Network Members
Areas of clinical expertise: HIV medicine, Hepatitis C, sexually transmitted infection, LGTBQ medicine
About: Yotam Arens, M.D., is a clinician-researcher based in the Weill Cornell Medicine Division of Infectious Diseases at the Center for Special Studies. He serves as an HIV primary care physician and also provides HIV and sexually transmitted infection prevention services. He earned a master’s degree in clinical epidemiology from the University of Pennsylvania where his thesis work focused on trends in incident Hepatitis C infection among people with HIV. He conducts clinical research focused on the syndemic of HIV, Hepatitis C, and sexually transmitted infections.
Areas of clinical expertise: Addiction psychiatry
About: Jonathan Avery, M.D., is the Vice Chair for Addiction Psychiatry, a Professor of Clinical Psychiatry, the Stephen P. Tobin and Dr. Arnold M. Cooper Professor in Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry, and the Program Director for the Addiction Psychiatry Fellowship. Dr. Avery’s primary academic focus has been to examine and help develop interventions to improve clinicians’ attitudes towards patients with substance use disorders. He is also focused on educating all physicians on how to treat individuals with co-occurring substance use disorders and mental illness.
Areas of clinical expertise: Environmental exposures, emergency medicine, internal medicine, psychiatry
About: Arnab Ghosh, M.D. is an ER doctor and internist who does environmental and health services research
Christopher J. Gonzalez, M.D., M.S.
Areas of clinical expertise: General internal medicine, diabetes, lifestyle medicine
About: Christopher J. Gonzalez, M.D., M.S., is an Assistant Professor and health services researcher in the Division of General Internal Medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine (WCM). His research, grounded by his primary care practice within federally qualified health centers (FQHC), focuses on improving cardiometabolic outcomes in underserved populations through the development and implementation of evidence-based interventions in real-world settings. Using mixed methods, he examines how social networks, cultural context, and healthcare delivery systems influence engagement in preventive behaviors.
Areas of clinical expertise: General pediatrics, behavioral health integration
About: Cori Green, M.D., MSc is an Associate Professor in Clinical Pediatrics at Weill Cornell Medicine, holds a Master of Science in Clinical Investigation, and is the Vice Chair of Behavioral Health Integration and Innovation in Pediatrics. Her academic niche is in pediatric mental health integration: she blends clinical innovation, education, research, and policy to improve access to the full spectrum of mental health services for children and adolescents. She has advanced mental health integration in pediatrics, workforce development, and policy reform at a local, regional, and national level. Nationally, she is a consultant for mental health research for the American Board of Pediatrics, is on the US News and World Report Behavioral Health Workgroup, and leads policy statements on mental health topics for the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Areas of clinical expertise: General pediatrics, mental health, suicide prevention
About: Dr. Huttle is a general pediatrician and early‑career researcher focused on improving mental health services for children and adolescents at risk for suicide. Her work integrates pediatric primary care experience with health services research and implementation science to address gaps in suicide risk screening and evidence‑based brief interventions.
Areas of clinical expertise: Maternal-fetal medicine, high-risk pregnancy, advanced maternal age
About: Dr. Robin Kalish is a Professor of Clinical Obstetrics and Gynecology and the Vice Chair of Obstetrics at Weill Cornell Medicine/NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, where she has served on the faculty since 2003. She is board certified in obstetrics and gynecology and in maternal–fetal medicine, and is nationally recognized for her expertise in clinical obstetrics. Dr. Kalish leads major initiatives in clinical operations, quality improvement, and patient safety, and played a central role in the strategic planning and program development of the Alexandra Cohen Hospital for Women and Newborns. She maintains a busy high-risk obstetrics practice, has collaborated on more than 60 peer-reviewed research publications, and remains deeply committed to education and mentorship.
Areas of clinical expertise: Infectious diseases, HIV, addiction medicine
About: Dr. Kapadia is an infectious diseases and addiction medicine physician. He conducts health services research pertaining to the diagnosis, care, and treatment of these conditions, with focus areas on HIV, Hepatitis C, and endocarditis. He is familiar with the use of large administrative datasets such as claims and EHR data, with qualitative methods, and with economic analyses.
Areas of clinical expertise: Cardiology
About: Dr. Kini is a general cardiologist and health services researcher. His research focuses on : 1) assessing and improving the value (outcomes / cost) of cardiovascular care delivery; and 2) evaluating the impact of healthcare delivery and payment models on cardiovascular care quality and outcomes. Since 2016, he has been the principal investigator or co-investigator of 6 funded multi-year research projects, including grants from the NIH and American Heart Association. His work has been published in high-impact journals including JAMA and the Journal of the American College of Cardiology. Finally, he is an associate editor at Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes and is the Associate Director of the cardiology fellowship program at Weill Cornell Medicine.
Areas of clinical expertise: Aging
About: Dr. Lachs is a clinical epidemiologist and physician scientist with expertise in aging. In addition to his own work in elder abuse and financial exploitation, he is also a methodologist who mentors physician scientists in other fields with an interest in aging.
Heather S. Lipkind, M.D., M.S.
