Description of Clinical Expertise

My primary focus is on providing care and education related to gender-affirming hormone therapy, as well as conducting early intervention trials for type 1 diabetes. I aim to improve the healthcare of gender-diverse patients by collaborating with colleagues and the Penn Medicine LGBTQ Health Program.

The LGBTQ+ Health Program Provider and Practice Association was established to identify and promote LGBTQ-affirming providers at Penn Medicine, and I’m an active member of this workgroup. It was created in response to patient feedback, the growing need for gender-affirming providers, and previous negative patient experiences. This initiative also addresses the lack of standardization for what it means to be an LGBTQ+ affirming provider by reviewing each provider’s experience, training, ongoing education, and commitment to current standards of care.

I also participated in the Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity (SOGI) workgroup at Penn Medicine, where we worked to implement changes in the electronic medical record (EMR) system, including indicators and wristband changes for preferred names, pronouns, and gender identity. I attend the Program for LGBTQ+ Health’s quarterly meetings, where topics such as case presentations, future goals, legal updates, and Penn LGBTQ+ updates are discussed.

In addition, I regularly attend national and international endocrine society conferences and the World Professional Association of Transgender Health (WPATH) annual conference. These events provide opportunities for me to collaborate with peers and advance both gender-affirming patient care and trainee education.

Description of Other Expertise

Regarding my educational expertise; I am dedicated to educating medical students, internal medicine, primary care residents, and endocrinology fellows on gender-affirming care. Every year, I deliver a lecture titled “Endocrine Considerations in Gender-Affirming Care” as part of the endocrine fellows’ summer didactic series, and I present a case-based lecture on complex and advanced cases in gender-affirming care during the winter didactics. For internal medicine and primary care residents, I provide a lecture called “Gender-Affirming Care in Primary Care.” Additionally, I lecture medical students on the “Endocrine Approach to Gender-Affirming Hormone Therapy” during the MOD endocrine course each spring and conduct male reproductive board reviews for endocrine fellows as part of the annual endocrine board review.

In collaboration with Dr. Robert Benson Jones, I developed a workshop for first-year endocrine fellows to practice initiating and counseling on gender-affirming hormone treatment in a supervised setting. This workshop includes standardized patient sessions, where fellows counsel gender-diverse patients on the initiation of feminizing and masculinizing hormones, with the goal of receiving formative feedback. I intend for this workshop to be an annual event.

As part of the Introduction to Clinical Medicine (ICM) curriculum for second-year medical students, I participate in gender-affirming communication standardized patient sessions each year. I also precept primary care residents during Friday morning clinics, teaching gender-affirming care on a weekly basis. Additionally, I precept second-year endocrine fellows who choose to rotate with me in my general endocrine clinic, where I focus on gender-affirming care.

Description of Research Expertise

I work under the mentorship of Dr. Michael Rickels within Penn Medicine’s Institute for Diabetes, Obesity, and Metabolism.

My work focuses on disease-modifying therapies for autoimmune type 1 diabetes (T1D). I was a co-investigator with Dr. Rickels on a study titled “A Phase 3, Multicenter, Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Study to Assess the Efficacy and Safety of 400 mg Twice a Day Oral Ladarixin in Patients with New-Onset Type 1 Diabetes and a Low Residual β-Cell Function at Baseline - GLADIATOR.” This study aims to determine whether inhibiting IL-8 signaling through CXCR1/2 receptor antagonism can help preserve residual beta-cell function at the clinical diagnosis of T1D.
I am a principal investigator in a teplizumab registry study titled "An Observational, Long-term Safety Study of TZEILD (teplizumab-mzwv) in Patients with Stage 2 Type 1 Diabetes." The aim of this study is to determine the effectiveness of anti-CD3 treatment in clinical practice.

I also submitted an IRB proposal to study bone health in adult gender-diverse patients at Penn Medicine, aiming to better understand bone mineral density in this population.