Melissa J. Garretson, MD

Melissa J. Garretson, MD, is a board-certified pediatrician living in Fort Worth, Texas. Elected to the American Medical Association Board of Trustees in June 2024, she is a practicing pediatric emergency medicine physician and fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Dr. Garretson is the Board liaison to the AMA Council on Legislation, the AMA Medical Student Section, and the AMA LGBTQ+ Section. In addition to serving on the AMA Board’s Awards and Nominations Committee, she also serves as an award judge for AMA Foundation scholarships and as one of the AMA appointed members to the Commission on Laboratory Accreditation Board. During her first year on the AMA Board, Dr. Garretson represented the AMA at the EDGE 2025 conference on telehealth and served as liaison to the AMA Council on Medical Education and the AMA Senior Physicians Section, where she helped lead the section governing council through its strategic planning session.

As an active and longstanding member of the AMA, Dr. Garretson previously served on the AMA Board of Trustees as the medical student trustee (1992–1993). She has also served as vice speaker of the AMA Medical Student Section, as a delegate to the AMA Resident and Fellow Section, and as the delegate on the AMA Young Physicians Section Governing Council. During her more than 27 years of policymaking and service to the AMA House of Delegates (HOD), Dr. Garretson has chaired multiple reference committees, served as a member of the Commission on Unity to transform the AMA, and on the Speaker’s Advisory Group to restructure the HOD.

Dr. Garretson received her undergraduate degree from Texas Christian University (TCU), graduating with honors as a Chancellor’s Scholar. She was awarded her medical degree in 1993 from Mayo Medical School, now the Mayo Clinic Alix School of Medicine. While completing residency training in pediatrics at Duke University Medical Center, she served as chair of the North Carolina Medical Society Resident and Fellow Section and was the first resident to serve on the society’s political action committee board. In 1996, after relocating to Texas and joining a small group pediatric practice prior to transitioning to the pediatric emergency department, Dr. Garretson became a member of the Tarrant County Medical Society and the Texas Medical Association (TMA).

In Texas she raised twins with her spouse, a rural hospital president, served as county medical society president, advanced public health through private partnerships as chair of the TMA Council on Health Promotion and served on the TMA political action committee board. Dr. Garretson, who remains active on the TCU Pre-Health Advisory Committee, has worked within communities across Texas having served on the PTO boards of her children’s schools, the board of a regional children’s advocacy center, the TCU College of Science and Engineering Board of Visitors, and the TCU John V. Roach Honors College Board of Visitors.

2025–2026

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