The National Medical Association will at the end of this month install Meharry Medical College professor Rahn Kennedy Bailey as its president for the upcoming year.

Bailey, an associate professor and chairman of the department of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Meharry, will take his role in New Orleans during the annual convention of the NMA, which represents more than 50,000 African-American physicians around the country.

In a statement, Bailey said he will focus on a policy agenda that includes support of the Obama administration’s Affordable Care Act, eliminating health disparities and raising awareness of the need for mental health care for African Americans.

“Health care policy is changing rapidly and, for more than 100 years, the National Medical Association has been at the forefront of the effort to provide quality health care for medically underserved populations,” Bailey said. “I look forward to expanding my commitment to the NMA as we continue to make a difference in meeting the health care needs of all Americans.”

A graduate of Morehouse College, Bailey received his medical degree from the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston, Texas. He completed his residency in psychiatry at the University of Texas at Houston and completed a fellowship in forensic psychiatry in the Department of Psychiatry at Yale University’s School of Medicine.