People

Rob Flint, MD

Assistant Professor, Emergency Medicine

University of Maryland School of Medicine

Dr. Flint joined the University of Maryland School of Medicine faculty in 2021 after spending twenty years in community emergency medicine (EM) practice. Having held the roles of department medical director, EMS medical director, as well as the education director for a regional staffing group, he brings significant experience in the areas of emergency department operations, administration, patient safety/risk management, and the business of medicine. Dr. Flint received his Bachelor of Art in History from the University of Rochester in Rochester, NY. He is a proud graduate of the University of Maryland School of Medicine. After completing an EM Residency at Albany Medical Center in Albany, NY, he moved back to Maryland where he has resided and practiced since.

Leah Anderson, MD

Resident Physician

University of Wisconsin-Madison

Dena Mohnani, MD

Emergency Ultrasound Fellow

University of Florida College of Medicine

What is your proudest ultrasound moment and/or save?

Though this was years ago, it still stands out in my mind as one of my proudest ultrasound saves.  We had an elderly patient presenting to the resuscitation bay in respiratory distress. CXR showed a large pneumothorax. With a diagnosis in hand, our team could have easily stopped there with respect to diagnostic testing. However, we noticed subtle swelling of the RLE and confirmed DVT at the bedside with POCUS. As a result of our early, expeditious ultrasound, the patient was able to receive timely treatment for his massive PE, in addition to a chest tube for his pneumothorax.

Who is your emergency ultrasound hero, and what inspired you to choose them?

Dr. Petra Duran-Gehring, my mentor and ultrasound fellowship director. She is an incredible teacher and is able to give impromptu lectures, complete with beautiful hand-drawn diagrams, on any ultrasound or emergency medicine topic at a moment’s notice. The way that she is able to teach and engage learners of all levels and answer questions without making learners feel intimidated is inspiring. I’m also in awe of her ability to be so present for her family, despite being so active and successful in her career. She is a superwoman.

What do you predict will be the next significant development in emergency ultrasound?

AI. The ability to put the probe in the hands of those with limited to no formal training to successfully aid in a diagnosis/treatment is an exciting concept, though certainly comes with its own unique issues.

What's your next big career goal or aspiration?

TBD. I am just re-entering the world of academic medicine after spending some years working in community practice. For now, I am just enjoying being immersed in learning and evidence-based-medicine.

What additional information would you like people to know about you?

It’s great to be a Florida Gator. I attended the University of Florida for undergrad, returned for medical school, completed residency at the Jacksonville campus, and then returned last year to the Jacksonville campus as an emergency ultrasound fellow. I can’t wait to share my love for UF with my kids and take them to some Gator football games. Go Gators!

Elaine Situ-LaCasse, MD

Assistant Dean/Associate Professor

University of Arizona

What is your proudest ultrasound moment and/or save?

One of my proudest ultrasound moments was when I heard one of my medical students used POCUS to save someone’s life in the Cook Islands on his global health trip. He was able to diagnose wall motion abnormality and hypokinesis in the setting of an MI. Patient was hypotensive, and because of his POCUS, patient received streptokinase and recovered. He had learned how to do cardiac POCUS during one of my teaching sessions! This is the reason why I love being an ultrasound educator.

Who is your emergency ultrasound hero, and what inspired you to choose them?

It’s definitely Srikar Adhikari. He is an incredible teacher and mentor, and I wouldn’t be where I am now without him.

What do you predict will be the next significant development in emergency ultrasound?

I think the operator role of POCUS will be phased out. It’s already happening with AI and wearable ultrasound devices.

What's your next big career goal or aspiration?

I have been more involved in the undergraduate medical education side of things in the last year and half, specifically Student Affairs, so I’d like to become more involved nationally while continuing research and publish in medical education and POCUS.

What additional information would you like people to know about you?

