University of Alabama. Office of the Vice President for Health Affairs.

The Office of the Vice President for Health Affairs was created in 1955 as a result of the T. Duckett Jones Special Survey Committee Report on the organization of the Medical Center. The vice president for health affairs has administrative responsibility over all Medical Center programs and since 1969 has reported directly to the president of UAB. Previously, the vice president for health affairs reported to the president of the University of Alabama. Dr. Joseph F. Volker served as the second vice president for health affairs from 1962 to 1966. He actively sought to improve programs and facilities, and he lobbied effectively for additional funds for programs, construction, and research. Volker, who had come to the University of Alabama Medical Center in Birmingham as dean of the School of Dentistry, later became the first president of UAB and the first chancellor of the University of Alabama System. Born in 1913, Volker died in Birmingham in 1989.