Alumni Scholars

Dr. Zhen Gooi is an Associate Professor of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery. He completed his residency in otolaryngology-head and neck surgery and fellowship in advanced head and neck surgical oncology at the Johns Hopkins Hopsital. His clinical focus is on patients with head and neck cancers. He has a special interest in the use of minimally invasive surgical techniques to preserve speech and swallowing function in the treatment of these patients. Dr. Gooi believes that head and neck cancer care is most effective when delivered in a multi-disciplinary setting. In this regard, he is an active collaborator in novel treatment de-intensification protocols to reduce the side effects of head and neck cancer treatment with University of Chicago medical and radiation oncologists. He is passionate in raising the profile of head and neck cancer in the larger medical community and is involved in efforts to increase the awareness of national guidelines pertaining to the treatment of head and neck cancers. Dr. Gooi is currently on staff at The Queens Health System in Honolulu, HI.

Dr. Shilpa Iyer is an Assistant Professor of Female Pelvic Medicine and Reconstructive Surgery (Urogynecology) in the department of Obstetrics & Gynecology. She first completed a joint degree in medicine and public health with a focus on epidemiology and biostatistics at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She then completed her residency in Obstetrics & Gynecology at the combined program at Massachusetts General Hospital/ Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, MA. She then returned to Chicago to complete a fellowship in FPMRS at the University of Chicago before joining the faculty in July 2017. Her clinical focus is pelvic organ prolapse, overactive bladder, stress incontinence, bladder pain, fistulas, and other complex pelvic floor disorders. She often has medical students, residents, and fellows in her clinic and operating room and enjoys clinical and surgical teaching. Her research interests include the pathophysiology and treatment of overactive bladder and bladder pain as well as long term clinical outcome measures. She has presented at national and international meetings, published in urogynecology journals, and is most proud of mentoring trainees in their research endeavors. Dr. Iyer is currently a faculty member at The University of Illinois at Chicago.

Dr. Skondra, Associate Professor of Ophthalmology and Visual Science at the University of Chicago. Dr. Skondra is the Director of the J. Terry Ernest Ocular Imaging Center who focuses on the medical and surgical treatment of vitreoretinal diseases. She in an expert in delivering care for diabetic eye disease, age-related macular degeneration, retinal detachment, retinal vein occlusions, eye trauma, proliferative vitreoretinopathy and intraocular infections, with advanced training and expertise in surgical repair of complex diabetic retinal detachments.

As a physician-scientist, Dr. Skondra is dedicated to investigating methods to improve prevention, diagnosis and treatment strategies for retinal conditions with special focus on the role of microbiome in age related macular degeneration and retinal disorders. Throughout her career, Dr. Skondra has received several prestigious awards for her translational research on diabetic retinopathy, ocular angiogenesis and age related macular degeneration, including the Retina Society Raymond Margherio Award, Harvard /Alcon Clinical Scholar Award, AUPO Research Award, ARVO/Alcon Early Career Clinician Scientist Award, Joslin/Tonseth Research Fellowship Award and the Knights Templar Award. She trained at Weill Cornell Medical College (residency) and Harvard Medical School (postdoctoral research fellowship and vitreoretinal surgical fellowship). Dr. Skondra is currently the Vice Chari of Research for Ophthalmology at NYU.

Dr. Saara Kaviany is a Pediatric Bone Marrow Transplant Physician at UChicago Medicine Comer Children’s Hospital, where she cares for children with cancer, immune deficiencies, and bone marrow failure. Known for her warm, relationship-centered approach, she sees every patient as family and is committed to supporting both medical outcomes and quality of life.

Dr. Kaviany leads the Comprehensive Immune Deficiency and Dysregulation (CIDD) Clinic, a multidisciplinary program that provides coordinated, cutting-edge care for children with complex immune disorders. She chose Comer for its collaborative environment and shared vision of compassionate, comprehensive care. As of July, 2025, Dr. Kaviany will be departing UChicago Medicine.

Dr. Lindsay Jaeger is an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics in the Section of Pediatric Emergency Medicine, and the Medical Director of the Comer Children’s Emergency Room. She is also the Medical Directors of the UChicago Medicine sections of Emergency Medical Services and Disaster Preparedness. Dr. Jaeger received her medical doctorate from Tulane University School of Medicine and completed her pediatric residency training at The Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago. Her post-doctoral training also included fellowships in pediatric emergency medicine and emergency medicine ultrasound at Washington University in St. Louis School of Medicine and an EMS fellowship at UChicago Medicine.

Dr. Jaeger presented research at several national conventions, including an EMS Telemedicine Pilot project at the National Association of EMS Physicians Annual Meeting. Much of her research experience is multidisciplinary, focusing on pediatrics as well as obstetrics, gynecology, nephrology, and cardiology, among others. Dr. Jaeger also serves on the EMS Medical Directors Consortium committee for Chicago EMS, the EMS for Children Illinois Chapter, and is the Co-Chair of a subcommittee of the National EMS for
Children. Through working with each of these organizations, her focus is on developing EMS protocols, policies, procedures on pediatric cardiac arrest and airway care, transport protocols, and education on medication administration. This focus on pediatric prehospital care reduces health disparities by addressing educational and policy gaps and barriers. As of 2023, Dr. Jaeger has joined the faculty at Emory University.