Aaasim Padilla, MD, MSc

Professor

MCW

Dr. Aasim I. Padela is a Professor with Tenure of Emergency Medicine, Bioethics and the Medical Humanities at MCW. In addition to being Vice Chair of Research and Scholarship in the Department of Emergency Medicine, he holds a teaching and research appointments in the Center for Bioethics and Medical Humanities within the Institute for Health and Equity, at the Center for Advancing Population Science, and in the Cancer Center. Further, he serves within the medical school as a learning community navigator, and on the Council of Faith for the Clinical and Translational Science Institute and on the Community Engagement Advisory Council for the Office of Community Engagement. Dr. Padela is an internationally renowned clinician-researcher with scholarly foci at the intersections of healthcare, bioethics, and religion. In addition to maintaining an active clinical, research, and bioethics practice at MCW, he provides public health and bioethics consultation to international organizations, legislative bodies, and in court.

Tai Donovan

Member-at-Large

Windsor University School of Medicine

Tai Donovan is a medical student at Windsor University pursuing a career in Emergency Medicine. She received her Bachelor’s degree from Howard University in Washington, DC followed by a Masters in Health Care Administration. Born and raised in New York, her path to medicine was sparked by her work as an Emergency Medical Technician. This experience, coupled with the connections she formed with her patients, fueled her passion for the medical field and is matched only by her dedication to serving her community.

Her commitment to advocating for health equity inspired her to co-found an organization dedicated to providing essential resources, health education, and services to the unhoused and survivors of intimate partner violence in New York City. In hopes of expanding her impact, Tai joined and now sits on the board for MedCEEP, a non-profit organization committed to supporting underrepresented students in pursuing health care careers by providing them with the resources and tools they need to be successful while empowering them to become future medical leaders and community champions. 

Her efforts have earned her recognition, including the 2023 Cook County Provident Scholar Award and the American Academy of Emergency Medicine (AAEM) International Medical Student of The Year Award, underscoring her dedication to serving underrepresented communities. As she continues to engage with initiatives like the Golden Institute 2024 Chicago Peace Fellows and the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine (SAEM) All EM DEI Taskforce, she hopes to continue to make her journey a testament to her commitment to community service, advocacy for diversity in medicine, and the pursuit of health equity for marginalized communities.

Bhakti Hansoti, MPH, PhD

John Hopkins University

Adam D. Laytin, MD, MPH

Johns Hopkins University

Catalina González Marqués, MD, MPH

Brigham and Women's Hospital

Ellen Weber, MD

USCF

Lee Wallis, MBChB, MD, FCEM

Shada Rouhani, MD

Harvard University

Patrick McCarthy, MD, MPH

St. Francis Regional Medical Center

Ambrose H. Wong, MD, MSEd, MHS

SAEM Nominating Committee member

Yale School of Medicine

Dr. Ambrose Wong is an Assistant Professor of Emergency Medicine and an academic physician-scientist at Yale School of Medicine. His focus has been to support national simulation-based research collaborations, which has led to multiple academy-based publications on topics ranging from virtual mentoring to assessment of models for procedural competency training. Dr. Wong was the recipient of the inaugural Simulation Academy Change Agent Award in 2021, which recognizes transformational leadership in the service of SAEM and the Simulation Academy. He also serves on the SAEM Research Committee, focusing on increasing the pipeline for career development awards in academic emergency medicine and chairing the objective for submitting high-quality research didactics during the Annual Meeting.

Carl Preiksaitis, MD

Clinical Instructor

Stanford University

Dr. Carl Preiksaitis is a Medical Education Fellow and Clinical Instructor in the Department of Emergency Medicine at Stanford University. Dr. Preiksaitis completed his medical training at New York University School of Medicine and a residency in emergency medicine at Stanford. His scholarly interests include digital technology and medical education, reproductive healthcare in the emergency department, and healthcare innovation. He is currently pursuing a master’s degree in medical education at the University of Cincinnati.

