A second top N.C. health-care official is stepping down amid major leadership changes in the administration of Gov. Bev Perdue.
Perdue said Tuesday that Dr. Jeffrey Engel will step down as state health director on Feb. 1 after more than two years in the position. He is being replaced by Dr. Laura Gerald, former executive director of the N.C. Health and Wellness Fund.
Perdue said Engel will serve as a special adviser on health policy.
On Jan. 14, Perdue said Lanier Cansler would leave as Health and Human Services secretary on Jan. 31 after three years running one of the largest and most complicated departments in state government.
Gerald also becomes leader of the newly formed Division of Prevention, Access and Public Health Services. That division has been created from the merger of the Division of Public Health and the Office of Rural Health and Community Care.
Gerald has served over the past decade as a consultant and senior adviser for Community Care of N.C. on disease management, quality improvement, cost-containment efforts and coordination of its services across state agencies.
She served as chairwoman of the governor's Eugenics Compensation Task Force, which recommended Jan. 10 that victims of a statewide sterilization program be paid $50,000 each in compensation.
Engel was praised for his work in overseeing the state's response to the H1N1 pandemic, the implementation of the South's first statewide ban on smoking in bars and restaurants, decline of infant mortality rates to the lowest in state history, and 18 percent decline in new HIV infections from 2009-2011.
Cansler, a Republican in a Democratic administration, will head a new commission that the governor has yet to assemble on affordable health care in the state. Perdue's senior policy adviser, Al Delia, will become acting secretary in early February.
The department receives $4.5 billion in state funds, or nearly one-quarter of the state's budget, to run Medicaid, mental-health facilities, social services and other health programs.
The leadership moves coincide with Perdue's executive order encouraging agencies to consolidate and realign state government.
N.C. Sen. Peter Brunstetter, R-Forsyth, said he looks forward to working with Gerald in resolving the state's health-care issues.
"A fresh set of eyes are always welcome," Brunstetter said.
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