Class of 2022
Angel Augustin, MD (she/her)
Florida State University College of Medicine
Peds Track
I was born in Brooklyn, NY, but I've spent most of my life in Florida. I obtained my bachelor's degree in Biomedical Science with a minor in Public Health at the University of South Florida. In undergrad, I developed my passion for working with underserved populations by working at the Center for Equal Health, and volunteering with several community organizations to promote health in underserved communities. After undergrad, I joined AmeriCorps Vista as a service-learning coordinator at Miami Dade College Medical Campus. I attended Medical school at Florida State University. While there I fell in love with psychiatry after receiving the opportunity to work on the Florida Assertive Community Treatment team in Daytona Beach, Fl. I am excited to have joined Penn Psychiatry where I have the opportunity to receive phenomenal training, pursue my interest in community psychiatry, all while living in the city of brotherly love! Outside of psychiatry, I enjoy singing, hiking, trying out new restaurants in Philly, and mostly anything, that involves hanging out with family and friends.
Daniel Barron, MD, PhD (he/him)
Emory University School of Medicine
I was born and raised in the greater Los Angeles, California area in a town called Sierra Madre. I attended the University of California, San Diego where I became interested in human cognition and behavior. During my undergraduate studies in psychology, I participated in research projects studying the maternal-fetal stress axis, behavioral modification strategies to prevent skin cancer, and cognitive impairment in methamphetamine users. After graduation, I decided to combine my interests in research and clinical care and pursue a combined MD/PhD program. During my pre-clinical medical education at Emory University in Atlanta, I became interested in basic cell and molecular biology. For my thesis work, I studied developmental growth pathways related to carcinogenesis using fruit flies as a model system. After returning to my clinical rotations, I rediscovered my fascination with the human mind and fell in love with psychiatry as a clinical discipline. My clinical interests are broad but include mood disorders, substance use disorders, and psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy. Outside of work, I enjoy playing video and board games, watching films, trying new restaurants, reading comic books, and viewing art. My favorite aspects of training at Penn (in no particular order) are 1) access to a variety of patient populations/training sites 2) exceptional supervision by experts in psychopharmacology and psychotherapy 3) my diverse and spectacular co-residents.
Stephanie Brennan, MD (she/her)
University of Nebraska School of Medicine
Post-Pediatric Portal Program
I grew up in Omaha, Nebraska and first became interested in psychology in high school. I attended the University of North Carolina for undergrad and worked in a lab focused on adolescent depression, suicidality, and peer relations. I also served as president of our chapter of Active Minds and sought to raise awareness of mental health issues on campus and decrease the stigma surrounding mental health disorders. I attended medical school at the University of Nebraska with the intent to practice psychiatry. I served as a leader of the psychiatry interest group as well as coordinated medical student involvement in providing psychiatric care at the student-run clinic. Throughout medical school, it became clear to me that mental and physical health are intertwined and should not be isolated from each other, so I chose to pursue combined training in pediatrics and psychiatry. I completed my pediatrics residency at Texas Tech in Lubbock and came straight to Philadelphia to do Post Peds Portal psychiatry. I enjoy working with LGBTQ youth and incarcerated youth and integrating mental health care into primary care settings.
Jeylan Close, MD (she/her)
University of Texas San Antonio School of Medicine
Post-Pediatric Portal Program
I grew up near Seattle, but moved to Texas in high school and stayed through medical school. For a few years before medical school, I participated in TMS and SSRI research in children and adolescents with depression. During medical school, I had the opportunity of a lifetime to spend a summer in Geneva, working on the WHO ICD-11 revision, and developed a passion for the importance of disease classification. For pediatrics residency, I branched out to the Midwest to the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. While in residency, I participated in research relating to multisystem organ dysfunction syndrome in PICU patients. Ultimately, I decided to pursue an academic career in child Psychiatry and am excited to be in the Post Pediatric Portal Program here at CHOP/Penn!
Michael Huang, MD (he/him)
University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine
I spent half my childhood in Taiwan and the other half in California. I went to Cornell University for college, where I studied neuroscience, followed by medical school at Penn. During medical school, I took a year off to teach and perform Cuban dance full-time and also picked up Afro-Cuban percussion along the way. When I'm not dancing or drumming, I enjoy cooking Taiwanese food, exploring the arts scene in Philadelphia, and spending quality time with my two cats. Within psychiatry, I am interested in psychosis, psychotherapy, and clinical education.
Axeline Johnson, MD, MPH (she/her)
UCLA, Drew School of Medicine
Peds Track
I was born in Puerto Rico and grew up in Hartford, CT. I attended undergraduate at Columbia University, obtained an MPH from Medprep at Southern Illinois University, and MD from UCLA/Charles R. Drew Medical Training Program for students dedicated to addressing health care disparities through culturally-competent care and research. My professional interests thus far center around bolstering pipeline programs for underrepresented populations in the health care workforce as well as mental health services (including psychotherapy) for incarcerated individuals and those struggling with the disease of addiction. However, I remain open-minded and look forward to where this journey will take me!
Helen Partridge, MD (she/her)
University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine
Hello! My name is Helen. I am originally from England, but grew up for the most part in Bucks County, PA. I went back to the UK for my undergraduate degree at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland. I studied Biochemistry in what were the four most amazing years, making friends with people from around the world! After graduation, I moved to Philadelphia to complete a Premedical Post-Baccalaureate Program at the University of Pennsylvania. I have remained at Penn since, both for medical school and now for residency too! Throughout my time at Penn, I have been inspired by compassionate and profoundly talented mentors and peers. I also love Philadelphia! In my free time, I enjoy spending time with my husband, son and friends, walking our dog, learning to cook, and practicing yoga.