Sara Wattenbarger, DO

Assistant Professor

University of South Alabama

Dr. Sara Wattenbarger is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Emergency Medicine at the University of South Alabama. She completed her medical training at Midwestern University Arizona College of Osteopathic Medicine and residency at Arrowhead Regional Medical Center in San Bernardino County, California. Her research and educational interests include mass casualty response, leadership skills in resuscitation, and active learning techniques in medical education. She is pursuing her master’s degree in academic medicine at the Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California, and is currently serving on the SAEM education committee.

L. Tamara Wilson, MD

Baylor College of Medicine

Dr. Wilson, a chief resident physician in emergency medicine at Baylor College of Medicine is a fierce advocate for those at the margins of society and champion of diversity, equity, and inclusion in medical education. Dr. Wilson graduated from Duke University and received a bachelor of science in economics and a bachelor of arts in African and African-American studies. She completed her medical degree with honors in Gold Humanism at Georgetown University School of Medicine (GUSOM).

Espoused by her relentless passion for health equity, Dr. Wilson continually engages in service to communities in Houston, Texas, Washington, DC and abroad. Notably, she provided free preventive healthcare to underserved communities in the Dominican Republic through a medical student-run clinic which underscored how health literacy can improve an individual’s health agency and create better community health outcomes. She has served populations experiencing housing insecurity in Washington, DC through organizing a toiletry drive and volunteering at HOYA Clinic, a student-run free clinic, where she was recognized as a HOYA Clinic Student of the Month. She believes service to others is invaluable and has dedicated her clinical career to furthering this mission.

Prior to attending Georgetown, Dr. Wilson’s work in higher education at George Washington University sparked an interest in medical education, teaching, and mentorship. Through her role in curriculum management, she created quality educational outcomes and gained insight into the disproportionate number of underrepresented minority (URM) students and faculty in medical education. This empowered her to create solutions which improve student learning and increase representation. As a medical student, she furthered these interests as a medical education research track scholar by developing a longitudinal curriculum in diversity, equity, and inclusion. Additionally, as professional development facilitator for the Georgetown Experimental Medical Studies (GEMS) Program, a post-baccalaureate program for students from disadvantaged backgrounds, she created a curriculum which incorporates professionalism, mentoring, wellness, scholarship, and community engagement. Through this curriculum, she coaches GEMS students in their pursuit of medicine.

Dr. Wilson believes in cultivating a culture of representation, equity, and inclusion and is a leader among her peers. She created MedSTARS, a visiting clerkship program for URMs to improve institutional equity at MedStar Health and GUSOM. She served on the Office of Diversity and Inclusion Council on Diversity Affairs where she was engaged in efforts to increase the recruitment and retention of URMs. She has served in leadership positions including Georgetown’s Racial Justice Committee for Change, Taskforce on Curriculum and Student Wellbeing, and SNMA. She also chaired the ScholarRx Student Advisory Council, an international, student-led collaboration created to implement innovations in educational technology. Now she serves as chief resident of the Baylor College of Medicine Emergency Medicine Residency.

As a resident physician, Dr. Wilson is pursuing a career in emergency medicine with a health equity lens and aspires to become a dean of a medical school. While her interests are robust, her ultimate goal is to create a ripple of change by empowering institutions to challenge the way they think about health equity in medical education and healthcare delivery.

John Martindale, MD

Brown Emergency Medicine

Dr. Martindale is a PGY-4 at Brown Emergency Medicine. In his three-and-a-half years as an emergency medicine resident, Dr. Martindale has held numerous leadership roles including medical education chief resident since 2022. He has worked with multiple faculty members on design and successful implementation of both research and quality improvement projects, including a campaign of teaching faculty and fellow’s placement of peripheral ultrasound-guided intravenous lines in the adult and pediatric emergency department, patient and staff safety initiatives, multiple residency curricula designs, and interdepartmental educational initiatives. He is a frequent guest lecturer at the Brown Warren Alpert School of Medicine and a mentor to several medical students. After residency, Dr. Martindale is poised to continue his career in academic medicine in a medical education fellowship with the intention of taking part in residency and medical student curriculum design.

