Amparo Gonzalez assumed the role of president of the American Association of Diabetes Educators (AADE) on January 1, 2008. She provides leadership to AADE, a multi-disciplinary organization of more than 11,000 health professionals dedicated to providing and advocating for quality diabetes self-management training.

Gonzalez is currently affiliated with Emory University School of Medicine as the director of the Georgia Latino Diabetes Program. Since December 2005, she has planned, designed and implemented a diabetes program conducted entirely in Spanish. By partnering with clinics in her area, the program has been administered to over 150 Latino patients. The goal of the program is to provide Latinos with up-to-date, high-quality diabetes care by eliminating barriers to understanding and providing information and instruction in patients’ native language. Gonzalez also serves as an adjunct professor at Emory University School of Nursing.

An AADE Board member since 2002, Gonzalez has been active member since 1994. She has served on many different committees: Annual Program, Finance, Strategic Planning, Personnel Practices and Bylaws/Policies and Procedures, as well as many different taskforces, including the Membership Taskforce, Diversity Taskforce, Governance Taskforce and the Environmental Scan Taskforce. In addition, she recently completed a term as the AADE liaison to the American Diabetes Association’s Education Recognition Program. She led the Strategic Planning committee through the development of AADE’s 2006-09 Strategic Plan and closed and evaluated the 2003-2005 Strategic Plan. Locally, Gonzalez is active in the Greater Atlanta Association of Diabetes Educators, an AADE chapter, serving as its president in 1999.

In addition to her AADE activities, she has served on the Board of Directors of several different institutions including Atlanta Diabetes University, Dia de la Mujer Latina, The Hope Clinic in Lawrenceville (GA), The Hispanic Health Coalition of Georgia and The Susan Komen Breast Cancer Foundation. She has also been active on many different committees of the American Diabetes Association.  

Reflecting her interest in diversity-related issues, Gonzalez served on the organizing committee for the First National Latino Diabetes Forum, which was held in Atlanta in September 2005. The Forum resulted in the establishment of the National Hispanic-Latino Diabetes Federation. Gonzalez is also an editorial advisor of Diabetes Forecast en Español.

Gonzalez earned her Professional Nurse degree (B.S. equivalent) from the Universidad del Norte in Barranquilla, Colombia. She has been a certified diabetes educator since 1994.