International FAIMER Institute Faculty

FAIMER
United States

Dr. Vyas contributes her expertise in medicine, health professions education and understanding of international culture to FAIMER programs and its research and scholarship activities. She applies her extensive experience to oversee the FAIMER Global Programs, geared towards health care education and workforce development in collaboration with international partners.

Prior to joining FAIMER, Dr. Vyas was a professor at Christian Medical College (CMC), Vellore, India. She has led education innovations such as the distance learning postgraduate diploma in family medicine, integrated learning, and early clinical exposure. She was the convener for the National Medical Commission (NMC) regional and nodal centers for national faculty development in medical education. She served on the expert committee for development and implementation of basic and advanced courses in medical education for NMC.

Dr. Vyas received her M.B.B.S. and M.D. degrees from India. She holds a master’s in health professions education from UI Chicago, USA.

International FAIMER Institute 2014 Fellow
Aga Khan University
Pakistan

Dr. Tashfeen Ahmad is an orthopedic surgeon working at Aga Khan University, a private medical university in the city of Karachi, Pakistan. He has a Ph.D. in orthopedic basic science from Karolinska Institute, Sweden and is a 2014 FAIMER Institute Fellow. He is involved in medical education at undergraduate, graduate, and postgraduate levels. His educational research interest is in teaching and learning, especially technical skills training. He has done research on role modelling, emotional intelligence, feedback, and use of apps for learning during work. Dr. Ahmad is currently developing a simulation based course on team building and communication in surgical setting. Apart from educational research he is active in clinical outcomes research, registries, stem cell research, and orthopedic basic research.

International FAIMER Institute 2011 Fellow
Director, ASU-MENA FAIMER Regional Institute
Ain Shams University Faculty of Medicine
Egypt

Professor Samar Ahmed is the Director of the Ain Shams Middle East North Africa FAIMER Regional Institute for Health Professions Education. In addition, Dr. Ahmed serves as Chair of the Centre of Excellence in Forensic Psychiatric Research at Ain Shams University, Professor in the Department of Forensic Medicine and Toxicology at the University, and Director of the Quality Assurance Unit for the University. A certified UNESCO Trainer, Dr. Ahmed serves as a global commercial adviser to universities and medical schools.

Dr. Ahmed’s peers have remarked on her tremendous leadership and execution skills that enable her to lead people in integrated projects. She understands what it takes to deliver and supports people to perform to the best of their abilities. She has a well-developed capacity to communicate with different cultures and to establish partnerships for education development. Dr. Ahmed dreams of a network of health care reformers working hand in hand defying natural and man-made boundaries.

International FAIMER Institute 2003 Fellow
Co-Director, Brazil-FAIMER Regional Institute
Universidade Estadual de Campinas
Brazil

Dr. Eliana Amaral is a tenured Full-Professor in Obstetrics at the State University of Campinas (UNICAMP), Sao Paulo, Brazil, who has served as Co-Director of the Brazil-FAIMER Regional Institute since its inception in 2007. She is a 2003 FAIMER Institute Fellow, and a 2014-2015 fellow of the Executive Leadership in Academic Medicine (ELAM) Program at Drexel University in Philadelphia. Dr. Amaral’s areas of interest for research, papers and book chapters published, projects, and conferences are issues of quality of Obstetrics care, maternal morbidity-mortality, infectious diseases in Obstetrics, education for health professionals, faculty development and affairs, and academic administration. Her current positions include: Head of the UNICAMP Obstetrics & Gynecology Department; member of the Brazilian Board on Obstetrics & Gynecology; advisor for the Reproductive Health Division of the World Health Organization (Geneva), Ministry of Health and Education (Brazil), and the State of Sao Paulo Secretariat of Health. Dr. Amaral is also currently the Head of the Faculty Affairs Office at the UNICAMP School of Medical Sciences (2014-2018). She has served as an advisor for the Vice-Provost of the UNICAMP Undergraduate Office (2011-2013), and as coordinator for the Board on Specialty Licensing at the Brazilian Federation of Obstetrics & Gynecology Associations (2009-2013). Dr. Amaral was awarded the Merit on Academic Career Dedicated to Education at UNICAMP (2013), a Gold Medal on Educational Merit from the Brazilian Association on Medical Education (2014), and Expert Recognition from the Latin American Federation of Associations on Obstetrics and Gynecology (2014).

See Dr. Amaral’s Lattes CV at http://buscatextual.cnpq.br/buscatextual/visualizacv.do?id=K4787083P3.

National Board of Medical Examiners
United States

M. Brownell (Brownie) Anderson is Vice President, Medical Education, Global Initiatives at the National Board of Medical Examiners (NBME), USA. She works with NBME colleagues and medical schools and health professions organizations globally to foster NBME’s role as a global leader in medical education assessment delivery and research.

Ms. Anderson serves on the editorial boards of three peer-reviewed journals in medical education and edits the “Really Good Stuff” section of Medical Education. She has presented and taught in nearly 30 countries and has published widely. She was on the faculty of the Arabian Gulf University for six years.

