Dr. David Hanekom joined Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Dakota, Fargo, as a medical director in medical management, effective January 1. He will assist in a broad array of services provided by medical management and will focus on quality review, provider reporting and quality improvement.

Hanekom had been an internal medicine physician at MeritCare SouthPointe Clinic in Fargo, where he was involved in ambulatory as well as hospital-based internal medicine. He also practiced palliative care in the Palliative Care Unit at MeritCare South University and was director of chronic disease with a focus on ambulatory diabetes care throughout the health system.

A native of Cape Town, South Africa, Hanekom grew up in South Africa and attended the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa. He earned his medical degree at the University of Witwatersrand medical school and received post-graduate training in family medicine at the Medical University of Southern Africa and in internal medicine at the University of North Dakota School of Medicine and Health Science in Grand Forks.

He lives in Fargo and has two children, Damian, 17, and Megan, 15.