Class of 2025 Shares Investigative Results at Research Day

Congratulations to the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine Class of 2025 for their outstanding research projects, showcased during the 15th Annual CCLCM Research Day, held on March 14.

Cleveland Clinic vitreoretinal surgeon and uveitis specialist Sumit Sharma, MD (‘09), delivered the keynote address, sharing details about his academic medicine path, academic roles and current research projects. While completing his vitreoretinal surgery fellowship at Duke University, Dr. Sharma was awarded the Heed Fellowship Award and the prestigious Ronald G. Michels Fellowship Foundation Award, given to the top vitreoretinal surgical fellows in the country. In 2016, he joined Cleveland Clinic and currently serves as the Medical Director of the Information Technology Division for Ophthalmology, Uveitis Fellowship Director and medical student clerkship director.

The students’ names, titles of their research work and names of their research mentors are listed below.

Class of 2025 oral research presentations

Helena Baffoe-Bonnie
Evaluation of the hypertension care cascade in South-Central Uganda: A population-based, cross-sectional study of adults
Mentor: Wendy S. Post, MD, MS

Kevin Fung
Pharmacological reduction of mitochondrial oxidative phosphorylation confers protection in a mouse model of ROP
Mentor: Jonathan Sears, MD

Nityam Rathi
Genomic and radiomic characterization of renal tumors in von Hippel-Lindau Syndrome
Mentor: W. Marston Linehan, MD

Chineme (Chichi) Onwubueke
Characterizing the maternal and placental immune response to yellow fever vaccination during pregnancy
Mentor: Suan Sin (Jolin) Foo, PhD

Brady Greene
Thyroid-stimulating hormone as a moderator of ketamine antidepressant and antianhedonic response in treatment-resistant unipolar and bipolar depression
Mentor: Carlos A. Zarate Jr, MD

Rachel Schafer
Influence of multilevel health care factors on patient satisfaction with breast reconstruction post-mastectomy.
Mentor: Graham Schwarz, MD

Class of 2025 mini presentations, abstracts

Madeleine Blazel
Neighborhood disparities in hypertension prevalence and treatment among midlife adults
Mentor: Jarrod Dalton, PhD

Christopher Cantrell
Corneal confocal microscopy as a diagnostic tool for small fiber neuropathy in postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS)
Mentor: Robert Wilson, DO

Lydia Cassard
Clinical and histopathologic factors associated with increased risk of malignancy in anti-TIF1-γ positive dermatomyositis
Mentor: Anthony P. Fernandez, MD, PhD

Jamie DeCicco
First histopathologic grading system and clinical outcomes in median arcuate ligament syndrome
Mentor: Kevin El-Hayek, MD, MBA

Radhika Duggal
Endotracheal intubation and upper aerodigestive injury: An assessment of current practice
Mentor: William Tierney, MD

Priya S. Eppel
The effect of immune-mediated inflammatory diseases on the development and progression of age-related macular degeneration
Mentor: Katherine E. Talcott, MD

Jesse Fajnzylber
Utilizing bioinformatic tools to characterize the mutational signatures of bladder cancers in Ohio
Mentor: Timothy Chan, MD, PhD

Ava (Cong) Fan
Matched cohort analysis of ultra-hypofractionated versus standard fractionation preoperative radiation therapy for soft tissue sarcoma
Mentor: Shauna Campbell, DO

Thomas Gautier
Understanding the use of pneumococcal urinary antigen testing in patients with community-acquired pneumonia
Mentor: Abhishek Deshpande, MD, PhD

Jakub Jarmula
Ibudilast and anti-PD-L1 combination treatment significantly improves survival in a sex-dependent manner in a murine model of glioblastoma
Mentor: Pablo Recinos, MD

Julia Joo, MPH
Circadian rhythm disruption in the pathogenesis of optic neuritis associated with multiple sclerosis
Mentor: Sujata Rao, PhD

Jessica MacWilliams
The impact of socioeconomic status on weight-related outcomes and lifestyle behaviors following metabolic and bariatric surgery
Mentor: Leslie Heinberg, PhD

Seth M. Meade
Continuous health assessment in spine surgery leveraging patient-reported outcomes and a novel healthcare utilization metric
Mentor: Ghaith Habboub MD

Jameson Mitchell
Point-of-care echocardiography for the detection of left ventricular remodeling in pregnant patients with chronic hypertension: A prospective cohort study
Mentor: Justin Lappen, MD

Sekinat Mumuney
Approaches for understanding the role of antibody-bound microbes in the female reproductive tract during cervical neoplasia
Mentor: Stephanie Langel, PhD

Monica Nair
Development of ALL-Hematotox (ALL-HT): predicting post-CAR T-cell hematotoxicity in B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (B-ALL)
Mentor: Nirali N. Shah, MD, MHSc

Joe O’Brien
Clinical characteristics, risk factors, and predictive modeling for primary and recurrent Clostridioides difficile infection in the hematopoietic stem cell transplantation population
Mentor: Matthew Pappas, MD, MPH

William Patterson, MPH
Regional analgesia catheter-related infections and the effectiveness of antibiotic prophylaxis in immunocompromised patients: a retrospective multicenter registry analysis
Mentor: Alparslan Turan, MD

Joseph Carter Powers
Exploring the association between rectal cuff inflammation and subsequent structural complications in patients with an ileal pouch-anal anastomosis
Mentor: Taha Qazi, MD

Peyi Runsewe
Novel clinical utility of retinal imaging in heart failure with preserved ejection fraction
Mentor: W. H. Wilson Tang, MD

Saswat Sahoo
Extracellular vesicle biomarkers of Alzheimer’s disease and insulin signaling in prediabetes and type 2 diabetes
Mentor: Dimitrios Kapogiannis, MD

Sokhna O. Seck, MS
Correlates of systemic disease in adult IgA vasculitis: A retrospective study of clinical and laboratory findings
Mentor: Anthony P. Fernandez, MD, PhD

Abigail Snyder
Investigation of aortic behavior as assessed by aortic ultrasound: A prospective study
Mentor: Eric Roselli, MD

Elizabeth Stanley, MPH
Gap in sexual dysfunction management between male and female patients seen in primary care
Mentor: Kathryn Martinez, PhD

Jessica Sterba
Short contact protocols to reduce pain during treatment of actinic keratoses with ALA gel-red light photodynamic therapy
Mentor: Edward Maytin, MD, PhD

Erin Sullivan
Does potassium supplementation reduce the risk of cardiac arrest?
Mentor: Michael Rothberg, MD

Mihika Thapliyal
Preliminary findings of a combined immunotherapy approach to glioblastoma in female mouse models: Anti-IL1ß and CAR T cell therapies
Mentor: Justin Lathia, PhD

We extend our warmest congratulations to the Class of 2025 and their mentors for the time and effort they invested in their outstanding research projects.

Photo credit: Marty Carrick