Before joining NBME, Ms. Anderson spent 27 years at the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) serving in a variety of roles in medical education. The “M. Brownell Anderson Award for Emerging Medical Educators” was created to honor Ms. Anderson’s commitment to medical education and the AAMC’s Group on Educational Affairs.

Ms. Anderson was on the faculty of Southern Illinois University School of Medicine for five years.

She received her degrees in Biology and Literature from Washington University and M.Ed. from the University of Illinois.

International FAIMER Institute 2009 Fellow
CMCL-FAIMER 2007 Fellow
IFME 2012 Fellow
Mahatma Gandhi Institute of Medical Sciences
India

Dr. Anshu is a Professor of Pathology at the Mahatma Gandhi Institute of Medical Sciences in Sevagram, India. She was awarded a Commonwealth Fellowship in 2007, a Fellowship from CMCL-FAIMER, Ludhiana in 2007, and a Fellowship from the International FAIMER Institute in 2009. In 2012, she was awarded the International Fellowship in Medical Education from FAIMER. The award allowed her to pursue her Master of Health Professions Education from Maastricht University, which she completed with distinction in 2014.

She is a faculty member and resource person at four Indian FAIMER Regional Institutes: CMCL-FAIMER, Ludhiana; GSMC-FAIMER, Mumbai; PSG-FAIMER, Coimbatore; and MAHE-FAIMER, Manipal. She also is a faculty member for the International FAIMER Institute and has written three WFME-FAIMER distance learning modules for the Centre for Medical Education in Context in the United Kingdom. She also is Editor of the Journal of the Mahatma Gandhi Institute of Medical Sciences. She has authored several publications and book chapters on medical education themes, including a book she edited with Dr. Tejinder Singh titled Principles of Assessment in Medical Education which is in its second edition. She was organizing secretary of the 2014 National Conference on Health Professions Education at Sevagram. She served as Secretary of the Academy of Health Professions Educators in India from 2017-2019.

International FAIMER Institute 2006 Fellow
Universidade Cidade de São Paulo (UNICID)
Brazil

Professor Valdes Bollela graduated from the School of Medicine of Ribeirão Preto, University of São Paulo (FMRP-USP) in Brazil in 1992. He is an Internal Medicine and Infectious Diseases Specialist (1993-1995) and finished his Ph.D. in 2000, when he started working in medical education. Professor Bollela is a 2006 FAIMER Institute Fellow. In 2007, he participated as one of the core faculty members in the foundation of the Brazil-FAIMER Regional Institute on Health Professions Education, and since 2008 he has been serving as Global Faculty at the FAIMER Institute in Philadelphia.

Professor Bollela has taught at FMRP-USP since 2011. He has published two books: Competence-Based Curriculum for the Clerkship: Bridging the Gaps (2010) and Community-Based Education for Health Professions: Learning with the Brazilian Experience (2014). Over the past 10 years, he has been a resource for faculty development in curriculum design and student assessment for Latin America.

International FAIMER Institute 2004 Fellow
University of Cape Town
South Africa

Francois Cilliers is an Associate Professor in the Education Development Unit at the University of Cape Town’s Faculty of Health Sciences in South Africa. His interests include the learning effects of assessment, faculty development, and helping faculty undertake meaningful educational research. Francois taught physiology for almost a decade before moving to work primarily in educational development. He holds a Ph.D. in Health Professions Education from the University of Maastricht. Also medically qualified, he has worked in the field of HIV since 1992.

Francois is a 2004 FAIMER Institute Fellow and a faculty member of the Southern Africa-FAIMER Regional Institute (SAFRI). He teaches on the M.Phil.(Health Professions Education) at Stellenbosch University. He is involved in the South African Association of Health Educationalists (SAAHE) and originated what has become the annual conference of the organisation.

Oakland University William Beaumont School of Medicine
United States

Dr. Dalal is a pulmonary critical care sleep medicine physician at Beaumont Health, Michigan. He has served as a respiratory course co-director for M1 students for the last seven years for the Oakland University William Beaumont (OUWB) School of Medicine. He also works as Associate Program Director for the Pulmonary Critical Care Fellowship. He received the Teacher of the Year Award for seven years in a row at Beaumont Health, and the Clinical Educator Award from OUWB School of Medicine twice. His medical educational interests spread over the continuum of undergraduate medical education, graduate medical education, and continuing medical education. As a course director he is constantly involved in writing and modifying questions for mid-term exams, weekly quizzes, and final exams. He serves as member of the Exam Question Review Committee for OUWB Medicine.

He serves as mentor for several organizations including FAIMER, the Alliance for Academic Internal Medicine and the American College of Physicians apart from serving at his local institutes.

International FAIMER Institute 2010 Fellow
Seth G.S. Medical College and King Edward Memorial Hospital
India

Dr. Sucheta Dandekar is Professor of Biochemistry at Era’s Lucknow Medical College, Lucknow, India. She also is adjunct faculty at Manipal Academy of Health Education. She was formerly Professor and Head of the Department of Biochemistry at Seth G.S. Medical College and K.E.M. Hospital, Mumbai. She has to her credit five books and several publications in national and international journals. She has actively participated in all student-related activities and coordinated the student mentorship and parent teacher programs.

