An estimated 5 billion people — two-thirds of the world’s population — do not have access to surgery because of a lack of facilities, money and trained surgeons and anesthesiologists.

The General Surgery residency program at Vanderbilt School of Medicine is getting a new program director, but it won’t be a new face.

Luda Davies, clinical instructor in Surgery in the outpatient surgery clinic at the Nashville campus of the Veterans Affairs Tennessee Valley Healthcare System, has been named Physician Assistant of the Year by the Tennessee Academy of Physician Assistants.