Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholars Program

Marcus Bachhuber, M.D. (VA Scholar) received his undergraduate degree from the University of Wisconsin-Madison followed by a medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. He completed residency and chief residency in Primary Care/Social Internal Medicine at Montefiore Medical Center/Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx, New York. Providing primary care, including office-based opioid treatment, at a Federally Qualified Health Center in the South Bronx inspired him to devote his career to studying the organization and delivery of medical and substance abuse treatment services to underserved populations.

Career Interest: Dr. Bachhuber plans to pursue a career in academic general internal medicine with a focus on health services research.

Research Interest: Organization and delivery of substance abuse treatment services, engagement and retention in primary care and substance abuse treatment, integration of medical and substance abuse services, methodological aspects of working with large administrative databases.

Elizabeth Brown, M.D. received her undergraduate degree in biology from Northwestern University. Prior to attending medical school, she was a research associate with the Institute of Medicine, where she worked on studies on quality measurement in cancer care and cancer survivorship. She attended medical school at the University of Chicago. During her residency in Family Medicine at Brown University, she collaborated on a project with the Rhode Island Department of Health to define a "medical practice" to assist with assessment and planning of the primary care delivery system.

Career Interest: Liz envisions a career combining health policy research and medical education, with the goal of encouraging future primary care physicians to be active in restructuring our health care system.

Research Interest: primary care delivery and workforce, payment reform, access to care, quality of care.

Brandon Maughan, M.D., M.H.S. (VA Scholar) is an emergency medicine physician who was raised in Portland, Oregon. He attended Stanford University and received a B.S. in Biology, after which he completed a master’s degree in health policy from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Dr. Maughan worked as a health policy consultant at The Lewin Group before returning to academics and obtaining his medical degree from Case Western Reserve University. He completed emergency medicine residency training and chief residency at Brown University, during which he served as the resident board member for the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine.

Career Interest: Dr. Maughan plans to pursue a leadership career in academic emergency medicine and conduct research on the safety, efficiency, and value of emergency care. His long-term career interests focus on state and federal health policy advocacy, public service, and translating policy research into improved public health.

Research Interest: Emergency medicine comparative effectiveness, cost transparency, physician risk tolerance, variation and appropriate use of diagnostic testing, measuring the value of emergency care services.

Pooja Mehta, M.D. (VA Scholar) is an obstetrician/gynecologist who grew up in the United Kingdom, India, and New York. She received her undergraduate degree in History and Sociology from Columbia University. She obtained her medical degree from Mount Sinai School of Medicine after completing a Doris Duke International Clinical Research Fellowship in Durban, South Africa. She completed her residency training at Boston University/Boston Medical Center where she experienced first-hand the effects of health care reform on provision of health care services in a safety-net setting.

Career Interest: Dr. Mehta hopes to work in an underserved setting that allows her to combine her love for clinical obstetrics and gynecology, medical education, and her passion for research as a vehicle for advocacy and reproductive justice.

Research Interest: Dr. Mehta is especially interested in the effects of health care reform on reproductive health disparities affecting particularly marginalized populations such as incarcerated women and undocumented immigrants. She is a believer in community-based participatory research as a tool for social justice and policy change.

Loren Robinson, M.D. completed the Combined Internal Medicine and Pediatrics program at UNC Chapel Hill. As both an Internist and Pediatrician, she feels that she has developed a skill set that will allow her to care for patients across generations, with a special emphasis on transition of care of the difficult adolescent patient. For her undergraduate training, Loren attended Spelman College where she graduated Summa Cum Laude with a degree in French/Pre-Medical Studies. Dr. Robinson then proceeded to complete her medical studies at Duke University School of Medicine. She spent her years at Duke working to engage and give back to both the local and global communities, spending a year abroad in Cape Town, South Africa conducting a project geared toward empowering community health workers. While at Duke, she was very active in the community, from mentoring on the undergraduate campus to implementing a healthy behaviors program at a local middle school. She continued this tradition of activism at UNC. Dr. Robinson's ultimate goal is to practice comprehensive care in an underserved community.

Career Interest: Dr. Robinson plans to use her comprehensive background in both Internal Medicine and Pediatrics to help influence and create health policy on a national level. On a smaller scale, she hopes to coordinate community outreach programs that will be geared toward youth, especially adolescent girls.

Research Interest: As a scholar, Dr. Robinson plans to examine the effect that the Affordable Care Act (ACA) has had on underserved communities and determine if this is a sustainable solution in the effort to expand healthcare with reducing health disparities.

Charlene Wong, M.D. is a pediatrician who completed her undergraduate training at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with a degree in biology. She received her medical degree from Emory University in Atlanta. During medical school, she did an epidemiology fellowship at the CDC where she conducted research on the HPV vaccine. She then completed her pediatrics residency at Seattle Children's Hospital/University of Washington where she researched adolescent vaccines and American Indian/Alaska Native infant and pediatric mortality.

Career Interest: Dr. Wong plans to pursue a career as a clinician-researcher, with a subspeciality in adolescent medicine.

Research Interest: Dr. Wong is interested in examining the role of social media and new media on adolescent and young adult health, with a focus on high-risk behaviors including violence, sexual health and substance use.