Dr. Dandekar is recipient of the Seth G. S. Medical College and K.E.M. Hospital Oration and the Awadesh Saran Oration awards. She received the University of Mumbai Oration in Biochemistry. Dr. Dandekar was given the Best Teacher Award by the Maharashtra University of Health Sciences. She is past president of the Association of Clinical Biochemists of India and has presented her research work at several national and international conferences. Dr. Dandekar was a visiting scientist at the University of Manitoba, Canada.

Dr. Dandekar was appointed to the Task Force of the Medical Council of India, Vision 2015, as a subject expert to draw the Biochemistry curriculum. She is an active member of the Medical Education Technology Cell at her institute. She serves as faculty at the GSMC-FAIMER, PSG-FAIMER, and MAHE-FAIMER Regional Institutes.

An International FAIMER Institute 2010 Fellow, Dr. Dandekar has been awarded the International Fellowship in Medical Education (IFME) and received the Master’s in Health Profession Education (MHPE) from Keele University, U.K. She has a keen interest in interprofessional education, integrating the basic sciences with clinical sciences and spreading the awareness of social accountability. Dr. Dandekar has conducted many workshops at the national level related to mentoring, early clinical experience, and interprofessional education, to name a few.

Temple University (retired)
United States

Dr. James Degnan was the Senior Director for Measurement and Institutional Research at Temple University. Now retired, Dr. Degnan continues to serve as a consultant to the University. Dr. Degnan developed and implemented programs used to assess student progress. He directed studies in the areas of applied statistics, psychometrics, program evaluation, educational research, testing, and public policy, and provided statistical analyses for university projects. Dr. Degnan served as an evaluator on several school reform initiatives including: Collaboratives for Excellence in Teacher Preparation (NSF), Restructuring Urban Schools for School Success (Pew), Philadelphia Standards Project—Mathematics (City of Philadelphia), North Philadelphia Community Compact (Pew), Capstone Program for Philadelphia Teachers and Students (City of Philadelphia and Temple University), Mathematics Academy for Science and Technology (Temple University), Early Mathematics Advising Program (Consortium of Pennsylvania Colleges), Statewide Grade 12/13 Mathematics Standards Project (Pew), Calculus on the Web Project (NSF), Policy Advisory Committees (Temple University), and Philadelphia School District Assessment Initiatives (Philadelphia School District Office of Assessment). He has served on a working group for the Governor’s Commission on College and Career Success (Pennsylvania), on an advisory committee on methodology for the Pennsylvania Legislative Office for Research Liaison (LORL), and on the College Ready Committee of the Mayor's Office of Education (Philadelphia). Dr. Degnan currently serves on the Executive Committee of the Board of Breakthrough of Greater Philadelphia – a program designed to provide a pathway to college for middle school students from low income families.

PSG-FAIMER Regional Institute 2008 Fellow
IFME 2015 Fellow
Pramukhswami Medical College
India

Dr. Amol Dongre is presently working as Head, Department of Extension Programme (SPARSH), Professor in Community Medicine and Medical Education at Prammukhswami Medical College, under Bhaikaka University, Karamsad, Gujarat, India. He received an International Fellowship in Medical Education (IFME) in 2015 and received his Master’s in Health Professions Education through the FAIMER-Keele program. Dr. Dongre has conducted 20 national level workshops on Qualitative Research Methods and six workshops on Mixed Methods Research. He is a regional faculty member for the PSG-FAIMER and MAHE-FAIMER Regional Institutes in Coimbatore and Manipal, India. His areas of interest and work are research and evaluation in the field of community-based health programmes and community-based medical education.

Clinical Skills Evaluation Collaboration
United States

Dr. Furman is Director of Quality Assurance for the Clinical Skills Evaluation Collaboration (CSEC), a partnership between the Educational Commission for Foreign Medical Graduates (ECFMG) and the National Board of Medical Examiners (NBME). CSEC is charged with the development and implementation of the United States Medical Licensing Examination (USMLE) Step 2 Clinical Skills (CS) examination, which employs standardized patients to evaluate the clinical skills of medical students and graduates seeking licensure in the United States. Dr. Furman’s role includes ensuring standardization of the Step 2 CS exam across the five test sites in the United States at which the exam is administered.

Prior to joining CSEC, Dr. Furman spent more than 20 years working with standardized patients and designing objective structured clinical examinations (OSCE). She was Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Saint Louis University School of Medicine and Director of the school’s Clinical Skills Center, where she managed the standardized patient program and served as Course Director for the Patient, Physician, and Society courses. She published the first study on the use of standardized patients to assess the clinical competence of medical students in an ambulatory care setting. Dr. Furman was a member of the NBME Midwestern Case Development Task Force (1990-1998), the NBME National Case Development Task Force (1998-1999), and the NBME Test Material Development Committee (2000-2003), and served as director for one of the pilot test centers for development of the USMLE Step 2 CS examination. She was also a member of ECFMG’s Test Development Committee (1996-2002), which developed standardized patient cases for use in the Clinical Skills Assessment (CSA), an examination used to evaluate the clinical and communication skills of international medical graduates pursuing ECFMG Certification from 1998-2004.

