Our Team
Lead Investigator
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Read More about Peter Reese, MD, MSCE
Peter Reese, MD, MSCE
Faculty Transplant Nephrologist
peter.reese@uphs.upenn.edu
215-900-3782
Attending Physician, Renal-Electrolyte and Hypertension Division, Department of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, School of Medicine
You can see Dr. Reese's research interests here, his CV here, and publications here. If you have ever had a urinary stone, please consider participating in our multi-center, NIH-funded trial to prevent stone recurrence — PUSH (Prevention of Urinary Stones with Hydration)!
Co-Investigators
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Read More about Marina Serper, MD, MS
Marina Serper, MD, MS
Faculty Hepatologist
marina.serper@uphs.upenn.edu
Marina Serper is an Instructor of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and the Philadelphia VA Medical Center in the Division of Gastroenterology and Hepatology. Dr. Serper additionally has a Master’s Degree in Health Services and Outcomes Research. Her research interests include determinants of medication non-adherence its relationship to health outcomes in transplantation and chronic viral hepatitis, medication safety, health communication, health literacy, healthcare delivery and healthcare quality. Under the mentorship of Dr. Reese,
Dr. Serper was recently awarded the Penn Leonard Davis Institute Roybal Center pilot grant to evaluate effective strategies in promoting adherence to Hepatitis C therapy, along with a related ITMAT/CHIBE grant to promote post-transplant health via exercise. Dr. Serper additionally collaborates with Dr. Reese on multiple projects related to medication understanding and adherence in liver and kidney transplantation.
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Read More about Deirdre Sawinksi, MD
Deirdre Sawinksi, MD
Transplant Nephrologist
deirdre.sawinski@uphs.upenn.edu
Deirdre is an Assistant Professor of Medicine at the Perelman School of Medicine in the Renal, Electrolyte and Hypertension Division. She is Assistant Medical Director of the Kidney-Pancreas Transplant Program and a practicing transplant nephrologist. Her work focuses on outcomes for renal transplant recipients with chronic viral infections including HIV, HCV, and BK. She is also interested in questions of donor selection (both living and deceased) as well as ways to increase the available organ donor pool.
She and Dr. Reese were also just awarded an R-21 to study outcomes for patients receiving chronic dialysis who have hepatitis C and were just published in Kidney International for work in this realm. She also recently received the Holmes Award for early career faculty engaged in clinical research for her work on transplantation in Hepatitis C patients.
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Read More about Jordana Cohen, MD, MSCEJordana Cohen, MD, MSCE
Assistant Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology
Email Jordana Cohen, MD, MSCE
Jordana Cohen, MD, MSCE
Assistant Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology
jordana.cohen@uphs.upenn.edu
Jordy is an Assistant Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology at the University of Pennsylvania in the Renal, Electrolyte, and Hypertension Division and Senior Scholar in the Center for Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics. Jordy went to medical school at Rutgers, completed her internal medicine residency at Boston University, and came to the University of Pennsylvania for her nephrology fellowship and the Masters of Science in Clinical Epidemiology program, after which she stayed on as faculty.
Her primary research interest is the interplay between hypertension, metabolic syndrome, and renal and cardiovascular outcomes. She is currently the principal investigator of a K23 grant funded by the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute evaluating the pharmacologic management of hypertension in obesity. She is co-PI of the Chronic Renal Insufficiency Cohort (CRIC) Scientific and Data Coordinating Center at Penn, and serves as co-chair of the CRIC Blood Pressure Working Group. Additionally, she was lead author on a paper that was recently published in Annals of Internal Medicine, with an accompanying editorial and coverage in news outlets including CNN.
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Read More about Vishnu Potluri, MD, MPH
Vishnu Potluri, MD, MPH
Instructor of Medicine
vishnusagar25@gmail.com
Vishnu Potluri, MD received his medical degree from PSI Medical College in India in 2010, Masters in Public Health from the University of Pennsylvania in 2013 and is currently pursuing his residency in Internal Medicine from Lankenau Hospital. It was during his training at the University of Pennsylvania where he developed an interest in transplantation, and he has been working with Dr. Peter Reese since 2012.
His research on Kidney Transplant Outcomes for Prior Living Organ Donors and Geographic Disparities in Access to Pediatric Transplantation has been published in the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology. In addition his work has also been presented at both the American Transplant Congress and the American Society of Nephrology’s Kidney Week. He'll, also, soon have work published in the Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology. Vishnu recently won 1st place in the NKF annual meeting fellows research competition, received the Holmes award for research from the Department of Medicine, and won a humanism award from the Renal Division on top of an NKF fellowship for next year.
Vishnu enjoys learning new statistical approaches, and his interests include medical ethics, geospatial and cost-effectiveness analysis.
Trainees
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Read More about Behdad Besharatian, MD
Behdad Besharatian, MD
Renal Fellow
behdad.besharatian@uphs.upenn.edu
Behdad is a renal fellow in his second year at Penn. He went to medical school at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland. He completed his internship in Ireland, after which he knew he would pursue a career in nephrology. Prior to starting his fellowship, he completed his internal medicine residency and chief residency at Baystate Medical Center/Tufts University School of Medicine, where he was also a clinical instructor for the medical students. His clinical and research interests include renal transplantation and quality initiatives in improving outcomes following renal transplantation. He is now working with our team to study rehospitalization after solid organ transplant.
