Eric Dishman, vice president and Intel fellow of Intel's Health and Life Sciences Group, has been tapped by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to become director of the Precision Medicine Initiative (PMI) Cohort Program.

In his new role, Dishman will lead NIH’s effort to build the PMI landmark longitudinal research study of one million or more U.S. volunteers to expand the ability to improve health and treat disease through precision medicine, NIH Director Francis Collins, MD, PhD, wrote in an NIH blog post.  

“Eric brings a wealth of health innovation experience to the PMI effort—as a social scientist and researcher, entrepreneur and business leader, patient and patient advocate, and policy advocate and thought leader,” Collins wrote, citing Dishman's “deep understanding of the initiative, having played a critical role as a member of the PMI Working Group that deliberated intensively for several months last year to develop the design for this audacious study.”  

Collins also noted that Dishman pioneered and co-founded several research and policy programs focused on telehealth, personal health records, independent living technologies for seniors and behavioral markers for Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, diabetes and heart disease.

In his roles at Intel, Dishman was responsible for global strategy, research, platform development, and policy in key areas, such as health IT, genomics and personalized medicine, consumer wellness and care coordination technologies.

He also brings his personal experience with precision medicine. He fought a rare form of cancer for 23 years but became cancer-free due to early access to precision medicine.