Allen Vu Phan, MD (he/him)
Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine
I was born and raised in Clemmons, North Carolina. For college, I went to Duke University where I majored in biology with a minor in art history. Then, before medical school, I spent one year in New Orleans, Louisiana, working for Habitat for Humanity and AmeriCorps where I trained volunteers and helped to build homes for those in need. For medical school, I went to Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine where I developed my passion for psychiatry under the guidance of great mentors, and for me, I loved how psychiatry was a field that combined the biology of the human mind with the written story of the individual. I am excited and honored by the opportunity to train at Penn, where I can pursue my interests in psychiatry which include child/adolescent psychiatry and medical education. For fun, I like to cook, run, watch NBA basketball (my teams are the 76ers and Blazers), and enjoy the Philly food scene.
Margaret Puelle, MD (she/her)
University of Michigan School of Medicine
I grew up in New Jersey and went to college at Brown University in Providence, RI where I majored in Cognitive Neuroscience and Sociology. After college, I spent time in Americorps in Jersey City before deciding I wanted to be a doctor. I moved to Boston where I worked full time in research studying the measurement and epidemiology of delirium while finishing my pre-med course requirements. I then went to the University of Michigan for medical school, where it became clear to me that psychiatry was my passion within medicine. I am particularly interested in consult/liaison psychiatry, quality improvement, and collaborative models of care between psychiatry and other fields of medicine. I was impressed by the breadth and depth of the opportunities within Penn Psychiatry and the enthusiasm of the faculty and residents. I'm excited to move back to the east coast and begin my residency training in Philadelphia.
Michael Roman, MD (he/him)
UCLA, David Geffen School of Medicine
I was born in New York and grew up in Southern California. I am an active member of the Coptic Orthodox Christian Church, where I have served as a Coptic hymnology instructor and church summer camp coordinator. I received my undergraduate degree in Psychobiology from the University of California, Los Angeles in 2013, where I developed my initial interest in Psychiatry. At the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA my passion for Psychiatry was deepen during my inpatient psychiatry clerkship. I elected to take a year of research between my third and fourth years of medical school and contributed to diverse clinical projects with the Department of Psychiatry at UCLA. As a senior medical student, I participated in studying novel mindfulness interventions and assessing their efficacy in treating geriatric mood disorders and cognitive impairments. I was also involved in research exploring resilience measurements and their psychometric correlates in depressed elderly individuals. My fascination with geriatric research under the Late-Life Mood, Stress, and Wellness Research Program at UCLA solidified my desire to pursue a career in Psychiatry. In addition, I have become interested in the field of neuroimmunology and have been working on a manuscript on novel immunotherapuetics in the treatment of depression. In my free time, I enjoy playing basketball, practicing mindfulness and meditation, and traveling.
Sheila Shanmugan, MD, PhD (she/her)
University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine
Peds Track - Research Track
I grew up in Nashville, TN before moving to Philly for college. I've always been fascinated by the brain so I majored in Biological Basis of Behavior as an undergrad at Penn. I loved Philly and stayed at Penn for the Best MSTP in the Galaxy. I'm passionate about women's behavioral health, and during grad school, I used neuroimaging to examine how childhood adversity confers a risk for executive dysfunction during menopause. I chose to stay at Penn because, after 9 years here, I couldn't imagine a more warm and supportive place to continue training that also has cutting-edge neuroimaging research and clinical opportunities for residents in women's behavioral health. In my free time, I like baking, listening to podcasts, and watching really bad TV.
William R. Smith, MD, PhD (he/him)
Emory University School of Medicine
Research Track
I'm originally from New Orleans, where my family still lives, and my wife and I love to visit. I went to UNC-Chapel Hill for Bachelor's, where I majored in philosophy and Greek. I then went to the NIH, Department of Bioethics, where I tried to decide between pursuing my medical and philosophical interests but, ultimately, decided to pursue both, I completed my MD training at Emory and my PhD at Notre Dame, focusing mostly in moral and political issues in healthcare resource allocation. I'm continuing my work on issues in resource allocation, but also doing research on psychiatric nosology. Clinically, my chief interests are in psychosis, consultation, and in the interactions in severe, chronic mental illness and other social and economic issues in patient's lives.
Jenny Wang, MD, MBA (she/her)
New York University School of Medicine
I was born in Miami, Florida and raised in Silver Springs, Maryland-with a hiatus in Hangzhou, China in between. English was not my first language, so I spent a lot of time haunting the local library reading Dr. Seuss and fantasy/sci-fi epics. I studied biology, English literature, and creative writing at the University of Maryland; at NYU, I earned my MD and MBA. While I had a lot of interests in medical school, psychiatry ultimately combined my curiosity about human behavior, other people's stories, and creating systemic change in healthcare. I am a huge fan of writing/reading, moving as little as possible, delicious food, shows about delicious food, theatre, and Korean pop.
Mary "Bit" Yaden, MD, MS (she/her)
Thomas Jefferson University Sidney Kimmel Medical College
Peds Track
Hi, I'm Mary Elizabeth, but everyone calls me "Bit". I was born and raised in New Orleans, LA and attended New York University's Gallatin School of Individualized Study. Inspired by an insatiable love of learning, I pursued a Master's in Applied Positive Psychology at the University of Pennsylvania and a Master's in Narrative Medicine at Columbia University. While in New York, I had the opportunity to coach groups in positive psychology and found that I loved witnessing people's journeys to greater joy and connection. Medical School allowed me to combine my passion for working with individuals with my love of science. Throughout medical school, I conducted research in student well-being, and as a resident in psychiatry, I hope to extend this work to include both patient and physician well-being. I feel honored by the opportunity to work as a clinician in Philadelphia and especially can't wait to learn more about community psychiatry and women's health. In my free time, I teach mindfulness and compassion-based meditation and enjoy walking adventures throughout the city.
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