Lainie Friedman Ross, MD, PhD, is the Carolyn and Matthew Bucksbaum Professor of Clinical Medical Ethics; Professor, Departments of Pediatrics, Medicine, Surgery and the College; Co-Director of the Institute for Translational Medicine, and Associate Director of the MacLean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics at the University of Chicago Clinically, Dr. Ross is a primary care pediatrician at The University of Chicago Comer Children’s Hospital and provides inpatient care of newborns in the Mother-Baby Unit.

Dr. Ross earned her undergraduate degree in Public and International Affairs from Princeton University, her medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, and her doctorate in philosophy from Yale University. She trained in Pediatrics at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and New York-Presbyterian Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital.

Dr. Ross’ research portfolio concentrates on ethical and policy issues in pediatrics, organ transplantation, genetics, and human subjects protections. She has published four books and over 200 articles in the peer-reviewed literature. Her fifth book, The Living Donor as Patient was funded by a Robert Wood Johnson Award in Health Policy and will be published by Oxford University Press in 2021. She is currently writing a 6th book examining the ethical issues related to siblings in health care that is funded by the National Library of Medicine. She is a frequent lecturer both nationally and internationally and actively involved in teaching ethics to trainees and staff at the University of Chicago Medicine.

Dr. Ross has served on a wide range of professional organizations including the American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Bioethics, the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) Ethics Committee, the International Pediatric Transplantation Association Ethics Committee, the HHS Secretary’s Advisory Committee on Human Research Protections (SACHRP) and the NIH Recombinant DNA Advisory Committee (RAC).

Dr. Ross was a 2014 recipient of a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship and a 2015 recipient of the American Academy of Pediatrics William G. Bartholome Award for Ethical Excellence.

As of January 2023, Dr. Ross is Professor and Chair of the Department of Health Humanities and Bioethics at The University of Rochester.

Dr. Kiran K. Turaga is a renowned surgical oncologist with a specific expertise in metastatic cancers. He grew up in India and completed his medical training from the prestigious All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS). He completed his surgical residency from Creighton University and his fellowship from The Moffitt Cancer Center. He also holds a Master’s in Public Health from Johns Hopkins School of Public Health.

Dr. Turaga is interested in the patient centered management of patients with complex malignancies. Prior to joining the University of Chicago, he was the Sharon Wadina Endowed Professor at the Medical College of Wisconsin. Some of his initiatives have included patient navigation, trimodality prehabilitation for patients undergoing complex cytoreductive surgery and early use of supportive oncology in the management of patients. Along with the regional therapies team, he has successfully created one of the premier programs for cytoreductive surgery and regional therapies in the nation which attracts patients from across the country.

Dr. Turaga’s research has focused on patient outcomes with oligometastatic cancers and he has published over 110 journal articles. He has contributed scholarly works to foremost oncological textbooks about peritoneal surface malignancies and is currently the section editor for the Annals of Surgical Oncology for the regional therapies section. He is interested in disease prediction, modeling and delivery of optimal care for his patients.

He is also the fellowship director for the Complex General Surgical Oncology Fellowship program at the University of Chicago/Northshore program. He has been awarded the Department of Surgery Excellence in Teaching award in 2016-17.

As of 2023 Dr. Turaga joined the faculty at Yale School of Medicine

Dr. Pathik Amin is an optometrist and was an Assistant Professor in the Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Science at the University of Chicago, where he serves as the Director of Optometry.  He earned his optometric degree from the University of Houston and completed a residency in ocular disease at the Albuquerque VA Medical Center. Dr. Amin’s clinical practice focuses on the medical management of glaucoma patients. He is interested in exploring ways to improve glaucoma adherence and outcomes, and was the recipient of the 2022 Bucksbaum Institute National Research Grant. Dr. Amin has a strong interest in education and founded the first optometric residency at the University of Chicago in 2021, for which he serves as the program director. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Optometry, serves on the executive committee for the Academy’s Glaucoma Section, and is a member of the Optometric Glaucoma Society.

Dr. Amin is currently a visiting associate professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Dr. C. Maxwell Medert is an ophthalmologist, who will serve as a Glaucoma specialist in the Department of Ophthalmology & Visual Science at the University of Chicago as an Assistant Professor. He completed his medical degree at Emory University School of Medicine before completing his residency in Ophthalmology at the Bascom Palmer Eye Institute in Miami, Florida. He has dedicated himself to a fellowship in Glaucoma and Advanced Anterior Segment Surgery at Washington University in St. Louis. He is interested in creating educational tools for patients with Glaucoma to help them understand their disease, their care, and the surgical options available to them. He also has an interest in education and hopes to develop the first Glaucoma fellowship at the University of Chicago.

Dr. Jennifer Tseng is a board-certified surgical oncologist and Assistant Professor of Surgery with the University of Chicago Medicine. She earned her medical degree from the University of California, Davis and completed her general surgery residency at Oregon Health and Science University. She received fellowship training in clinical immunotherapy at the National Cancer Institute and complex general surgical oncology at the University of Chicago Medicine. She is a senior fellow with the MacLean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics and previously was a theme issue editor for the American Medical Association’s Journal of Ethics. Her research interests include ethical considerations in clinical trials, the use of surrogate decision makers and prophylactic surgery.

Dr. Tseng integrates the latest research in clinical trials in caring for patients with breast cancer, melanoma and sarcoma. She is a prior national resident representative for the Surgery Residency Review Committee of the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) and is an Associate Program Director for the general surgery residency and complex general surgical oncology fellowship. She is an Education Scholar with the American Society of Clinical Oncology and is pursuing a Masters in Health Professions Education with the University of Illinois at Chicago.

As of 2022, Dr. Tseng is a surgeon with City of Hope Cancer Treatment and Research Center in California.