Meet the Board

Medical Director at the Caron Foundation from 1994 until 2002. I continue to work with the Caron Foundation as a faculty member, training physicians in their Addiction Medicine Fellowship Program with Reading Hospital.

My wife Jill and I married in 1982 and have two children. Justin has worked for Giant Food Supermarket for the past 20 years. Alex earned her doctorate in clinical psychology and has worked at the Caron Foundation for the past 5 years.

William Santoro, MD President, Berks County Medical Society Chief, Section of Addiction Medicine Reading Hospital/Tower

Health

My medical degree was earned from Central University of Puerto Rico School of Medicine in Puerto Rico. I then completed my Family Medicine Internship and Residency at the Reading Hospital and Medical Center. From 1985 until 2016 I had a private practice in Laureldale, PA, which is now part of Tower Health Medical Group. During that time, I also served as the Medical Director at Albright College from 1985 to 2012 and health officer for the township of Laureldale from 1987 to 2015.

I was the Medical Director at the Reading Hospital Drug and Alcohol Program for the Center of Mental Health from 1988 until its closing in August 2020. In addition, I served as the Medical Director to New Directions Treatment Services, a methadone maintenance program, from 1999 until 2021, and was the Associate

In 2014, I was appointed as the first Section Chief of Addiction Medicine, Department of Family & Community Medicine, Tower Health System, and since 2016 have focused my practice exclusively on Addiction Medicine. I have served as a Public Policy Chair for the Pennsylvania Society of Addiction Medicine from 2018 until 2021, and as President of the Pennsylvania Society of Addiction Medicine from 2021 until 2023. I served as PresidentElect of the Berks County Medical Society (BCMS) from 2021 until 2023 and am now beginning my term as President.

In 1997, I received the Berks County Medical Society William Alexander Community Service Award and again in 2017. I also received the first Jasper G. Chen See Medical Professional Award for work in Addiction Medicine as well as other awards in Addiction Medicine. My community activities include starting the medical clinic within the Reading – Berks Emergency Shelter over twenty years ago. I was the founder and race director to the “To Reading and Back 10K” charity run for the Easter Seals Society, Co-founder, and race co-director of the “Alligator Run 10K” charity run for Crime Alert of Berks County, and Assistant Coach to the Berks County Special Olympics track and softball teams. I was also a volunteer medical director for the US Olympic Training Teams in Lake Placid, New York. As most people know, I like to run and have completed 57 marathons.

Once I became involved in organized medicine, I made some suggestions and realized if I wanted to be heard and make real changes then I needed to be committed and willing to have a seat at the table. The best way to ensure this was to be willing to serve in leadership positions.

Ankit Shah, MD President-elect, Berks County Medical Society Emergency Medicine Physician Reading Hospital/Tower Health

I am originally from northern New Jersey and graduated from Rutgers University with a BA degree in Cell Biology and Neuroscience. I then went to medical school at MCP Hahnemann (now known as Drexel University College of Medicine) in Philadelphia.

I stayed in Pennsylvania, moving up to the Lehigh Valley area to do a residency in Emergency Medicine at St. Luke’s Hospital (now known as St Luke’s University Health Network). I then pursued a fellowship in Trauma and Critical Care, also at St. Luke’s. During this fellowship, I did a few moonlighting shifts at Reading Hospital (now part of Tower Health System) and fell in love with the culture, the community, and the hospital – not to mention the volume of patients and pathology (top ten busiest EDs in the country!). I was offered a job here and accepted without hesitation.

Over the 15 years I have been here, I have served in many administrative roles, and was given support from the health system to pursue additional education. I am currently board-certified in Emergency Medicine and Clinical Informatics. My roles at Tower Health include clinical emergency medicine physician, medical director of Telehealth, physician builder for Epic, and clinical informaticist for emergency departments. I also serve as the medical director of the physician assistant program at Alvernia University.

Despite all that, I do occasionally carve out time for our 2-year dog, 12 and 14-yearold daughter and son (respectively), and my physician wife, Dr. Vinti Shah. My two greatest passions outside of medicine and family are golf and hockey. If not playing golf, you can typically find me watching hockey (the sport I played for years when on the right side of 40).

The value of a local medical society cannot be overstated. The wounds, trauma, and emotions physicians experienced over the past three years were absolutely brutal. Not only did we go from health care heroes to zeroes, but the health care system was shown to be a house of cards that started collapsing all around us, while we all dealt with our demons.

BCMS was a beacon of hope and refuge during these trying times. Physicians had a life raft on which to cling to get them through some of the worst situations that one could ever imagine. The focus of our executive director to get free CME, finance classes, collaboration with business leaders, and most importantly, socially safe gatherings were paramount to helping many of us stay sane. Continuing these efforts to serve chapter members with their state medical licensure requirements, while also focusing on helping each and every provider get “through this” will be necessary to maintain the mental health of one of our most valuable healthcare resources. when we moved to Berks County in 2006 are all grown up now. In fact, my middle child will start working as a Registered Nurse in the Emergency Department at the Reading Hospital this July. Time flies!

BCMS can also help guide the local community through other controversial and politically charged topics that affect public health and individual health. Moving forward, bringing more members into the BCMS fold will be vital to helping our local physicians weather the multitude of crises that we may face in the not-too-distant future.

I started working at Berks Hematology Oncology in 2006. Since then, Tower Health has acquired this group, and I now proudly work at the McGlinn Cancer Institute (MCI). My role at MCI is somewhat unique; I work full-time in the hospital. My days are dedicated to seeing patients in the hospital with newly diagnosed cancer, cancer-related concerns, or hematologic problems. This work can honestly be quite challenging because it is a rare day when I am giving good news. However, I am supported by a strong inpatient team that consists of two CRNPs, an RN, and a CMA. I also have the pleasure of teaching hematology-oncology fellows, medical residents, and students. The learners keep me on my toes and make my days more rewarding and fulfilling. As for my wife, Liz, she is still working as a nurse, now with the Reading School District.

Daniel Forman, DO Treasurer, Berks County Medical Society Medical Oncologist/McGlinn Cancer Center Reading Hospital/Tower Health

After graduating from Rowan University School of Osteopathic Medicine in New Jersey, I set my sails on becoming a primary care physician. I moved to Pennsylvania to pursue my residency in Internal Medicine at Lehigh Valley Hospital.

I fell in love with PA, and found the love of my life, Liz, here as well. After spending four years working in rural Carbon County in primary care, and shortly after the birth of our third child, I decided to pursue a Fellowship in Hematology-Oncology at the Penn State Cancer Center.

Although those three years of fellowship were stressful, Liz held down the fort at home, amazingly, while working full-time as a Registered Nurse. After fellowship, we moved from the Lehigh Valley to Berks County. It is hard to believe that those three kids who all needed booster seats in the car

Outside of work, Liz and I enjoy vacationing at Bethany Beach, and spoiling our new Aussie-Doodle puppy, Bailey. Other hobbies include pickle ball (you must play, it is fun!), bingeing Yellowstone, and mountain biking near our home at Blue Marsh.

We currently face many challenges in healthcare, and these challenges will only increase over the next decade. Healthcare spending is out of control and new technologies and pharmaceuticals will only add more cost to the system. Most physicians are now employed by large hospital systems that are working with shrinking profit margins.

The PA Medical Society is constantly reviewing legislation in Harrisburg to ensure that our patients and physician leadership remain a priority in our Commonwealth. I am looking forward to serving physician needs in Berks County with the goal of increasing physician membership and engagement. The future of healthcare is uncertain, and it is up to us to make certain that quality patient care remains the primary focus of all the stakeholders.