DMU 2025 Alumni of the Year and Rising Star Honorees

WEST DES MOINES, IA (07/10/2025) Des Moines University Medicine and Health Sciences announces this year's Alumni of the Year and Rising Star honorees. Selected by the DMU Alumni Board of Directors and university leadership, this year's honorees have advanced their professions and improved patient care. They are educators whose mentorships have shaped the minds of thousands of DMU students.

"These honorees represent the very best of their professions and reflect the core values of DMU - service, leadership and excellence," says DMU President and CEO Angela L. Walker Franklin. "Our mission at DMU is to shape the future of health care through world-class education, impactful research and compassionate care. These alumni are living that mission every day."

An Alumni of the Year Award Ceremony will be held on Friday, September 12, to celebrate these distinguished alumni and their impact on DMU and health care.

The 2025 Rising Star Award

Major Joshua Dilday, D.O.'15, is an adjunct assistant professor of trauma and critical care at the Medical College of Wisconsin and a major in the U.S. Army. His path to becoming a trauma surgeon and military medical leader was rooted in a commitment to service and personal experiences with medical hardships. After attending Truman State University, he served in the Army before attending DMU. He chose DMU because of its military lineage and supportive surgical community. As a student, Dilday helped create a military elective that bridged the gap between preparing to become an officer and medical training. Following graduation, he completed fellowships in trauma and surgical critical care at Los Angeles County/USC Medical Center, where he developed an interest in quality improvement and medical administration. Today, Dilday mentors military medical students, leads national trauma care initiatives and works to improve patient outcomes.

The 2025 College of Osteopathic Medicine Alumnus of the Year

Gary Stuck, D.O.'83, FAAFP, is a board-certified family physician and recently retired chief medical officer for Advocate Health, the third largest nonprofit health system in the country, and chief executive officer of Advocate Physician Partners, a 4,500-physician network in Illinois, where he served from 2018 until his retirement in 2024. Inspired by his parents' emphasis on education, Stuck knew he wanted to be a primary care doctor from a young age. After earning undergraduate degrees in biology and psychology from Morningside College, he chose DMU for its strong focus on primary care and supportive faculty. Early clinical experiences shaped his patient-centered approach, which he carried into his residency at Rush University Medical Center and his long career at Advocate Health. There, he served as a founding member and 13-year chair of the Advocate Physician Partners Board of Directors, president of Advocate Christ Medical Center's physician-hospital organization for 22 years and a long-standing member of its governing body. Throughout his career, Stuck remained committed to treating patients with empathy, dignity and care.

The 2025 College of Podiatric Medicine and Surgery Alumna of the Year

Shari Nichols, D.P.M.'95, FACFAS, is a board-certified foot and ankle surgeon with United Health Services Podiatry in Vestal, New York. Her journey to podiatry began at Cortland State University, where she was introduced to the field at a career fair. After completing her undergraduate degree in biology, she chose DMU for its smaller, holistic environment. She completed her residency at Yale-New Haven in a newly expanded three-year surgical program. Nichols then returned to upstate New York to build her career, first in private practice and then helping grow United Health Services' podiatry program, which only had one provider at the time. Over her two decades in practice, Nichols has served as a clinician, department chair and director of both the residency and wound care programs at UHS. She remains committed to mentoring residents, many of them from DMU, and championing podiatry as a versatile and impactful specialty.

The 2025 College of Health Sciences Alumna of the Year

Carla Stebbins, M.H.A.'93, Ph.D., credits her education for shaping her career and remains passionate about empowering students on their journeys. After graduating from the University of Northern Iowa with a degree in business and marketing, Stebbins transitioned into health care management from retail management when living near DMU's former campus in Des Moines. As a student, Stebbins worked part-time in DMU's admissions office and the physician assistant program, later becoming a full-time faculty member six years after graduating with her M.H.A. degree. In 2004, she became the director of DMU's M.H.A. program. Under her leadership, the program earned accreditation from the Commission on Accreditation in Healthcare Management in 2015. After 22 years at DMU, Stebbins joined the Rochester Institute of Technology as the sole full-time employee of its M.H.A. program. Despite starting from scratch, she led the program through the accreditation process, a challenging task made even more challenging by the disruptions of the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2023, she became the M.H.A. program director at Texas Women's University. Most recently, in summer 2025, she stepped into the same leadership role at Texas A&M University's School of Public Health.

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