department. He is responsible for the design and development of dynamic web applications, medical record abstract and exchange system, a Physician Peer-review project and US Army Ranger Pre-Hospital Trauma Registry.

Ms. Clay is a 1985 graduate of Texas A&M University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Agricultural Economics. Since 1985, she has worked in the medical and dental fields.

In addition to general office management, Ms. Clay brings a wealth of experience to the Texas A&M Health Science Center Rural and Community Health Institute (RCHI) as a former medical staff coordinator of physician credentialing and peer review. In that position, she developed many credentialing tools that culminated in successful accreditation surveys.

As a senior program coordinator for HSC-Rural and Community Health Institute, Ms. Clay has facilitated and managed numerous projects, most notably the Diabetic Retinopathy Screening Project.

Stephanie comes to RCHI from the State Office of Rural Health where she managed the Medicare Rural Hospital Flexibility Program that provided technical assistance Texas critical access hospitals’ efforts to enhance quality of care, financial and operational performance, and trauma coordination with EMS. Her previous experience includes federal grant program coordination and regional/local coalition development at the Texas Department of State Health Services, management of a statewide coalition at the Texas Cancer Council, and performance improvement team facilitation at the University of Kentucky Medical Center. She received her Bachelor’s of Arts degree from the University of Kentucky in 1991.

Cassity Phillips is an Outreach Representative with Texas A&M Health Science Center Rural and Community Health Institute. She holds a Bachelor of Science in Emergency Administration and Planning from the University of North Texas. She comes to Texas A&M Health Science Center with marketing experience and strives to use that to facilitate outstanding service to our region and assist the health care community in reaching their goals for higher health care quality and efficiency.

Ben Hunsaker is a Programmer Analyst for the Texas A&M Health Science Center Rural and Community Health Institute (RCHI). He holds a Bachelor's in Environmental Design with a Visualization emphasis from the College of Architecture at Texas A&M University. He has over 6 years experience in web development and user interface design. Mr. Hunsaker recently developed and designed the Texas Safety Net - Event Reporting and Tracking Tool that is now being used by rural hospitals across the state of Texas. He believes in service, honesty, and open source.