Dr. Furman is a former member of the Executive Board of the Association of Standardized Patient Educators (ASPE), an organization supporting the use of standardized patients in health professions education.

FAIMER
United States

Dr. Hallock is President Emeritus of the Educational Commission for Foreign Medical Graduates (ECFMG) and a FAIMER Senior Scholar. From 2001 to 2009, he served as President and CEO of ECFMG and as Chair of FAIMER’s Board of Directors.

Prior to joining ECFMG in 2001, Dr. Hallock served as the Dean of East Carolina University Brody School of Medicine (1988-2001) and as Vice Chancellor for Health Sciences at East Carolina University (1990-2001). He has held a wide variety of academic and administrative positions in medicine, including Associate Dean of All Children’s Hospital at the University of South Florida School of Medicine, Executive Dean and Professor of Pediatrics at the University of South Florida School of Medicine, and tenured Professor of Pediatrics at East Carolina University Brody School of Medicine.

Dr. Hallock is a Fellow of the Academy of Pediatrics. He is a Distinguished Service Member of the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) for his outstanding contributions to academic medicine and dedication and service to AAMC and the Council of Deans. He has served as a member of the National Board of Medical Examiners (NBME) Executive Board, the United States Medical Licensing Examination (USMLE) Composite Committee, the Institute for International Medical Education (IIME) Advisory Committee, and the World Federation for Medical Education (WFME) Task Force for Defining International Standards in Postgraduate Medical Education. In 2009, Dr. Hallock received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Association for Medical Education in Europe (AMEE).

ASU-MENA FAIMER Regional Institute 2019 Fellow
Assistant Professor, Menoufia University
Egypt

Dr. Hegazy is an Assistant Professor in the Family Medicine Department and Director of the Medical Education and Human Resources Development Center at Menoufia College of Medicine at Menoufia University in Egypt. A 2019 Fellow of the ASU-MENA FAIMER Regional Institute, she serves as a writer for the Applied Knowledge Test, examiner for the Objective Structured Clinical Examination, Chair of the Digital Transformation Committee, and member of the Scientific Board of the Egyptian Family Medicine Team of the MRCGP[INT]. She also serves as an Executive Member of the Working Party on Education of WONCA - World Organization of Family Doctors. In addition, she is Executive Board Member of the Egyptian Family Medicine Association and Associate Editor for the Egyptian Family Medicine Journal.

Dr. Hegazy received her Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery degree in 2005. She completed her residency in family medicine at the Menoufia Teaching Hospitals and earned her Master of Science in 2009. She earned her Doctor of Medicine degree in 2013 from Menoufia Medical College. She also holds a professional diploma in research methodology and program evaluation from the American University in Cairo, Egypt.

She joined the Family Medicine Department in 2004 and is involved in teaching courses offered in the diploma, master, and doctoral programs, as well as advising post-graduate students. In addition, she teaches undergraduate students and mentors them in their research.

She has organized and conducted over 50 workshops in more than 10 countries and has more than 30 peer-reviewed publications. Her workshops and publications have focused on curriculum assessment, program evaluation, family medicine, mental health, and teaching and learning.

Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia
United States

Dr. Henry Lin is a pediatric hepatologist at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia with an interest in healthcare advocacy and community development. His international experiences in public health and primary care have helped develop his passion for improving access to care for marginalized populations. As an educator, Dr. Lin enjoys mentorship and working with young professionals of tomorrow. He studies integrated approaches for graduate medical education as well as patient-clinician communication. Dr. Lin received his B.A. in Communications and M.D. from the University of Missouri-Kansas City. In his spare time, he enjoys traveling, eating Taiwanese food, barefoot running, fencing, and ceramics.

Drexel University Dornsife School of Public Health
Drexel College of Medicine
United States

Dr. Longjian Liu is an associate tenured professor of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at the Drexel University Dornsife School of Public Health, and an adjunct professor of Medicine at Drexel College of Medicine. He teaches and serves as an academic adviser for M.P.H. and Ph.D. students, as well as M.D./M.P.H. fellows. Dr. Liu’s research activities include three themes: (1) Epidemiological studies of cardiovascular disease and diabetes mellitus, using data from electronic medical records, regional, national, and international studies. (2) Big data analytics technology for pharmacoepidemiological and health outcomes studies. (3) Global health, focusing on cross-country comparisons of environmental risks and health policy for population and urban health studies. He is a Fellow of the American Heart Association and a Fellow of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science. Dr. Liu serves as Co-Chair of the Cardiovascular and Diabetes Research Interest Group of the American Public Health Association-Epidemiology Section. He has had more than 70 articles published in peer-reviewed academic journals and textbooks.

International FAIMER Institute 2017 Fellow
Associate Professor, Khyber Medical University
Pakistan

Dr. Usman Mahboob is an accomplished medical educationalist with more than 75 papers published in peer-reviewed journals. He also has authored a book chapter on data collection instruments and facilitated more than 35 workshops. Under his supervision, more than 70 students have completed master’s degrees in the last eight years. He is also a supervisor for doctorate and fellowship programmes. He is an avid researcher and has been principal and co-investigator for nationally and internationally funded projects and has won grants of more than 1.9 million pounds. He also is the Associate Editor for BMC Medical Education.