Areas of clinical expertise: Maternal-fetal medicine, outcomes research, maternal health, cardiology, patient centered research.
About: Dr. Heather Lipkind is the Director of Maternal-Fetal Medicine at Weill Cornell. Dr. Lipkind previously served as a Professor of Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Reproductive Sciences and the Maternal-Fetal Medicine Fellowship Director at the Yale School of Medicine. Dr. Lipkind has clinical experience and research expertise in perinatal epidemiology and birth outcomes. She is passionate about caring for patients. She collaborates on a number of studies focusing on maternal and fetal birth outcomes, including vaccine safety studies with two recent CDC awards examining the receipt of vaccines for COVID-19 in pregnancy. Her research examines associations between hypertension and psychiatric conditions and pregnancy outcomes as well as research with diverse pregnant populations. She has created programs that help patients understand the association of pregnancy-related health conditions with long-term health outcomes with a focus on hypertensive disorders of pregnancy and cardiovascular disease.
Areas of clinical expertise: Rheumatology
About: Dr. Bella Mehta specializes in the care of patients with various rheumatic conditions including rheumatoid arthritis, psoriatic arthritis, ankylosing spondylitis, systemic lupus erythematosus, osteoarthritis, and has a particular interest in adult-onset Still’s disease. Dr. Mehta is actively involved as an investigator in numerous clinical studies focusing on disparities in rheumatologic diseases and has been the recipient of several awards for her research studies. Dr. Mehta’s research reflects her commitment to achieving health equity, focusing on disparities in rheumatologic diseases. Dr. Mehta also leads studies to identify and build creative approaches using Artificial Intelligence to improve diagnoses and patient outcomes. She is an active member of associations for medical professionals in rheumatology.
Areas of clinical expertise: Medical oncology, prostate cancer, bladder cancer
About: Dr. Mitchell is a medical oncologist and health services researcher at Memorial Sloan Kettering. His focus is in health policy, in particular the financial determinants of cancer care delivery, which he defines broadly to include financial COI between oncologists and drug companies, oncology payment policy (e.g., buy-and-bill drug reimbursement), and patient insurance coverage and OOP costs. He has MPH-level methods training and conducts most of his research in large administrative datasets (SEER-Medicare, Medicare, MA encounter). His clinical expertise is focused on prostate and bladder cancer, but his research interest in cancer care delivery extends to any cancer type.
Areas of clinical expertise: Vascular neurology
About: Dr. Navi is an academic vascular neurologist with an expertise in stroke epidemiology, risk factors, and outcomes. His primary research focus is stroke and other forms of arterial thrombosis in patients with cancer. He has also published extensively on acute stroke treatments, mobile stroke units, cryptogenic stroke, and the relationship between pregnancy and stroke. He serves as Vice Chair for Neurology Hospital Services, Chief of the Division of Stroke and Hospital Neurology, and Medical Director of the Stroke Center at Weill Cornell Medicine.
Areas of clinical expertise: Obstetrics & gynecology, community engaged research, maternal health disparities, health disparities
About: Dr. Christina Pardo is an obstetrician-gynecologist and maternal health equity researcher at Weill Cornell Medicine/New York-Presbyterian. Her scholarship centers on health-related social needs, respectful maternity care, and community-driven approaches to improving outcomes for immigrant and minority populations. She leads multiple cross-institutional studies and quality initiatives. Dr. Pardo is committed to integrating community wisdom into evidence-based clinical practice and research.
Areas of clinical expertise: Fibroids, endometriosis, pelvic pain, adenomyosis
About: Dr. Kristen Pepin is an Assistant Professor of OBGYN at Weill Cornell Medicine – New York Presbyterian in New York City. There she serves as the Fellowship in Minimally Invasive Gynecologic Surgery (FMIGS) assistant program director and director of surgical simulation for OBGYN. She completed her fellowship at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and received her MPH at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. She has served on the Fibroid Special Interest Group board since 2021. Research interests include decision making for fibroid treatment and the role of online communities to support patients with endometriosis.
Areas of clinical expertise: Addiction medicine, housing
About: Dr. Ramsdell has been an addiction medicine doctor and hospitalist at Weill Cornell Medicine since 2015. She is currently the clinical lead for the housing navigation program at Lower Manhattan Hospital (LMH) and directs the inpatient addiction consult services at WCM and LMH. She is a former co-course director of the health policy clerkship and has an academic interest in best practices for teaching structural competency.
Areas of clinical expertise: Elder mistreatment, geriatric emergency medicine
About: Dr. Rosen is an emergency physician and a health services researcher focused on elder abuse and geriatric emergency care. His research explores improving identification, intervention, and prevention of elder mistreatment in EDs and other health care settings. His work has explored forensic injury patterns in physical elder mistreatment and health care utilization among elder mistreatment victims. He has also led the development of a first-of-its-kind Emergency Department-based multi-disciplinary Vulnerable Elder Protection Team (VEPT) to assess, treat, and ensure the safety of elder abuse and neglect victims while collecting evidence and working closely with law enforcement and Adult Protective Services. In his patient-oriented clinical research lab, he and colleagues are currently examining health care utilization among elder abuse victims using Medicare claims data and techniques including machine learning. They are also developing a novel screening tool and intervention approach for elder neglect in older adults with dementia.
