Associate Chief Medical Officer of Diversity and Inclusion

Duke Health

Erica Taylor, MD is the Duke Health Physician Organization’s inaugural Associate Chief Medical Officer for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. She brings to this role a lifetime of experience, passion and a proven track record as a leader for change. Inspired by the aforementioned education and experiences, she founded the Orthopaedic Diversity Leadership Consortium, LLC, a pioneering organization whose mission is to elevate the necessary components of inclusive leadership in orthopaedic surgery through network and strategy development.

Dr. Taylor deeply values leadership, diversity, and inclusion. She is known for embracing differences among people and making sure that everyone as a “voice at the table” so that together we can achieve so much more.

As a proud member of the Duke Community, she is heavily committed to various aspects of leadership, including her service as the Chief of Surgery and Medical Director of Orthopaedic Surgery at Duke Raleigh Hospital. She is the Vice Chair of Diversity and Inclusion for the Department of Orthopaedics, working with colleagues and institutional leaders to develop thoughtful strategy and best practices toward belonging. For over a decade, she has worked closely with pipeline programs and national organizations that strive to promote successful pathways into orthopaedic surgery for populations that are under-represented in this field.

Dr. Taylor achieved her Bachelor of Science degree in Biomedical Engineering Science from the University of Virginia in 2002. She obtained her medical degree from the Duke School of Medicine and then returned back to the University of Virginia to complete orthopaedic surgical residency training, including a year of productive tissue engineering research under the guidance of Dr. Cato Laurencin. She then went on to complete a fellowship in Hand and Upper Extremity Surgery at The Cleveland Clinic in Ohio. She joined the Duke School of Medicine faculty as a hand surgeon in 2013 and received her Master of Business Administration from Duke’s Fuqua School of Business in 2020.