University of Pennsylvania
United States

Dr. Katherine Margo is a family medicine doctor and faculty member at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and is affiliated with multiple hospitals in the area, including Hospitals of the University of Pennsylvania-Penn Presbyterian and Penn Presbyterian Medical Center. She received her medical degree from State University of New York Upstate Medical University and has been in practice for 33 years. She has been the director of medical student programs in the Department of Family Medicine and Community Health and has a special interest in doctor-patient communications. Dr. Margo is active in a number of national organizations including the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine, where she serves as a member of the Medical Student Education Committee. She is also an Associate Editor for fmCASES, a series of online cases used by the majority of medical schools in the United States.

Temple University
United States

Dr. Murphy is Professor Emeritus at the Temple University Fox School of Business in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where he taught for 30 years. He has been a Senior Visiting Research Fellow at the King Abdullah Petroleum Studies and Research Center where he was participating in the development of energy models and writing policy analyses in a range of areas, including domestic energy use in Saudi Arabia, market power in world oil markets, and China’s energy economy. He works mainly in the area of energy-market forecasting and energy policy analysis.

Prior to joining Temple University, he was at the Energy Information Administration (EIA) and its predecessor, the Federal Energy Administration, where he headed the group that did the economic impact analyses of the bills and laws passed during the Carter administration and developed and ran the forecasting models then used for policy analyses and the forecasts in the EIA Annual Report.

He has authored more than 100 refereed articles. He was the Editor in Chief of the journal Interfaces, an Area Editor for Operations Research, and the INFOMRS Journal on Computing, and the Vice President of Publications for INFORMS and its predecessor society, Operations Research Society of America.

He has been involved in studying local economic policy issues, including advising the Tax Reform Commission of the City of Philadelphia, estimating the impact on jobs of building casinos in Philadelphia, and political redistricting. He has a B.A. in mathematics and a Ph.D. in operations research from Yale University. His recent research has been on political redistricting.

Drexel University College of Nursing and Health Professions
United States

Cheryl Portwood is Assistant Clinical Professor at the Drexel University College of Nursing and Health Professions in Philadelphia, PA. She teaches primarily on-line in the Master of Science in Nursing program and serves as Coordinator for the Nursing Leadership in Health Services Management track. Her particular area of interest is the use of influence as a means of achieving organizational goals.

As part of her faculty role, Professor Portwood previously served as Coordinator of Quality for Distance Learning Programs in Nursing. Her responsibilities included management of the secure testing program, monitoring courses for best practices, student and faculty satisfaction, and working with faculty to ensure quality in on-line courses. She has extensive experience teaching in the virtual environment and mentors faculty on design, development, and delivery of on-line courses. She has presented on topics related to on-line quality and secure testing both nationally and internationally. In 2008, she was honored by Drexel University as Online Teacher of the Year for the College of Nursing and Health Professions.

Prior to joining the Drexel faculty, Professor Portwood served in nursing and hospital executive leadership positions in the Delaware Valley for 17 years as Chief Nursing Officer and Vice President of Patient Care Services at Germantown Hospital and Medical Center and The Health Network of the Chester County Hospital. She is a Wharton–Johnson & Johnson Fellow in Management for Nurses and a past executive board member of the Southeastern Pennsylvania Organization of Nurse Leaders. She is a board-certified nursing executive.

In addition to her role as a FAIMER project advisor, Professor Portwood is currently serving as an advisor to a project jointly funded by USAID and the Ukrainian Federation of America to develop a model for deployment of a hospital-based electronic medical records system in Ukraine.

Temple University
United States

Dr. Portwood is currently a Professor of Human Resource Management and International Business in Temple University's Fox School of Business and Management. He is also Director of the Temple University Center for European Studies and since 1990, has been an adjunct Professor of Management at the Graduate School of Business, Central European University, Budapest, Hungary. Dr. Portwood was a Fulbright Fellow in Hungary in 1990-91, and has since led projects promoting economic and social transformation in Central and Eastern Europe funded by the United States Agency for International Development, the Soros Foundation, the Ukrainian Federation of America, and the World Bank. These projects include reform efforts in the public as well as private sectors. He has also worked as a consultant with such international companies as American Express, Nycomed Pharmaceuticals, General Motors, Ford Motor Company (Europe), Dominion Textiles (Canada), Manulife Insurance (Asia), McKinsey & Co. (Japan), NEC (Japan), KPMG (Europe), General Electric, British Telecom, Pioneer Seed (Hungary), and MOL-Hungarian Oil Company.

Dr. Portwood is an active scholar and author in the areas of International Human Resource Management, Global Change Management, and the Human Side of Organizational Transitions. His research and writings have appeared in such publications as the Academy of Management Journal, Journal of Vocational Behavior, Journal of Allied Health, Human Resource Planning, American Chamber of Commerce-Japan Journal, Industrial and Labor Relations Review, and Labor Law Journal. He has been a member of the editorial board of Human Resource Planning, President of the Careers Division of the National Academy of Management, and a peer reviewer for a variety of journals and professional associations. He has taught internationally in England, Italy, France, Japan, India, and Singapore as well as Hungary. He currently teaches the Leadership and Group Dynamics course in Temple’s Executive MBA programs in Philadelphia, Tokyo, and Singapore.