Prior to his time in Rhode Island, Dr. Martindale attended medical school at the University of Arkansas in Little Rock, during which he was awarded the ACEP/EMRA National Outstanding Medical Student Award. In his spare time, Dr. Martindale enjoys all things outdoors, from gardening to dog training to backpacking and boating.

Marina Gaeta Gazzola, MD

NYU Grossman School of Medicine

Dr. Gazzola is a resident physician in the Department of Emergency Medicine at NYU Langone Health/Bellevue Hospital Center in New York and a post-doctoral research associate at the APT Foundation Inc., a not-for-profit, low-barrier opioid treatment program based in New Haven, Connecticut. She is a graduate of the Yale School of Medicine and Cornell University. Her scholarship examines areas for intervention to address the worsening overdose crisis in the United States and improving experience and engagement in medication for opioid use disorder treatment for people with opioid use disorder. She has broad experience in conducting patient-centered, mixed methods research ranging from individual qualitative interviews to prospective survey studies to large quantitative studies using national datasets and electronic medical record data. She is particularly interested in emergency-department interventions that reduce the harms associated with substance use and improve treatment engagement and outcomes for people with addiction with high levels of social vulnerability, such as those experiencing homelessness or with criminal-legal system involvement.

Since 2019, Dr. Gazzola has held a first author/project management role for over a dozen addiction-focused research projects spanning medical school and residency (resulting in 16 published peer review articles, 2 book chapters, over 30 abstracts, and several workshop/didactic level speaking engagements and invited talks at national conferences); led a number of clinical initiatives to improve access to harm reduction tools at the institution level across NYU Langone Health sites; mentored other trainees in addiction research; and led educational initiatives surrounding addiction and vulnerable populations for her residency program. She has given poster and oral presentations at many addiction-focused conferences, including the College on Problems of Drug Dependence, the American Society of Addiction Medicine, and the Association for Multidisciplinary Education and Research in Substance Use and Addiction, and presented her research on emergency department-based harm reduction interventions at the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine annual meeting last year. In September 2023, she gave an hour-long invited talk at the annual meeting of the International Society of Addiction Journal Editors to disseminate the results of multiple first-authored research projects studying patient preferences for substance use terminology. She has also been recognized locally and nationally, including being awarded the “Best Abstract: Resident” award at the 2023 American Society of Addiction Medicine annual meeting, the 2024 Ruth Fox Scholarship by the American Society of Addiction Medicine to attend the 2024 annual meeting and pre-conference didactics sponsored by the society, and winning “best abstract” at her residency program’s 2023 research day as an intern. In medical school, she spent a dedicated research year examining the intersection of social determinants of health and methadone treatment, culminating in her MD thesis, “Housing as Healthcare: The role of homelessness in patient characteristics and retention in outpatient medication for opioid use disorder treatment,” for which she was awarded the Peter F. Curran graduation prize for an outstanding thesis at the Yale School of Medicine. Since starting residency in July 2022, Dr. Gazzola has conducted research examining emergency department harm reduction interventions and emergency clinician knowledge of overdose prevention tools. She has also joined several pre-existing projects surrounding overdose prevention and addiction treatment run by faculty at her institution.

Mohamad Ali Cheaito, MD

University of Toledo

Dr. Cheaito is a dedicated third-year emergency medicine resident at the University of Toledo. Dr. Cheaito laid the foundation for his medical career at the American University of Beirut, where he successfully completed his medical degree. Currently serving as the academic chief resident, he plays a pivotal role in shaping the educational landscape of the program, extending his dedication beyond residency as the vice chair of the Education Committee for the Emergency Medicine Residents' Association (EMRA). Additionally, Dr. Cheaito's significant scholarly impact is underscored by his extensive publication record, coupled with his roles as the managing editor of The Mediterranean Journal of Emergency Medicine & Acute Care and a reviewer for several peer-reviewed journals. As Dr. Cheaito continues to progress in his residency and academic career, it is evident that his passion for emergency medicine and commitment to education will leave a lasting mark on the field.