Secondary & Adjunct Faculty Appointments
The growing interest in global health by incoming and current students, residents, fellows and faculty makes investment in resources and individuals with experience in global health essential for the College. As we build a strong, campus-wide Global Health Program, it is imperative to access medical providers in the field who are addressing global health disparities. The disease burden and health complications within resource-limited countries are wholly different than what our trainees experience locally. Secondary and adjunct faculty can assist in educating our trainees about the complicated healthcare systems that are affected by cultural, socioeconomic, and environmental difficulties.
Adjunct Faculty
Dr. Aaron Andersen completed his medical degree at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health in 2008 and his Emergency Medicine Residency at the Medical College of Wisconsin in June 2011. Prior to beginning his medical education, Dr. Andersen taught English to individuals for whom English was a second language. This activity ignited his interest in international issues and his on-going personal and professional dedication to global health issues. He has had educational experiences in Japan and Mexico and has also completed a global semester abroad in several countries including Switzerland, Greece, Egypt and Nepal. Dr. Anderson is currently working with Emergency Medicine Specialists, S.C. and is staffing the Emergency Department at Wheaton Hospitals.
Dr. David Gaus received his bachelor’s degree in Accounting from the University of Notre Dame. After graduating from Notre Dame, Dr. Gaus lived in rural Ecuador and astonished with the lack of the most basic medical services, he returned to the United States and in 1992, Dr. Gaus earned his MD and his Master’s in Public Health and Tropical Medicine from Tulane University. He then completed his residency at the University of Wisconsin Family Practice Residency Training, St. Luke’s Hospital. In 1996, Dr. Gaus and Fr. Hesburgh founded Andean Health & Development (AHD) to provide self-sustainable, comprehensive health care in poor, rural areas of Latin America. AHD now serves as an advisor to the World Health Organization’s vision to renew the role of the rural hospital in primary healthcare. He is the Executive Director of Hospital Pedro Vicente Maldonado in Ecuador, Adjunct Professor – Universidad de San Francisco de Quito. Statewide, he holds the positions of Emergency Department staff physician at St. Luke’s Hospital and Adjunct Professor with the Tulane University Department of Tropical Medicine and of Medicine, University of Wisconsin. Additionally, Dr. Gaus is a well-respected, clinically active Assistant Clinical Professor at the University Of Wisconsin Department of Family Medicine.
Dr. Eric Kroner completed his pediatric residency, fellowship in emergency medicine and received a Masters in Bioethics at the Medical College of Wisconsin and most recently served as Assistant Professor in the Department of Pediatrics, Emergency Medicine. Dr. Kroner’s research interests are in vulnerable populations, emergency department reliance and global health. Dr. Kroner left the Medical College of Wisconsin in August 2010 to pursue the position of medical doctor with The Evangelical Alliance Mission (TEAM) in Am Timan, Chad which illustrates his personal and professional dedication to global health.
Dr. Angela Thomas completed her undergraduate training at Bethel College in St. Paul, Minnesota and her medical training at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas. She completed a Family Practice Residency at University of Minnesota Family Practice Department, North Memorial Medical Center. She went on to accept an academic appointment as Assistant Professor of Family Medicine and Director of Undergraduate Medical Education at Conroe Family Medicine Residency Program and Lone Star Family Health Center in Conroe, Texas, where she has been working for the past six years. Following a desire to continue to work with different cultures, but in an international setting, Dr. became a Medical Director at Hillside Healthcare International (HHCI) located in Eldridgeville, Toledo District, Belize. The Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW) and HHCI have a close affiliation and MCW faculty, medical students, and residents regularly serve at the HHCI clinic in Belize.