Dr. Portwood's current interests include tracking trends in international labor markets, especially the increasing use of offshoring and contingent workers as tools of strategic HR practice. He is also studying the impact of economic transitions in emerging economies, and the need for new management paradigms as these economies mature. Finally, he is studying strategic and labor market implications of the trend towards global product design and production. Most recently, Dr. Portwood has been working on a project to improve healthcare availability in rural areas of Ukraine through use of web-based technology. He has also worked on healthcare development projects in Hungary, Poland, India, Cameroon, and Egypt.

Ross University School of Medicine
United States

Dr. Vijay Rajput is a Chair and Professor of Medicine at Ross University School of Medicine (RUSM). He also serves as Associate Dean for Academic and Student Affairs for RUSM. Prior to joining RUSM, he served as the Head for Division of Medical Education in the Department of Medicine for Cooper Medical School of Rowan University, New Jersey from 2010-2015. Dr. Rajput served as Program Director of the Internal Medicine residency at Cooper University Hospital, UMDNJ/Robert Wood Johnson Medical School in Camden, New Jersey from 2004-2012. He served as Assistant Dean for curriculum for development of new Cooper Medical School from 2010-2013. Dr. Rajput was an associate fellow at the Center for Bioethics at University of Pennsylvania from 2009-2013. He was active in clinical medicine as senior academic hospitalist for the last 18 years at Cooper University Hospital. He was chair of the ethics committee for Cooper Hospital for 13 years. He is a member of and has served on several committees for the American College for Physicians (ACP), Association for Program Director in Internal Medicine (APDIM), and the Society of Hospital Medicine (SHM). He also served as a senior note rater for USMLE Step 2 Clinical Skills examination for the Clinical Skills Evaluation Collaboration [a National Board of Medical Examiners (NBME) and Educational Commission for Foreign Medical Graduates (ECFMG) collaborative].

Dr. Rajput was a key founding member for the new Cooper Medical School of Rowan University’s curriculum and student affairs committees. He developed many new innovative curricula and serves as course director for innovative courses like the Chronic Care clerkship, LifeStages and the Foundation of Medical Practice. He has authored or co-authored more than 80 papers, abstracts, and book chapters. He has presented more than 160 seminars, workshops, and grand rounds at national, international, and regional educational conferences. Over the last 20 years, he has received more than 15 “Excellence in Teaching” awards from students and residents. He was awarded the ACGME Parker J. Palmer “Courage to Teach Award” in 2011. He also received the prestigious Christian R. and Mary F. Lindback Foundation award for distinguished Teaching in 2006 and was inducted in the UMDNJ’s Master Educator Guild in 2005. In 2004, Dr. Rajput received an “Excellence in Teaching Award” from the Society of Hospital Medicine. He also received the 2015 laureate award from the New Jersey chapter of the American College of Physicians (ACP).

Dr. Rajput’s main areas of interest are bedside teaching, professionalism, ethics and humanism in medicine, student mentoring, and curriculum development. He lives in Pembroke Pines, Florida.

Jefferson
United States

Dr. Rattner is Professor of Medicine with a secondary appointment as Professor of Family and Community Medicine. She has served in medical college administrative leadership roles for over 25 years, first in Student Affairs at Hahnemann University and for the past 20 years in Academic Affairs at Jefferson. From 2009-2013, she served as Vice Dean for Academic Affairs /UME with primary responsibility for curriculum planning, development and evaluation, for accreditation and for UME-related mission-based budget allocation. She continues to provide patient care with the Division of Internal Medicine; this practice earned Level 3 Patient-Centered Medical Home designation in 2011.

Dr. Rattner is actively involved with the Center for Research in Medical Education in support activities for students and faculty. She has been a principal investigator and collaborator in several externally-funded medical education projects and has a special interest in professionalism and interprofessional education.

People’s Light & Theatre
United States

Mary Beth Scallen (known as “MB”) is a professional stage actor, writer of mystery fiction, and educational consultant. She lives just outside Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in the United States. She has coached business executives, teachers, and medical professionals on effective verbal and physical communication skills, and ways to help students take enthusiastic charge of their own learning. She works regularly with FAIMER, Trident Publishing Holdings, People’s Light (a professional company outside of Philadelphia), and numerous other city theaters. She has taught at Temple University, West Chester University, and the University of Pennsylvania. She lives with her partner Tom, a theatre stage manager; and their pets, an old, sleepy dog named Brody, and a young, naughty cat named Dexter.

