Chaudhry, Ahsen
Ahsen is an endocrinologist who completed his medical school, core internal medicine, and endocrinology training at the University of British Columbia.
The field of islet transplantation for diabetes is rapidly progressing with advancements in stem cell therapy, and Ahsen is excited to be participating in this revolution. He will be working with Dr. Timothy Kieffer to investigate the use of miRNA-based biomarkers for studying the cell death and fate of transplanted islet cells, which may reveal ways to optimize and enhance their survival. He will also be assisting several clinical trials of stem-cell derived beta-cell therapy for type 1 diabetes.
Ultimately, he hopes to help support the clinical transplant and research team here in making Vancouver a major center for islet and stem-cell based therapy for patients living with diabetes.
Jiang, River
River completed internal medicine and cardiology training at UBC and previously obtained his MD from McMaster University. He is training in advanced echocardiography at the University of California, San Francisco, and is pursuing a Master of Information and Data Science at the University of California, Berkeley. As a part of the Clinician Investigator Program, River is working on applications of machine learning and computer vision for analyzing large datasets within cardiovascular medicine. Outside of his research, River enjoys biking, playing squash, trying out new restaurants, and spending time with his friends and family outdoors.
Karacabeyli, Derin
Derin Karacabeyli completed his rheumatology residency at UBC in June 2024. During his undergraduate studies in kinesiology, medical doctorate, and internal medicine residency at UBC, he developed an interest in obesity. Enrolled in a Master of Science in Experimental Medicine, Derin is studying the effects of treating metabolic comorbidities like obesity and type 2 diabetes on patients with immune-mediated inflammatory diseases. He plans to pursue a PhD, focusing on pharmacoepidemiology and models of care. His goal is to establish an interdisciplinary metabolic-rheumatology clinic in order to better characterize and manage the unique needs of patients with excess adiposity and inflammatory arthritis.
Lee, Alex
Alex was a medical student in the University of Ottawa and is now currently a resident in the University of British Columbia General Surgery program. He is pursuing a Master of Science in Clinical Informatics Management at Stanford University. His research interests include failure-to-rescue and rescue quality in Acute Care Surgery. He hopes to learn about the applications of big data analysis and machine learning in quality measurement and improvement in surgical systems.
Nguyen, Quynh
Quynh is a cardiac surgery resident at the University of British Columbia. She did her medical school at the University of Alberta. As part of her academic enrichment program, she is pursuing a master’s degree in biomedical engineering at the University of British Columbia. In her free time, Quynh enjoys hiking, swimming, and watercolor painting.
Scarffe, Leslie
Leslie Scarffe is a clinical and postdoctoral neuroimmunology fellow in the laboratories of Drs Ari Green and Michael Wilson at the University of California, San Francisco. She has a BSc in Biochemistry from McGill University and completed a PhD in neuroscience at Johns Hopkins University studying genetic models of Parkinson’s disease in the laboratory of Drs Ted and Valina Dawson. She then pursued medical school at McGill University and her Neurology residency at the University of British Columbia. Her interests include studying how immune subsets and antibodies in multiple sclerosis could potentially inform clinical decision making.
Streith, Lucas
Lucas is a general surgery resident at UBC, taking time away from clinical training to explore his passion for teaching, education scholarship, and research. When he started the Master of Health Professions Education at UBC and Maastricht University, he was looking forward to formal training in teaching skills and education theory. It did not take long for him to realize that he wanted to spend much more time in this realm to explore a passion far beyond what he initially expected. He is now embarking on a PhD in health professions education.
Lucas’ background is in the basic sciences; his love of anatomy drove him to general surgery and has also inspired his master’s thesis research in surgical decision-making. Through the Clinician Investigator Program, he is looking forward to further developing his research skills and research programme, as well as meeting more residents, scholars, and clinician scientists that are passionate about a diverse range of research domains. For Lucas, teaching and research offer an additional layer of meaning and fun to the gratifying clinical work of general surgery. Outside of working and studying, he enjoys travel, gardening, and learning languages.
Wu, Florence
Dr. Florence Wu obtained her MD/PhD from the University of Toronto, where her research involved using antiangiogenic drugs to reduce vascular permeability and inhibit cancer metastasis. Dr. Wu then completed her Internal Medicine and Medical Oncology residency training at the University of British Columbia. Through the Postdoctoral Stream of the UBC Clinician Investigator Program, Dr. Wu will be returning to Toronto for further clinical and research training with the Thoracic Medical Oncology Group at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre. Her research interest lies in the crosstalk between tumor vascular biology and tumor immunology.
Zhao, Henry
Henry was born in China and briefly lived in Singapore before immigrating to Canada with his family in 2001. He spent most of his life in Toronto until moving to Montreal in 2013 for his undergraduate degree in Microbiology and Immunology and subsequently Medicine at McGill University. There, he played varsity badminton and developed an interest in tennis and golf, which he now enjoys with his co-residents in UBC plastic surgery.
Since high school, he has always been keen on innovation and engineering, so much that he had almost gone down the path of engineering for his undergraduate degree. Now, with CIP, he is granted the opportunity to re-explore his passion for creating innovative solutions in Plastic Surgery. With his studies at UC Berkeley and UCSF, he hopes to return to Plastic Surgery with a comprehensive skillset in medical device design, project management, and engineering principles to continually advance his career in academia.