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Read More about Elizabeth Sonnenberg
Elizabeth Sonnenberg
Research Fellow
elizabeth.sonnenberg@uphs.upenn.edu
Elizabeth (Liza) is a University of Pennsylvania General Surgery resident completing a research fellowship as a 2017-2019 National Clinician Scholar at the University of Pennsylvania. She has been awarded NIDDK research T32 training grant. She received her medical degree at the University of Pennsylvania where she was inducted as a member of the Alpha Omega Alpha and Gold Humanism medical honor societies. She plans to pursue a fellowship and career in abdominal transplant surgery. She is interested in organ allocation policy, expanding the donor pool, and transplant systems.
Staff
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Read More about Adam Mussell, MA
Adam Mussell, MA
Project/Lab Manager
adam.mussell@uphs.upenn.edu
215-746-4177
Adam graduated from Rutgers College in 2006 and became a Lab Manager for the Human Emotions Lab (Haviland-Jones) during his gap year. This was followed by a Masters in Positive Psychology from Penn before moving to Costa Rica. Spending a year abroad, he was able to explore Central America and volunteer in multiple capacities. Upon his return to the States, he considered many careers paths and decided healthcare research was the best fit.
Adam has been working with Peter for over 6 years and initially started with little-to-no knowledge of kidney transplant. Beyond gaining a great respect for the process and those involved, he now has a deep understanding of live kidney donation, kidney transplant, and the barriers/outcomes associated with each. He is also drawn to Dr. Reese's research on health behaviors and decisions, like medication adherence, as he continues his education with a degree in healthcare policy. His hobbies include travel, wine, BYOBs, running, music, donuts, and coffee.
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Read More about Emily Funsten
Emily Funsten
Clinical Research Coordinator
emily.funsten@uphs.upenn.edu
215-898-4897
Emily graduated from Middlebury College in 2016 with a BA in Neuroscience. In pursuit of her passion for both healthcare and research, she began pre-medical post-baccalaureate studies at Penn in the fall of 2016. While completing her pre-med coursework, she worked as a part time research coordinator in the Department of Surgery. As a new member of the Reese Lab, Emily is primarily leading the PUSH Study.
In addition to this work, she is also pursuing a Masters in Bioethics with a concentration in clinical ethics. She hopes to apply her experience and knowledge from the ethics program to her research and future clinical practices. Outside of research, her hobbies include backpacking, playing tennis, and trying out new breweries around the city.
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Read More about Caitlin Philips
Caitlin Philips
Clinical Research Coordinator
caitlin.phillips@uphs.upenn.edu
Caitlin graduated from the University of Chicago in 2014 with a BA in East Asian Languages and Civilizations specializing in China. In order to test the mettle of her lifelong curiosity about medicine, she joined the clinical research team of David Meltzer, MD, PhD as a research coordinator at University of Chicago Medicine right after graduation. Her primary role was to lead recruitment and training efforts for the university’s involvement with the PCORI-funded CAPriCORN Project (Chicago Area Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Network). In August of 2016 she began pre-medical school post-baccalaureate studies at Penn, and has been enjoying balancing out chemistry and physics classes with healthcare research experience through the Reese Research Group.
Caitlin’s interests include public and preventative health, medical ethics, the role of technology in healthcare, and the integration of electronic medical records between health networks. Some of her non-academic interests are science fiction, languages, cooking, and trying new foods.
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Read More about Heather Mentch
Heather Mentch
Clinical Research Assistant
heather.mentch@pennmedicine.upenn.edu
Heather graduated from Susquehanna University in 2018 with a BS in Biology and a BA in Religious Studies. She works for us as a part-time Research Assistant on the HCV+ organ transplant studies, THINKER, USHER, and SHELTER.
Heather is also currently pursuing a Master of Bioethics degree from the University of Pennsylvania while applying to medical school. She hopes to carry knowledge and experience from the ethics program into her research and future clinical work as a physician. Outside of her studies and research, Heather’s hobbies include hiking, traveling, and discovering new places to eat around the city.
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Read More about Elizabeth Lee
Elizabeth Lee
Clinical Research Assistant
elizabeth.lee@pennmedicine.upenn.edu
Elizabeth graduated from University of Southern California in 2015 with a BA in Biological Sciences and minors in Business Administration and Psychology. She began her pre-med post-baccalaureate program at University of Pennsylvania in the fall of 2018 to further develop her experience in healthcare research and explore her passion for helping others through medicine.
While completing her pre-med courses, she worked as a research assistant in the Neuroendocrinology Department at UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine and volunteered at the Los Angeles County Hospital + USC Medical Center in the Emergency Medicine Department. Currently, her interest in addressing health disparities and non-medical determinants of health led her to volunteer at Service Link, an organization that links low-income Philadelphians with public benefits and community resources, and to work on our team.