International FAIMER Institute 2008 Fellow
Topiwala National Medical College & BYL Nair Charitable Hospital
India

Dr. Henal Shah has been Co-Director of the GSMC-FAIMER Regional Institute since December 2018. Dr. Shah also is a Professor (Additional) in the Department of Psychiatry at Nair Hospital in Mumbai, India. Having obtained her master’s degree in psychiatry from King Edward Memorial (KEM) Hospital in Mumbai, she gained experience at the Royal Hospital for Sick Children in Glasgow, Scotland. On returning to Mumbai she has been working at KEM Hospital followed by her current position at Nair Hospital. She is keenly interested in the area of child and adolescent psychiatry and has presented and published in this field.

She is passionate about medical education and received a Master of Health Professions Education from the University of Maastricht in 2010. She was awarded a Fellowship in medical education by FAIMER Philadelphia in 2008 and GSMC-FAIMER in 2006. Since then she has been a faculty member for FAIMER and other health professional education forums.

She has received the Bai Savitribai Phule Award from the Mayor of Mumbai for excellence in work and contributions to health services of MCGM (Municipal corporation) and an International Fellowship for Medical Education (IFME) awarded by Foundation for Advancement of International Medical Education and Research (FAIMER). She has been awarded a St. Vincent’s Foundation Thomas Trauer Grant for Development of a skills-based fellowship training program in child and adolescent psychiatry in Mumbai.

International Leadership and Fellowship Consultant
United States

Diane Shoemaker is an international leadership and fellowship consultant. She served Eisenhower Fellowships for 30 years, selecting and coaching leaders from around the world in her role as Program Director under the Chairmanship of President George H. W. Bush, Dr. Henry Kissinger, and General Colin Powell, respectively. She has assisted a generation of women and men to become outstanding leaders in government, business, healthcare, NGOs, and the arts. While serving as Senior Director for the global alumni network, Diane was noted for strategically nurturing active engagement among professionals at the highest levels.

Diane organized and directed Women’s Leadership Conferences in Miami, London, and Philadelphia and served as lead staff in organizing international thematic conferences in Paris, Colombo, Rome, and Santiago. She was instrumental in launching Eisenhower Fellowship’s Youth Leadership Initiative. Diane is a founding member of the Global Leadership Consortium, which includes Yale World Fellows, Ashoka, German Marshall Memorial Fellows, TED Fellows, the Aspen Institute, Harvard Loeb Fellows, and Kellogg Fellows Leadership Alliance.

Currently, Diane is an advisor for MyPhy, Geneva, Switzerland; the Center for Asian African Studies in Islamabad, Pakistan; and FAIMER. She is an honorary Eisenhower Fellow with the Eisenhower Fellows of Philadelphia.

Diane received a B.A. in Political Science from the State University of New York at Cortland, Cortland, New York and an M.A. in Government and Foreign Affairs from the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia.

International FAIMER Institute 2007 Fellow
Faculty of Medicine, Suez Canal University
Egypt

Wagdy Talaat joined FAIMER as a FAIMER Institute Fellow in 2007. In 2009, he joined the FAIMER Institute faculty.

Dr. Talaat holds a Ph.D. in Pathology jointly between Boston University in the United States and Suez Canal University in Egypt. He received his medical education training and earned his diplomas during the early 1980s.

In 2001, Dr. Talaat established the first Medical Education Department in Egypt and the eastern Mediterranean region at the Medical School of Suez Canal University in Egypt. In March 2004, in collaboration with Dr. Jan van Dalen from the Netherlands, he launched the Joint Master of Health Professions Education, an international distance learning program administered by Suez Canal University and Maastricht University. In October 2008, as his FAIMER fellowship innovation project, he launched the Diploma of Health Professions Education, a national distance-learning program that serves Egyptian health professionals. In 2010, he launched the Arabic Diploma of Health Professions Education in collaboration with the World Health Organization (WHO). Hundreds of senior-level faculty in health professions education graduate annually from these three medical education programs, including presidents of medical universities, deans of health professions education institutions, chairpersons, and full professors.

Dr. Talaat has also worked for more than 25 years as a WHO Consultant for health manpower development and, since 2003, as a WHO Accreditation Project Director in Egypt and the Eastern Mediterranean region.

Dr. Talaat is an author of four WHO books in medical education, the most recent titled Community Based Education in Health Professions: Global Perspectives.

In 2010, Dr. Talaat was granted the International Award for Leadership and Management from Management Science for Health in Boston, USA.

In 2017, he became the President of the Egyptian Society for Medical Education.

International FAIMER Institute 2009 Fellow
IFME 2012 Fellow
Aga Khan University
Pakistan

Dr. Muhammad Tariq is employed by the Aga Khan University (AKU), Karachi, Pakistan, where he has served as Interim Associate Dean Education and Interim Chair Department for Educational Development since December 2015. He is an Associate Professor and Section Head of Internal Medicine and a practicing Internist. Dr. Tariq served as Director of Postgraduate Programs in the AKU Department of Medicine from 2008-2015, and as Program Director of Internal Medicine from 2001-2011. He graduated from Dow Medical College (now Dow University of Health Sciences) in 1992 and completed his residency in internal medicine at Aga Khan University in 1998. He was awarded Membership of the Royal College of Physicians (MRCP) in the UK in 2001, and was advanced to a Fellowship of the Royal College of Physicians (FRCP) of Edinburgh and London in 2011 and 2013, respectively. Dr. Tariq became a Fellow of the American College of Physicians (FACP) in 2009. He was selected as a FAIMER Institute Fellow in 2009 and completed his two-year fellowship in 2011. In 2012, he was awarded an International Fellowship in Medical Education (IFME) by FAIMER, to pursue a Master’s degree in Health Professions Education (MHPE) at Maastricht University, Netherlands. Dr. Tariq became Supervisor for the Fellowship of the College of Physicians & Surgeons (FCPS) at the College of Physicians & Surgeons, Pakistan in 2005 and became Examiner for FCPS Internal Medicine in 2012. He is a bird lover, and particularly enjoys pigeons and parrots.

