Spotlight on the SUS Mid Career Award
2021-2022
Hari Nathan, MD, PhD, FACS, FSSO
University of Michigan
Project: Fulfilling the Promise of Hospital Consolidation to Improve Clinical Quality and Costs
Dr. Hari Nathan is an Associate Professor of Surgery and Chief of the Division of Hepato-Pancreato-Biliary Surgery at the University of Michigan. He was trained in general surgery at The Johns Hopkins University, where he also received a PhD in Clinical Investigation, and in surgical oncology at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. Dr. Nathan’s clinical focus is on tumors of the liver, bile duct, pancreas, and stomach.
Dr. Nathan’s research seeks to identify strategies to improve outcomes and control costs for surgical care. His work has been funded by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and the National Institute on Aging. He was previously awarded the 2018 American College of Surgeons Joan L. and Julius H. Jacobson II Promising Investigator Award. Dr. Nathan is also involved in regional efforts to improve healthcare delivery. He is the Director of the Michigan Value Collaborative, a coalition of 100 Michigan hospitals and 40 physician organizations focused on improving the value of healthcare. He is also the Co-Chair of the Cancer Steering Committee for the Michigan Surgical Quality Collaborative (MSQC) and directs MSQC efforts to improve pancreatectomy care across Michigan.
The research project supported by the SUS Mid-Career Award seeks to elucidate strategies implemented by high-performing hospital networks to optimize the delivery of surgical care. Through quantitative and qualitative approaches, the research team will identify opportunities for hospital networks to improve surgical quality, reduce costs, and promote equity.
Spotlight on the SUS George P. Yang, MD, PhD Junior Faculty Award for the Underrepresented in Medicine
Sponsored by an unrestricted educational grant from the SUS and the SUS Foundation
2022-2023
Andrea Gillis, MD
Andrea Gillis is a board certified general surgeon receiving her M.D. from Columbia University and completing surgical residency at Albany Medical Center in New York. She completed her endocrine surgery fellowship training at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) where she is now an Assistant Professor in Endocrine Surgery. Dr. Gillis is a health outcome disparities and translational science researcher working in the field of social epigenetics in pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors. Under the mentorship of Dr. Smita Bhatia as a part of the UAB Institute of Cancer Outcomes and Survivorship, she will investigate the connection of social determinants of health on differential tumor methylation by race.
Project: Mixed Methods Analysis of Molecular Mediators of Social Determinants of Health in Pancreatic Neuroendocrine Tumors
Spotlight on the SUS Junior Faculty Research Scholar Award
Sponsored by an educational grant from the SUS Foundation
2022-2023
Frank Davis, MD
Dr. Frank M. Davis is an Assistant Professor in the Section of Vascular Surgery, Department of Surgery at the University of Michigan. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa with highest honors from the University of Michigan with a Bachelor of Science in Cellular and Molecular Biology. He then went on to receive his medical degree from the University of Michigan and graduated with Alpha Omega Alpha status. During his medical studies he pursued a Sarnoff Cardiovascular Foundation Fellowship at the University of Kentucky under the guidance of Dr. Alan Daugherty investigating the pathological mechanisms of abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) formation. Following medical school, he returned to the University of Michigan to complete his Integrated Vascular Surgery training. During his surgical training he spent two years as a National Institutes of Health Ruth L. Kirschstein Postdoctoral Fellow investigating the impact of epigenetic modifications to the immune system in diabetic wound healing. Currently, Dr. Frank Davis’s laboratory focuses on defining the role of the immune system in the development and progression of aortic aneurysms. The long-term goal is to uncover mechanisms responsible for aortic dilation and rupture in order to identify new targets for therapeutic intervention.
For the current project funded by the Society of University Surgeons, a pathological hallmark of AAA development is a pro-inflammatory macrophage phenotype that infiltrates into the aortic wall and contributes to vascular remodeling. Preliminary data from Dr. Davis’s laboratory demonstrates that the histone methyltransferase SETDB2 is increased in aortic aneurysm tissues and in turn induces post-transitional modifications that regulate the inflammatory macrophage phenotype during AAA progression. Using both murine models and human specimens, this proposal seeks to understand how these changes develop in aortic tissue and will test new therapies to restore the macrophages to homeostasis in order to prevent AAA expansion.
Spotlight on the SUS Resident Scholar Award
Sponsored by an educational grant from the SUS Foundation
2022-2023
Kevin Li, MD
Research Mentor: Andrew Lowly, MD
Dr. Kevin Li is a current 4th year general surgery resident at University of California San Diego. He has a strong interest in surgical oncology and translational research. He studied biochemistry and cell biology at Rice University and obtained his medical degree from the University of Texas at Southwestern Medical School. His SUS-affiliated mentor is Dr. Andrew Lowy, and he is co-mentored by Dr. Yuan Chen. With the support of this award, Dr. Li and his mentors are studying the post-translational modification called SUMOylation, and how it may be a target for treating pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma. Their work explores how targeting SUMOylation may affect both intrinsic cancer cell biology as well as the tumor immune microenvironment of pancreatic cancer.
Spotlight on the SUS Resident Scholar Award
Sponsored by an educational grant from KARL STORZ
2021-2022
Alexandra Ladd, MD
SUS Mentor: Ali Zarrinpar, MD
Project Title: Utilization of visual artificial intelligence to improve intraoperative identification of biliary anatomy
Alexandra Ladd received her Bachelor of Science in molecular and cellular biology from Johns Hopkins University. She earned her medical degree from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. She is currently a fourth-year general surgery resident at the University of Florida in Gainesville, FL. She is working with her mentor, Dr. Ali Zarrinpar, on the utilization of visual artificial intelligence to improve intraoperative identification of biliary anatomy. The aim of the project is to use data collected from near-infrared fluorescence cholangiography (NIRFC) images during laparoscopic cholecystectomy to train artificial intelligence (AI) models to interpret biliary anatomy and identify the critical view of safety in real time, thus improving the safety of this operation.
Spotlight on the SUS Global Surgery Scholar Award
2023
Thomas G. Weiser, MD, MPH, FACS, FCS(ECSA), FRCSEd(ad hom)
Clinical Professor, Department of Surgery, Stanford University
Section of Trauma and Critical Care, Stanford Medicine
Thomas Weiser, MD, MPH, is a Clinical Professor in the Department of Surgery at Stanford University. He practices general, emergency, and trauma surgery and surgical intensive care. His research focuses on quality and safety of surgical care, and strategies for improving the safety and reliability of surgical delivery in resource-poor settings. He was part of the World Health Organization’s Safe Surgery Saves Lives program where he helped quantify the global volume of surgery and create, implement, evaluate, and promote the WHO Surgical Safety Checklist. He contributed to the Disease Control Priorities Project to identify a suite of emergency and essential operations that are very cost-effective and highlight surgery’s importance in a strong, well-functioning health system. He was also involved in the Lancet Commission on Global Surgery and helped organize and craft its key messages. He was previously the Consulting Medical Officer for Lifebox, a charity dedicated to improving surgical safety worldwide, where he helped develop the Clean Cut program to improve compliance with perioperative infection practices embedded in the Surgical Safety Checklist.
He is currently the Program Director for Wellcome Leap where he leads the SAVE program (Surgery: Assess/Validate/Expand). SAVE aims to accelerate laparoscopic surgical skills acquisition and reduce mortality following surgery through enhanced monitoring and early prediction of deterioration.