Faculty and Staff Achievements
Congratulations to the following faculty and staff for achieving special distinction this quarter:
Internal Medicine
Dr. Agustin Garcia (Hematology-Oncology) was recently selected to serve on the Conquer Cancer Grants Selection Committee. The purpose of the GSC is to administer the Young Investigator Award and Career Development Award programs, including the peer review and selection of the grant recipients.
Dr. Garcia was also invited to serve on an expert panel for the American Society of Clinical Oncology guidelines update on neoadjuvant chemotherapy in advanced ovarian cancer. The first step for the panel will be a systematic review that will serve as the evidence foundation for the guideline’s updated recommendations.
Dr. Sanjay Kamboj (Pulmonary & Critical Care/ Allergy & Immunology) has been elected President-elect for the Faculty Assembly. He will be the President of the Faculty Assembly next year (2023-2024).
Dr. Matt Lammi (Pulmonary/Critical Care) has been named Chair of the Scientific Leadership Council Research Committee for the Pulmonary Hypertension Association.
Dr. Catherine O’Neal (Baton Rouge) has been named the Chief Medical Advisor to the South Eastern Conference (SEC). She will serve as a consultant to advise the Commissioner and Conference Office staff on medically-related matters and serve as the primary medical liaison for SEC member institutions on matters related to student-athlete health and safety.
Dr. Benjamin Springgate (Community and Population Medicine and the Center for Healthcare Value and Equity) has been accepted to the Health and Aging Policy Fellowship based at Columbia University, a highly competitive, one year non-residential fellowship through which he will receive health policy training and placement with policymakers in Washington DC to address issues relating to health and aging: https://www.healthandagingpolicy.org/health-and-aging-policy/program-overview/
Dr. Allison C. Augustus-Wallace has been elected to serve as a Member-at-Large on the AAMC, Group on Women in Medicine and Science (GWIMS) Steering Committee. GWIMS advances the full and successful participation and inclusion of women within academic medicine by addressing gender equity, recruitment and retention, awards and recognition, and career advancement. This position is a three-year term that began in November 2022.
Many department faculty were recognized for their contributions and excellence through the Chancellor’s Excellence Awards: James Falterman, MD (Lafayette Campus); Allison Augustus Wallace, PhD (DOM and Office of Diversity & Community Engagement); Stephen Kantrow, MD (Pulmonary/Critical Care); Najy Masri, MD (Hospital Medicine); and Sanjay Kamboj, MD (Pulmonary/Critical Care/Allergy/Immunology).
The Humana 2021 quality scores demonstrate Internal Medicine doctors are excelling: Diabetes Care – Kidney Disease Monitoring received 5 stars, as did Statin Use in Persons with Diabetes. Both Breast Cancer Screening and Hemoglobin A1c Control received 4 stars. The Infectious Disease Center (Dr. Paula Seal, Dr. Michael Hagensee, Dr. Cassandra Youmans, and Dr. Yussef Bennani) was recognized recently for having the highest patient satisfaction scores for the past six months.
The following faculty were named UMC Difference Makers this quarter: Drs. Zee Ali, Pedro Cox Alomar, Paul LeLorier (Cardiology); Drs. James Aiken, Matthew Carlisle, Bruce Hurley, Meghan Maslanka (Emergency Medicine); Drs. Andrew Burke, Jordan Callender, Lee Engel, Corey Gregg, Cody Williams (Hospital Medicine); and Dr. Fred Lopez (Infectious Diseases).
Patients at UMCNO have named Dr. Nabeel Saghir (Cardiology) as a Difference Maker in their care over six times this year.
Orthopaedic Surgery
Drs. Christopher Marrero, Anna Cohen-Rosenblum, William Accousti, Peter Krause, Michael Hartman, and Vinod Dasa were featured in New Orleans Magazine's Top Doctors Edition.
Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery
Adele Evans, MD and Belinda Mantle, MD, both pediatric otolaryngology faculty members, were listed in the New Orleans Magazine's Top Doctors Edition.
Pathology
Dr. Jihuan Chen's poster, "A Rare Case of Primary Cardiac T-Cell Lymphoma in Immunocompetent Adult"
was selected as a blue-ribbon finalist in the Case Study Category, ASCP 2022.
Dr. Michael Webber's poster, "Benign Multicystic Peritoneal Mesothelioma as a Rare Cause of Death" was
selected as a blue-ribbon finalist in the Case Study Category, ASCP 2022.
Dr. Zaid Khreefa's poster, “Liver Injury in COVID-19: Direct Evidence of Hepatic SARS-CoV-2 Infection
and Associated Histopathologic Findings” received third place in the Junior Member
Abstracts for the CAP22 Annual Meeting (October 2022).
Pediatrics
New Orleans Magazine's Top Doctors Edition featured included many members of the department:
• Andrew Abreo
• Diego Aviles
• Sergio Bartakian
• Tamara Bradford
• Michael Brumund
• Kelly Gajewski
• Thomas Kimball
• James Krulisky
• Betty Lo
• Ken Paris
• Shannon Powell
• Steffan Sernich
• Luke Wall
• Lolie Yu
CityBusiness recently honored Dr. Alexis Morvant as a Health Care Hero at an event at the New Orleans Museum of Art. Health Care Heroes
honors health care professionals in the New Orleans area in the following categories:
first responders, nursing, physicians, professionals and volunteers. Honorees are
selected annually based on industry achievement and community involvement.
Dr. Morvant also recently became certified as VitalTalk Faculty. VitalTalk is a training organization for clinicians seeking to advance their communication skills. Dr. Morvant is the only pediatrician in Mississippi and Louisiana with this certification. If any faculty are interested in participating in this program, please contact Dr. Morvant for more information.
Dr. Raghubir Mangat received the 2022 Master Pediatrician Award at the Louisiana American Academy of Pediatrics annual meeting held in Baton Rouge in August.
Professor Emeritus Dr. Abraham Gedalia was honored at the Arthritis Foundation's Bone Bash in October in Baton Rouge. Bone Bash unites and honors those living with arthritis and their medical providers. The event attracts more than 200 corporate and medical partners, physicians, donors and volunteers of the Arthritis Foundation. Proceeds support the Arthritis Foundation’s research, advocacy and public health programs.
Dr. Gedalia was also selected as a Master of the American College of Rheumatology (ACR). This is one of the highest honors the College bestows.
Dr. Tamara Bradford was a contributing author to an NEJM article which won the 2022 Charles Shepard Award in the category of Prevention and Control. The award recognizes the most outstanding study published in conjunction with the CDC.
Dr. Shubho Sarkar was recently named a Fellow of the American Medical Informatics Association. This achievement signals to patients, employers, and colleagues that he is an expert in evidence-based informatics practice and engaged with a community of lifelong learners who apply the latest advances in informatics to improve health and health care. Dr. Sarkar will be honored along with 70 FAMIA recipients for his contributions to informatics and AMIA at the AMIA 2023 Clinical Informatics Conference next year.
Physiology
Melissa Prestwood was awarded Light of Physiology, 2022. Prestwood was also awarded the Chancellor’s Excellence Award, 2022.
Stefany Primeaux received the Chancellor’s Excellence Award, 2022.
Anna Whitehead was awarded the 2022 Levitzky Outstanding Teaching Award.
Whitehead was also invited for an oral Session at the 64th ASH Annual Meeting and Exposition in December in New Orleans.
Whitehead is also nominated to be a co-chair of a session at APS Summit.
Psychiatry
Dr. Ronja Roxane Bodola received two awards at the Association for Academic Psychiatry annual meeting in Denver: Best Achievement in Innovation and Best Poster (“Graphic Psychiatry: Teaching the Iconography of Mental Illness”).