Affiliated Members
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Read More about Meera Nair Harhay, MD, MSCEMeera Nair Harhay, MD, MSCE
Faculty Nephrologist - Drexel University College of Medicine
Email Meera Nair Harhay, MD, MSCE
Meera Nair Harhay, MD, MSCE
Faculty Nephrologist - Drexel University College of Medicine
meera.harhay@drexelmed.edu
Meera Nair Harhay is an Assistant Professor of Medicine at Drexel University College of Medicine who is interested in kidney transplantation research. Her work to date has focused on the examination of quality-of-care metrics in kidney transplantation including early rehospitalization. Her ongoing research interests include projects aimed at improving the evaluation and monitoring of kidney transplant candidates using longitudinal physical and cognitive testing. The primary goal of her research is to discover novel and easily implemented metrics enabling clinicians to identify and improve outcomes in the most vulnerable kidney transplant candidates and recipients.
Meera has been recognized with the Bradley Award for Outstanding Health Evaluation Research (2013-PSOM) and Outstanding Renal Fellow Award (2012-PSOM). Recently, her work on the health status and physical function of dialysis patients and it's connection to early rehospitalization post-transplant was published in PLOS ONE.
Her research has been supported by F32 and K awards from the NIDDK.
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Read More about Matthew Allen, MD
Matthew Allen, MD
Medical Intern - Brigham and Women's Hospital
matallen@mail.med.upenn.edu
Matt Allen is currently a medical intern at Brigham and Women’s Hospital with a strong interest in bioethics and epidemiology. He graduated from Williams College in 2008 with a degree in philosophy, and spent several years doing research in Emergency Medicine at BWH. During that time he also pursued independent research in end-of-life decision making. Early in medical school, he became attracted to transplantation as an area of rich interaction between ethics, policy, medicine, and surgery.
In 2013, he was awarded a summer research fellowship from the CCEB for his proposal, “Donor hemodynamics as predictor of outcomes after kidney transplantation using donors with circulatory determination of death” which was selected for the PSOM Renal Research Prize and published in the American Journal of Transplantation. He has performed research identifying key omissions in ethical frameworks, clinical studies, and policy relating to living kidney donation, which was also published in AJT and was recently published in Clinical Transplantation for work on live kidney donation.
Other recent papers describing new paradigms for talking about living kidney donation were just accepted by PLOS | Medicine and AJT, and he was just awarded the Herbert and Faye Moskowitz Prize for clinical excellence and research in epidemiology at graduation.
Matt continues to contribute to the discussion of how to ethically expand access to organ transplantation, and is now involved in mixed methods research evaluating outcomes of individuals turned down as living kidney donors. He intends to pursue graduate training in clinical epidemiology, and hopes to develop a research career blending empirical and theoretical approaches to ethical problems. His clinical interests include critical care medicine and organ transplantation.
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Read More about Avrum Gillespie, MDAvrum Gillespie, MD
Assistant Professor of Medicine - Temple University School of Medicine
Email Avrum Gillespie, MD
Avrum Gillespie, MD
Assistant Professor of Medicine - Temple University School of Medicine
avrum.gillespie@tuhs.temple.edu
Avi is an Assistant Professor of Medicine at the Lewis Katz School of Medicine at Temple University in the division of Nephrology, Hypertension, and Kidney Transplantation. His primary research interest is in social determinants of health and how they exacerbate disparities in access to kidney transplantation. He uses survey research and social network analysis to examine how hemodialysis patient outcomes are affected by other patients with which they interact. This research has been funded by the Norman S. Coplon Satellite Healthcare Grant. Avi is also site sub-investigator for the Systolic Blood Pressure Intervention Trial (SPRINT) and a co-investigator on an antibiotic pharmacokinetics study for continuous renal replacement therapy (Allergan).
Find his most recent publication on social networks in hemodialysis and renal transplant here and other work here.
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Read More about Jonathan Suarez, MDJonathan Suarez, MD
Assistant Professor of Medicine - Emory University SOM
Email Jonathan Suarez, MD
Jonathan Suarez, MD
Assistant Professor of Medicine - Emory University SOM
jonathan.suarez@bcm.edu
Jonathan is a Cuban-American born and raised in Miami. He completed his medical school training here in Philadelphia at Temple University and returned to Miami to complete his internal medicine training at Jackson Memorial Hospital. During his time in Miami, he was actively involved in taking care of patients from underserved communities both in the hospital and the community. He became interested in health-care disparities and completed a project to look at how lack of access to high quality food impacts chronic kidney disease, which he later presented at the American Society of Nephrology annual research meeting. Jonathan’s primary research interest include health care disparities and access to care. He plans to look at how these disparities and lack of access impact the chronic kidney disease population.
After finishing his nephrology fellowship and MSCE degree at Penn, Jon moved on to Baylor to study critical care. He was also given The 2017 Vanitha Appadorai Vaidya Award For Humaneness in Medicine! Jon is now an Assistant Professor at Emory University with the Nephrology Division.
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Read More about Yoonhee P. Ha, MSc, MPhil
