Rhondee Benjamin-Johnson, M.D., M.A. University of California, Los Angeles
Rhondee Benjamin-Johnson, M.D., M.Sc., graduated Summa Cum Laude from Spelman College in Atlanta with a bachelor’s degree in Chemistry. She later attended The London School of Economics and Political Science where she earned a master’s degree in anthropology and development. She completed her undergraduate medical training at Harvard Medical School and then completed her residency in internal medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. She is interested in access to care for vulnerable populations and with a specific focus at the intersections of entry into HIV care, substance abuse treatment and incarceration. She is examining preventive care needs among substance users in Los Angeles County with a local community-based organization. She is also examining mental health care on HIV outcomes among Medicaid recipients. Prior, to joining the fellowship, she worked as a full-time clinician in Washington, D.C. dividing her time between a community health center and the D.C. Department of Corrections.
Peggy Chen, MD is a pediatrician who received her undergraduate degree in English at Stanford. She received her medical degree at Columbia and a masters degree in science in health policy, planning and finance at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and the London School of Economics. Dr. Chen completed her pediatric residency at Yale. She has a particular interest in immigrants and their interactions with the US healthcare system and in dissemination of research results.
Evan S. Fieldston, MD, MBA University of Pennsylvania
Evan Fieldston (Pediatrics) is second-year scholar. He obtained his undergraduate degree from Princeton University, where he was in the Woodrow Wilson School of Public Policy & International Affairs and focused on health policy and economics. He attended the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and the Wharton School, where he obtained his MD and MBA in 2003. Evan was a resident in pediatrics at The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) and served as chief resident there. He is currently an attending physician in the Division of General Pediatrics at CHOP. He has been active in policy and advocacy work related to children for many years, with efforts at the local, regional, and national levels. His current research considers behavioral economics, particularly in regard to incentives directed to parents for their adherence to home management guidelines in childhood asthma, as well as operations research, evidence-based management, and process improvement work related to hospital patient flow.
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Christie Lancaster, MD
University of Michigan
Christie Lancaster, MD is an obstetrician and gynecologist. As an undergraduate, she majored in Spanish at Davidson College and is a graduate of the Medical University of South Carolina. She completed her residency in OB/GYN at the Universityof Florida. Her research interests include screening for antenatal depression and utilization of care among obstetric patients with psychiatric disease.
Patrick Link, M.D. University of California, Los Angeles
Patrick Link, M.D., earned his bachelor’s degree in Chemistry and Philosophy at the University of North Carolina. He also received his medical degree at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine and his master’s degree in Public Health at the University of North Carolina School of Public Health. He completed his training in General Psychiatry at UCLA and the West Los Angeles VA. His current research interest is in using community participatory methods to assess and improve mental health outreach, education, and stigma reduction efforts for veterans, particularly veterans of the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Raina Merchant, MD (Emergency Medicine) received her MD from the University of Chicago and completed her residency at the University of Chicago. Her research is focused on preventing potentially avoidable deaths from cardiac arrest. Using geographic information software, she would like to identify communities at risk for cardiac arrest and determine unique strategies for improving cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) training and automated external defibrillator AED availability. In the in-patient setting, she is interested in using large administrative data sets to identify disparities in post-resuscitation care.
Gerardo Moreno, M.D. University of California, Los Angeles
Gerardo Moreno, M.D., completed his undergraduate studies in Environmental Studies and Chemistry at San Jose State University. He then attended the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA for his medical degree. He completed his post-doctoral training in Family Medicine at San Francisco General Hospital/UCSF. While at UCSF, his research activities focused on qualitative research on minority pre-medical student experiences. Dr. Moreno’s current research interests include healthcare access and delivery to uninsured and immigrant populations with chronic disease, with a particular interest in diabetes.
Matthew O’Brien, MD,(Internal Medicine) is a general internist who completed medical school at Brown University in 2004 and residency in Internal Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania in 2007. During medical school, Dr. O’Brien was student director of a free clinic that served recent Dominican immigrants in Providence, RI. He also spent a year during medical school working in Chile and Guatemala providing public health education in rural villages. During residency at the University of Pennsylvania, Dr. O’Brien and his faculty mentor started a clinic (named Puentes de Salud) that provides primary care services to a rapidly growing Latino immigrant community in Philadelphia. Dr. O’Brien is currently the Director of Community Research at Puentes de Salud and a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholar at the University of Pennsylvania. His research interests include alternative models of care delivery to redress disparities in access and outcomes among Latino immigrants. Dr. O’Brien is currently the PI on a study using community health workers to improve Pap smear screening and promote early detection of cervical cancer.
[ Veteran Affairs Fellow ]
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Kara Odom, M.D., M.P.H. University of California, Los Angeles
Kara Odom, M.D., M.P.H., is a family physician raised in Newark, Delaware where she obtained her undergraduate degree in Chemical Engineering at the University of Delaware. While earning her medical degree at Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, she took a year off to complete a master’s degree in Public Health at Johns Hopkins School of Public Health with an emphasis in health policy and management. She has served the Student National Medical Association as National President and also the National Medical Association as Postgraduate Physician Trustee. During residency at UCSF, she also was involved in research examining issues in physician workforce diversity. Her research interests are in the impact of hospital closure and access to care for vulnerable populations.
Joan Ryoo, M.D. University of California, Los Angeles
Joan Ryoo, M.D., attended Harvard University to complete a joint degree in fine arts and anthropology. Prior to matriculation at Harvard Medical School, she attended the University of Cambridge, England on scholarship to study geography. She is in the midst of post-graduate training in general surgery at Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston. As a Clinical Scholar, she will be investigating gastric cancer risk in the Korean American community of Los Angeles.
Comilla Sasson, MD is a graduate of the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Medicine. She completed her emergency medicine residency at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia. Her work with the uninsured population at Grady Hospital and on the national level in emergency medicine resident issues sparked her interest in pursuing the RWJ Clinical Scholars program. Her areas of research interest include predictors of survivability of out-of-hospital cardiac arrest and emergency department utilization patterns of nursing home patients within their last six months of life.
Vijay Singh, MD, MPH, is a family physician who earned a BA in Biology and an MD from Northwestern University. Before residency he graduated with an MPH from the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, where he also completed a post-doctoral research training fellowship. He completed family medicine residency at UCLA, where he served as an Academic Chief Resident in his last year of training. Dr. Singh’s research career began in medical school, when he conducted a qualitative study at the Navajo Indian Reservation, performed a family violence screening project in the Cook County Hospital emergency department, and presented both of these topics at American Public Health Association Annual Conventions. While a fellow at Johns Hopkins University, he co-wrote a book chapter on the health of children in cities and undertook research on developing a primary care screening program for perpetration of domestic violence. As a Clinical Scholar he will gain a health services research training and perspective while continuing these investigations into family violence screening in primary care.
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Joanne N. Wood, M.D.
University of Pennsylvania
Joanne N. Wood, M.D. (Pediatrics) received her M.D. from University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and completed her residency at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP). She spent a year as Chief Resident and completed a one year fellowship in Child Abuse and Neglect at CHOP. During medical school and residency she completed and published a research study comparing the presentation of young children with inflicted and accidental abdominal trauma. Dr. Wood’s research is currently focused on the evaluation of physical injuries in victims of child abuse.
