2025 Annual Research Symposium
Invited Professor
Sudha Jayaraman, MD, MSc
2025 Dunphy Professor
Dr. Jayaraman received her BA from the University of Pennsylvania and her MD from the University of California, Davis. She did her General Surgery residency at UCSF, during which she obtained a Masters Degree in Public Health in Developing Countries at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and was a fellow at UCSF Global Health Sciences working on several projects on trauma systems development in Uganda. After residency, she did her Acute Care Surgery, Surgery Critical Care and Burns fellowship at the Brigham and Women's Hospital/Harvard Medical School where she was awarded the Harvard Medical School Health Disparities Fellowship grant to work on evaluating disparities in injury mortality in Kigali, Rwanda.
Dr. Jayaraman started practice as an academic trauma surgeon at Virginia Commonwealth University in 2013 where she created and co-led the Program for Global Surgery. She was then recruited to the University of Utah to lead the Center for Global Surgery as Professor of Surgery and direct research at the Center for Medical Innovation. Dr. Jayaraman helped create and co-lead a Masters track in global health innovation at the University of Utah and has mentored multiple teams developing innovative devices and technologies. She was awarded the Cliff C. Snyder MD Far Eastern Presidential Endowed Chair in 2023.
Dr. Jayaraman has been a Board Examiner for the College of Surgeons of East, Central and Southern Africa since 2018. She has also led the development of university competencies in academic global surgery as well as the ACS Global Health Competencies course through ACS HOPE (former ACS OGB). Dr. Jayaraman has worked extensively with colleagues at the University of Rwanda, University Teaching Hospital-Kigali and Ministry of Health on trauma and emergency systems capacity building in the country - most recently on the use of digital health technologies to improve access to emergency care -funded by the NIH and NIHR.
Awardees
Outstanding Presentation in Basic & Translational Science Research
“Mechanistic insights underlying the beneficial impact of CCR5 blockade after kidney transplantation in HIV+ recipients”
Ali Abbasi, MD
“Novel Vitrification Solutions Enable Whole-Organ Cryopreservation and Reanimation via Normothermic Machine Perfusion”
Simon Chu, MD, MS
Outstanding Presentation in Clinical Research
“Early Compliance with Lung Cancer Lymph Node Standard 5.8: An Analysis of 2022 and 2023 Commission on Cancer Site Reviews”
Alison Baskin, MD
“Patient and Hospital Factors Associated with Transfer of Emergency General Surgery Patients to a Tertiary/Quaternary Hospital”
Jessica Santos-Parker, MD PhD
Outstanding Presentation in Global/Education/Innovation Research
“Using Surgical Indicators to Prioritize Investment in Surgical Systems Strengthening by a Global Non-governmental Organization: Geospatial Access”
Greta Davis, MD
“Population-Level Evidence for Expanding Kidney Transplantation Programs Worldwide”
Alan Zambeli-Ljepović, MD, MHS
Outstanding Medical Student Presentation
“Empowering Sustainability During Kidney Transplants Using a Patient Safety Framework”
Gerardo Gamino
“Trial in Progress: Bariatric Breast Results in Testing Experience (BBRITE)”
Mandeep Kaur
Naffziger Surgical Society Resident Research Travel Award
“Mechanistic insights underlying the beneficial impact of CCR5 blockade after kidney transplantation in HIV+ recipients”
Ali Abbasi, MD
“Genetic Landscape Differentiates Primary Aldosteronism from Non-Functional, Benign Adrenal Tumors”
Kirkpatrick Fergus, MD
Mentorship Achievement Award
Laura Esserman, MD, MBA
Merisa Piper, MD