Bierhals Named Vice Chair for Community Radiology

Headshot of Andrew Bierhals, MD, standing outside.

Andrew J. Bierhals, MD, professor of radiology for Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology (MIR) at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, has been named vice chair for community radiology effective Dec. 1. In collaboration with section chiefs, Bierhals will oversee and provide clinical services at the community hospitals served by MIR and will work to expand and improve the clinical practice, among other responsibilities. He will also continue to serve as vice chair for quality and safety.

Notably, Bierhals, along with MIR’s leadership team, helmed MIR’s safety response to the COVID–19 pandemic and continues to work to ensure patient and employee safety. And when MIR began providing radiology services to Phelps Health in December 2018, he played a key role in updating quality and safety processes, which included a robust peer review. Bierhals also helped secure grant funding to establish a dedicated follow-up program to limit delay in diagnosis for patients with incidental imaging findings.

As a member of the Radiological Society of North America, American College of Radiology (ACR) and Society of Thoracic Radiology, Bierhals has participated in several educational, scientific and quality committees. And in 2021, he was named an ACR fellow, one of the highest honors the organization bestows.

Bierhals earned his medical degree and a master’s degree in public health at the University of Pittsburgh before arriving at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, where he completed a diagnostic radiology residency and cardiothoracic imaging fellowship at MIR.

Bierhals succeeds Michael W. Penney, MD, who first arrived at MIR in 2004 as part of an MRI fellowship and was appointed director and chief of radiology at Barnes-Jewish St. Peters Hospital two years later.