University of Illinois at Chicago College of Medicine
United States

Dr. Tekian is Professor and Director of International Affairs for the Department of Medical Education (DME), and the Associate Dean for the Office of International Education at the College of Medicine, University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC). He joined DME in 1992 and is involved in teaching courses offered in the Master of Health Professions Education and the doctoral programs, as well as advising graduate students. Prior to joining DME, he was the founding Director of the first medical education department in Saudi Arabia at King Saud University, College of Medicine in Riyadh (1983–1990). He served during the 80s and 90s as a consultant to the World Health Organization (WHO) Eastern Mediterranean Regional Office for projects in the Division of Development of Human Resources for Health. Dr. Tekian established several medical education departments/units in Eastern Mediterranean countries.

Dr. Tekian is an internationally recognized scholar and leader in health professions education. He has organized and conducted over 300 workshops in more than 45 countries and 60 cities, as well as presented over 250 keynote addresses nationally and internationally. He has more than 160 peer-reviewed publications and is the Principal Investigator of 15 research and training grants totaling more than $5 million. His consultations and workshops have focused on curriculum development, assessment, program evaluation, accreditation, simulations, and international medical education. Dr. Tekian is the senior author of the book Innovative Simulations for Assessing Professional Competence: From Paper-and-Pencil to Virtual Reality published in 1999.

Ara Tekian has received numerous honors and awards including an honorary doctorate by the Tashkent University in Uzbekistan (1996), Teaching Recognition Program Award by UIC in 2007, the Association for the Study of Medical Education Gold Medal Award in 2012, Lifetime Achievement Award by the Armenian American Medical Society (2014), the American Educational Research Association (AERA) Division I’s Distinguished Career Award (2017), Ellis Island Medal of Honor (2017), and the highly competitive UIC Award for Excellence in Teaching (2018). He has served as the President of the Division of Education in the Professions for AERA from 2009–2012, which is a major venue for presentation of scholarship in health professions education. Currently, he is the Chief Editor for the Springer-ICPE Book Series. His involvement with FAIMER extends for over two decades.

Temple University
United States

Donna Weiss, Ph.D., OTR/L, FAOTA, earned a B.S. and M.A. in Occupational Therapy from Columbia University and New York University and a Ph.D. in Psychoeducational Processes from Temple University. She is a licensed occupational therapist, a Fellow of the American Occupational Therapy Association, and is certified by The Leading Clinic as a coach/consultant in Appreciative Inquiry and Whole System IQ^™.

Dr. Weiss is associate professor emeritus at the College of Health Professions and Social Work at Temple University, where she served as a faculty member in the Department of Rehabilitation Sciences and Associate Dean for Academic and Student Affairs. She taught classes in pediatric intervention, group dynamics, leadership, clinical education and fieldwork supervision and outcomes measurement and administered curriculum development, admission and enrollment, teaching/learning evaluations, student relations and faculty development initiatives.

She is the lead editor of A Practitioner’s Guide to Clinical Occupational Therapy, 2nd Edition (2012) published by Pro-Ed and The Interprofessional Health Care Team: Leadership and Development (2013) published by Jones & Bartlett Learning.

Dr. Weiss is a consultant in the areas of interpersonal communication, group dynamics, and leadership. She believes that positive communication can engage imaginations, broaden possibilities, and empower action for personal, professional, and organizational sustainability and growth.

Saint Peter’s University Hospital
United States

Dr. Zetkulic is Associate Program Director of the Internal Medicine Residency Program and Chief of General Internal Medicine at Saint Peter’s University Hospital. In addition, she is Assistant Professor of Medicine at Drexel University. She has particular interest in the education and evaluation of International Medical Graduates (IMGs). She has worked on programs to assess and ameliorate communication skills in IMGs. In February 2012 she traveled to Kasoa, Ghana to work and she hopes to be able to have an opportunity to do clinical skills training there. She has lectured on Patient Safety in Graduate Medical Education. She has also introduced a Certificate of Business Administration into the Residency curriculum in conjunction with Rutgers University, where she is also an Adjunct Assistant Professor.

She is a graduate of Robert Wood Johnson Medical School and has been presented the Humanism and Professionalism Award for her work in the Internal Medicine Residency Program. In addition, she was presented with the Chairman’s Award by the Department of Medicine for her work in the Internal Medicine Residency Program as well as the Excellence in Teaching Award in 2009-2010. She was voted Physician of the Year in 2011 by the Medical and Dental staff of Saint Peter’s University Hospital.