William has spent a long and rewarding career as a clinician, creating programs such as P.A.C.E., William has made good on a mission he set out for since he was in high school: To help people.
William decided to fulfil this mission by attending medical school at UC Santa Barbara. Along the way, he developed an interest in teaching other medical students how to become physicians, providing experience to interns and residents seeing patients in his practice located at the college.
While performing residency training, Bill met and mentored fellow foundation founders John Alchemy and Bradford Stiles, two students who would go on to begin successful practices of their own, each with a similar goal of helping as many people as possible.
In the midst of the “Managed Care Revolution” of 1995, Bill created the P.A.C.E. (Physician Assessment and Clinical Education) program, meant to perform a competence assessment on physicians who had been recommended by their peers for evaluation.
P.A.C.E. was a first in its field, a program running inside but independently of UCSD, meant to break the stigma of mental health in physicians, where previously there had been little to no help. P.A.C.E. continues to operate out of UCSD to this day, and has helped over 2,000 physicians and medical professionals.
Dr. Norcross’ C.V.
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Published White Papers by Dr. Norcross
- Preventing Egregious Ethical Violations in Medical Practice: Evidence-Informed Recommendations from a Multidisciplinary Working Group. J Med Regul. 2018 Dec; 104(4):23-31. DuBois JM, Anderson EE, Chibnall JT, Diakov L, Doukas DJ, Holmboe ES, Koenig HM, Krause JH, McMillan G, Mendelsohn M, Mozersky J, Norcross WA, Whelan AJ. PMID: 30984914.View
- Testing of A Caregiver Support Team. Explore (NY). 2019 Jan – Feb; 15(1):19-26. Graham P, Zerbi G, Norcross W, Montross-Thomas L, Lobbestael L, Davidson J. PMID: 30424993.View
- Assessment and remedial clinical education of surgeons in California. Arch Surg. 2011 Dec; 146(12):1411-5. Cosman BC, Alverson AD, Boal PA, Owens EL, Norcross WA. PMID: 22288085.View
- Remediation of the deficiencies of physicians across the continuum from medical school to practice: a thematic review of the literature. Acad Med. 2009 Dec; 84(12):1822-32. Hauer KE, Ciccone A, Henzel TR, Katsufrakis P, Miller SH, Norcross WA, Papadakis MA, Irby DM. PMID: 19940595.View
- Toward meeting the challenge of physician competence assessment: the University of California, San Diego Physician Assessment and Clinical Education (PACE) Program. Acad Med. 2009 Aug; 84(8):1008-14. Norcross WA, Henzel TR, Freeman K, Milner-Mares J, Hawkins RE. PMID: 19638764.View
- Diagnosis of acute coronary syndrome. Am Fam Physician. 2005 Jul 01; 72(1):119-26. Achar SA, Kundu S, Norcross WA. PMID: 16035692.View
- Illness and Secrecy on the Supreme Court. N Engl J Med. 2005 Mar 31; 352(13):1387-8. Norcross WA, Ganiats TG. PMID: 15803529.View
- The influence of women on the health care-seeking behavior of men. J Fam Pract. 1996 Nov; 43(5):475-80. Norcross WA, Ramirez C, Palinkas LA. PMID: 8917147.View