Areas of clinical expertise: Hepatology
About: Dr. Rosenblatt is a transplant hepatologist. His research interests include disparities in access to liver transplant and the impact of hyperlipidemia and primary biliary cholangitis.
Areas of clinical expertise: Pediatrics, clinical informatics
About: Dr. Chethan Sarabu is a physician-informaticist and clinical assistant professor at Weill Cornell Medicine, with a primary appointment at Cornell Tech, where he serves as Director of Clinical Innovation at the Health Tech Hub. His work focuses on pediatrics, clinical informatics, and the responsible development and implementation of AI in healthcare, with an emphasis on real-world clinical impact. He leads interdisciplinary initiatives that bridge medicine, technology, and policy to advance patient-centered, equitable, and sustainable digital health solutions.
David Scales, MPhil, M.D., PhD
Areas of clinical expertise: Internal medicine
About: David Scales MPhil, M.D., PhD is an internal medicine hospitalist and assistant professor of medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine. His research focuses on medical communication in clinical and online settings, including understanding how structural factors affect our information environments to allow misinformation to propagate and misconceptions to persist. Dr. Scales’ work leverages qualitative and quantitative methods to build community-based interventions to address the problem of health-related misperceptions, training “infodemiologists” to help build resilience against information distortion within their communities using “community-oriented motivational interviewing.”
Areas of clinical expertise: Obesity
About: Dr. Schmitz sees patients with obesity at the Comprehensive Weight Control Center at WCM. She has served as a sub-investigator on various industry sponsored clinical trials for novel obesity medications. She is in start up for a trial that she designed on the impact of tirzepatide on post-menopausal breast cancer.
Areas of clinical expertise: Palliative care, end of life care, hospice, integrated care, behavioral health, psychiatry, serious mental illness, psychooncology, serious illness care, aging, geriatrics
About: Daniel Shalev, M.D., is an Assistant Professor of Medicine and Medicine-in-Psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medicine. A psychiatrist and palliative care physician, his clinical and research work focuses on improving mental health outcomes for individuals with serious medical illness. Clinically, he provides palliative care as well as psychiatric care to patients with serious medical illnesses. He leads the Behavioral Health, Aging, and Serious Illness Care (BASIC) Lab, an NIH-funded program integrating behavioral health into serious illness and geriatric care. His work combines qualitative, implementation, and health services methods to inform policy and advance models of integrated care across settings.
Areas of clinical expertise: General medicine
About: Dr. Shapiro is involved in a national study of care for HIV disease. His work focuses on access to care and health disparities. He is also an elected member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (ASCI) and the Association of American Physicians (AAP).
Areas of clinical expertise: Primary care, cancer screening, genetics
About: Dr. Shieh is a general internist and clinician-investigator focused on improving cancer screening and prevention through personalized (“precision”) approaches. His research focuses on cancer risk prediction, genetic risk scores, and the delivery of cancer screening. He is also broadly interested in the translation of genetic tools and risk models to the clinic. Most of his work focuses on breast and lung cancer.
Areas of clinical expertise: Infectious Diseases, Healthcare epidemiology, cost-effectiveness analysis.
About: Dr. Simon is an Associate Professor of Clinical Medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases and an Associate Professor of Clinical Population Health Sciences at Weill Cornell Medicine. He is the Chief Hospital Epidemiologist at New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell and the Deputy Medical Director for Infection Prevention & Control at NewYork-Presbyterian. His academic interests include healthcare-associated infections, antimicrobial stewardship and cost-effectiveness analysis.
Areas of clinical expertise: Women’s health, obstetrics, perinatal medicine
About: Dr. Moeun Son is an Associate Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Weill Cornell Medicine. She is board certified in Obstetrics and Gynecology and Maternal-Fetal Medicine. She is a clinical researcher and is funded by the National Institutes of Health, the U.S. FDA, and foundation and industry grants. She is clinically active on the wards and is also the Program Director of the Maternal-Fetal Medicine Fellowship.
Sri Lekha Tummalapalli, M.D., MBA, MAS
Areas of clinical expertise: Nephrology, hypertension
About: Dr. Sri Lekha Tummalapalli is a nephrologist and health services researcher at Weill Cornell Medicine. Her research focuses on improving quality of care for patients with kidney disease and other chronic diseases. She primarily studies 1) value-based care models, 2) strategies to incorporate social factors in payment models, 3) alignment of quality measures with evidence-based care, and 4) factors driving novel therapeutic adoption.
Areas of clinical expertise: Chronic disease, community health workers, social determinants of health
About: Dr. Devin Worster is an internal medicine physician and innovative public health leader dedicated to advancing health equity through better integration of healthcare and community services. He is a hospitalist and Assistant Professor of Clinical Medicine at Weill Cornell and has spent the past eight years with the global nonprofit Partners In Health, first in Mexico, developing rural chronic disease programs, and later in the US, leading pandemic response and community health worker program design, evaluation, and policy. Devin brings both clinical insight and systems-level experience that can help build more equitable, coordinated models of care.