Department Updates – August 2024
General Department Updates
The Department once again participated in the Emerging Leaders Program. This year’s attendees were Dr. Sudipta Sen, Dr. Keyur Ghael, Dr. Ryan Rihani, and Ms. Kimesha Webb.
Dr. Nischal Gautam won best poster for the third year in a row at the Congenital Cardiac Anesthesia Society (CCAS) 2024 Annual Meeting. His abstract and poster was entitled, “Enhancing Efficiency with Boarding Pass: Timely Gastrostomy Tube Surgery and Shorter Stays After Congenital Cardiac Surgery”.
Dr. Yang Yang was a poster award winner at the 15th annual Frontier in Digestive Diseases Symposium with her poster entitled “A novel COX-2-IL-22-dependent Crosstalk Between Eosinophils and Type 3 Innate Lymphoid Cells Protects Against Colitis”.
Dr. Barbara Orlando was appointed on the Texas Maternal Mortality Morbidity Review Committee as the new anesthesiologist member.
Drs. Olga Pawelek and Rishi Kumar were inducted into the Academy of Master Educators.
Latest Publications
Dr. Davide Cattano was published in Minerva Anestesiol for his article titled “Perioperative Management and Surgical Field Optimization in Functional Endoscopic Sinus Surgery“.
Dr. Omonele Nwokolo was published in Anesthesiology for her article titled “Reviewing Ethical Guidelines for the Care of Patients with Do-Not-Resuscitate Orders after 30 Years: Rethinking Our Approach at a Time of Transition“.
Dr. Nishcal Gautam was published in Pediatric Anesthesia for his article titled “A Single-Center, Restrospective Analysis to Compare Measument of Fibrinogen Using the TEG6 Analyzer to the Clauss Measurement in Children Undergoing Heart Surgery“.
Dr. Barbara Orlando was features in the TSA newsletter with her article entitled: “Why Obstetric Anesthesiologists Should Be Represented on the Texas Maternal Mortality and Morbidity Review Committee“.
Emily Mathuria, CAA, was also featured in the same TSA newsletter with her article entitled: “Certified Anesthesiology Assistants in Texas – Celebrating the First Training Program Based in Texas“.
Research Updates
Dr. Aubrey Samost-Williams was awarded a K12 grant to support her research with Dr. Eric Thomas.
The University was ranked 13th in the 2023 Blue Ridge Institute for Medical Research rankings. UT Heath Houston is the only institute in the state of Texas ranked in the top 20. Drs. Holger Eltzschig and Cynthia Ju are both nationally ranked in the top 50 in the nation. Dr. Eltzschig is ranked 10th, and Dr. Ju is ranked 42nd out of 351 PIs.
Dr. Cynthia Ju was awarded a CPRIT grant titled “Targeting Chitinase-3-like-1 as a Novel Therapy for Hepatocellular Carcinoma”.
Dr. Dongze Zhang was awarded a Rising STAR award for his research.