Honors

William Turner, M.D., received a Lifetime Achievement Award from his alma mater, the Tulane University School of Medicine in New Orleans. The dean of the medical school, Dr. Lee Hamm, who did his residency at UT Southwestern with Dr. Donald Seldin, presented the award at a banquet celebrating the 50^th reunion of Dr. Turner’s class.

Awards

Erik Hansen, M.D., won the Award for Humanitarian Service from the American Pediatric Surgical Association.

Madhuri Nagaraj, M.D., won the award for Best Abstract – Second Place for the Current Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Climate of the Association for Surgical Education at the annual meeting of the Association for Surgical Education in San Antonio, Texas (coauthors: Sandhu G, Sachs TE, Telem D, Cochran A, Dechert TA, Scott DJ). 

Caroline Park, M.D., won the Trauma Surgeon of the Year Award for 2022 from the UT Southwestern Department of Emergency Medicine.

Patricio Polanco, M.D., was named a Eugene P. Frenkel, M.D., Scholar in Clinical Medicine at UT Southwestern. This award includes funding for research and professional development to promote excellence in cancer care.

Robert Tower, Ph.D., won our first-ever Faculty Research Pilot Award, which funds scientifically meritorious and innovative pilot projects. The award will support his work in characterizing the metabolic responses of cells to trauma and inflammation.

Awards at our annual Surgery Research Forum

May 18, 2022

Amr Al Abbas, M.D., won the award for Best Regular Presentation – Educational for The Development of Task-Specific Metrics for the Evaluation of Robotic Gastrojejunostomy Videos From Robotic Pancreaticoduodenectomy.

Esther Castro-Dubon, B.S., won the award for Best Poster – Basic Science for Optimization of a Patient-Derived Xenograft Generation Protocol for Gastric Cancer.

Raghav Chandra, M.D., won the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Award for Homelessness and Race Are Mortality Predictors in US Veterans Undergoing Coronary Artery Bypass Grafting.

Dr. Caitlin Fitzgerald, M.D., won the award for Best Poster – Clinical for Comparison of Erector Spinae Plane Blocks Versus Multimodal Pain Management for Traumatic Rib Fractures: A Matched Cohort Analysis.

Debolina Ganguly, M.S., won the award for Best Regular Presentation – Basic Science for Pleiotrophin Drives a Pro-Metastatic Immune Niche Within Breast Tumor Microenvironment.

Michelle Ju, M.D., won the award for Best Regular Presentation – Clinical for Defining Volume Targets for Regionalization of Esophagectomy, Pancreaticoduodenectomy, and Major Lung Resection Centers to Improve Oncologic and Surgical Outcomes.

Gilbert Murimwa, M.D., won the Center for Organogenesis Research & Trauma (CORT) Award for Combination of Immune Checkpoint Inhibition and a Small Molecule Inhibitor of TGFβR1 Shows Anti-Tumor Effect and Reversion of Immunosuppression in Tgfbr2 Mutant Pancreatic Cancer.

John Norton, B.S., won the award for Best Poster – Educational for Reducing Intraoperative Downtime Caused by Robotic Failures Using Data From OR Black Box.

Announcements

Benjamin Levi, M.D., was selected to serve on the editorial board of Annals of Surgery.

Madhukar Patel, M.D., was appointed as a member of the Vanguard committees of the International Liver Transplant Society and the American Society of Transplant Surgeons.

Jigesh Shah, D.O., was appointed as a member of the membership and workforce committee and the transplant accreditation and certifying council–knowledge assessment committee of the American Society of Transplant Surgeons.

Parsia Vagefi, M.D., was elected as a fellow of the American Surgical Association.

Grants

Amr Al Abbas, M.D., under the guidance of Ganesh Sankaranarayanan, Ph.D., has been awarded a major grant for robotic surgery research from the Association for Surgical Education. The grant will support their project, The Impact of Task-Specific Feedback Using a Virtual Platform on Trainee Technical Skills and Perceptions: A Novel Multicenter Robotic Hernia Curriculum (coauthors: Zeh HJ, Polanco PM, Hogg ME).

Madhuri Nagaraj, M.D., and Caroline Park, M.D., have been awarded a grant from the Association for Surgical Education for Developing a Tool to Assess Surgeon Ergonomic Risk: A Grounded Theory Approach to Understanding Occupational Pain in Multidisciplinary Surgeons (coauthors: Turner W, Tsoi-a-Sue K, Talwalkar S).

Presentations

Amr Al Abbas, M.D.

(Coauthor: Sankaranarayanan G, Zeh HJ, Polanco PM, Hegde S)

The Development of Task Specific Metrics for Grading the Robotic Gastrojejunostomy

Annual meeting, Association for Surgical Education

May 4, 2022  San Antonio, Texas

Jacqueline Byrd, M.D.

(Coauthor: Chung KC)

Plastic Surgeons and Equity: Are Merit-Based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) Scores Impacted by Minority Patient Caseload?

Annual meeting, American Association of Plastic Surgeons

April 11, 2022  San Diego, California

(coauthor: Chung KC)

Plastic Surgeons and Equity: Are Merit-Based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) Scores Impacted by Minority Patient Caseload?

Dingman Research Day, University of Michigan section of plastic surgery

May 16, 2022  Ann Arbor, Michigan

(coauthors: Lin I, Knudson S, Prasetyono T, Chung KC)

How Has the COVID-19 Pandemic Impacted International Surgical Education and Practice?

Annual meeting, Association for Surgical Education

May 3-5, 2022  San Antonio, Texas

Michael Dellinger, Ph.D.

KRAS-Driven Model of Gorham-Stout Disease Effectively Treated With Trametinib

World Congress, International Society for the Study of Vascular Anomalies

May 10-13, 2022  Vancouver, Canada

Erik Hansen M.D.

(Coauthors: Panatpur A, Mpongo Y)

Comparison of Sacrococcygeal Teratoma Presentation and Outcome at a High- and a Low-Middle–Income Hospital

Annual meeting, American Pediatric Surgical Association

May 12-15, 2022  San Diego, California

Jesus Porras Colon, M.D.

(Coauthors: Chamseddin KH, Scott CK, Pavarino F, Soto Gonzalez M, Baig MS, Timaran CH)

Midterm Results After Endovascular Repair of Complex Aortic Aneurysms Using Inverted Limb Bifurcated Devices

UTSW Surgery Research Forum

May 18, 2022  Dallas, Texas

(Coauthors: Pizano A, Pavarino F, Scott C, Kirkwood M, Baig MS, Timaran C)

Embolization Outcomes of Well-Defined vs. Indistinct Type II Endoleaks After Endovascular Aortic Aneurysm Repair (EVAR)

Visual abstract, Society for Vascular Surgery

March 21, 2022

Carlos Timaran, M.D.

Upper x Lower Extremity Access for F-BEVAR

Simposio Aorta

May 20, 2022  Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Simplified Preloaded Devices for F-BEVAR

Simposio Aorta

May 20, 2022  Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

John Zuniga, D.M.D., Ph.D.

Overview of the Key Elements of Clinical Trial Design

Clinical Trials Methods course

American Association of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons 

May 4, 2022  Rosemont, Illinois

MRI Nerve Imaging, My Experience of 30+ Years of Trigeminal Nerve Repair

Advancements and Innovations in Surgery: OMS, ENT/Head and Neck & Facial Plastics (symposium)

May 14, 2022  San Diego, California

Advanced Practice in Trigeminal Nerve Injuries

Annual meeting, Ohio Society of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons

May 21, 2022  Westerville, Ohio

View recent publications for the Department of Surgery here.