Dr. Wendy Watson completed a master’s degree in Cell Biology from Perdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana in 1976. She received her medical degree at Indiana School of Medicine in Indianapolis, Indiana in 1981. In 1988 she joined the Medical College of Wisconsin as an Assistant Professor of Anesthesiology, a position she held until her retirement in December 2010. While at the Medical College of Wisconsin she also advised students in the Global Health Pathway and served on the Human Research Review Committee from 1993-2000. Additionally, Dr. Watson volunteered her time as a teacher at Kilimanjaro Christian Medical College in Moshi, Tanzania, Bugando Medical Center in Mwanz, Tanzania, Nelson Mandela Teaching Hospital in Umtata, South Africa and Vellore Christian Medical College in Vellore, India. Dr. Watson is currently a staff physician of the Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) international medical humanitarian organization. Since her retirement she has traveled to South Sudan, Nigeria and Sri Lanka.
Dr. Shankuan Zhu completed his medical degree at Zhejiang University School of Medicine in Hangzhou, China in 1988. Following graduation he conducted research in the Department of Public Health, Nagoya University School of Medicine in Nagoya, Japan and received a PhD in Medical Science from the same institution in 1997. From 2000-2003 he was a post-doctoral research fellow at the Obesity Research Center, Institute of Human Nutrition, College of Physicians & Surgeons, Columbia University, New York, New York. Dr. Zhu’s research interests are in obesity, metabolic syndrome, cardiovascular disease and diabetes prevention and injury prevention and control. Since 2003, Dr. Zhu has served as an assistant professor at the Medical College of Wisconsin and currently is an Adjunct Senior Epidemiologist and Associate Adjunct Professor. Additionally, Dr. Zhu is the Director of the Obesity and Body Composition and Injury Control Research Centers at the Zhejiang University School of Medicine and the Executive Dean of the Zhejiang University School of Public Health.
Secondary Faculty
Dr. M. Riccardo Colella received his undergraduate training at the University of Maryland-Baltimore County in Baltimore, MD and medical school training at the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine in Philadelphia, PA where he also received the National Health Service Corps/Maine Ambulatory Care Coalition the Rural Primary Care Fellowship Award. He completed an internship in Internal Medicine at Cook County Hospital/Midwestern University in Chicago, Illinois, his residency in Emergency Medicine at the Medical College of Georgia in Augusta, Georgia and a fellowship in Emergency Medical Services at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, Maryland. He also earned a Master in Public Health from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, Gillings School of Public Health in Chapel Hill. Dr. Colella is an Associate Professor and Global Exchange Program Director in the Department of Emergency Medicine at the Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW)and an Affiliate Faculty in the Injury Research Center. In addition, he is the Assistant Director of Medical Services at Milwaukee County Emergency Medical Services (EMS) and Medical Director and Chief Medical Officer of Flight For Life Milwaukee, WI.
Dr. Peter Layde received his undergraduate and medical degrees at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He earned a Master of Science degree from the London (England) School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. He completed an internship in Internal Medicine at the Montreal General Hospital/McGill University in Quebec, Canada. Dr. Layde served as a Commissioned Officer of the U.S. Public Health Service from 1977-1987. During this time, he completed an Epidemic Intelligence Service and Preventative Medicine Residency Program at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta, GA and was Director of the Division of Chronic Disease Control at the CDC. Dr. Layde is currently Professor in the Department of Emergency Medicine and Associate Chair for Global and Public Health at the Medical College of Wisconsin and Co-director of the Injury Research Center. Dr. Layde is also Co-Director of the Healthy Wisconsin Leadership Institute, which conducts health policy training for public health professionals throughout the state of Wisconsin. Moreover, in September, 2011 Dr. Layde was appointed as the first Ombuds for the Medical College of Wisconsin and serves as a confidential, impartial and informal resource for faculty, staff physicians, postdoctoral fellows and staff with whom to voice concerns.
Dr. Jacquelyn (Jackie) Kuzminski received her undergraduate and medical school training at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and her Pediatric residency training at the Medical College of Wisconsin which is affiliated with Children's Hospital of Wisconsin. Dr. Kuzminski has worked internationally in Kenya and extensively in Belize. She is on the Board of Directors for Hillside Healthcare International, a Non-Government Organization (NGO) forced on improving healthcare, education and community empowerment in the Southern part of Belize. Dr. Kuzminski has been involved in education efforts to train Belizean healthcare providers in neonatal resuscitation and maintains a continued relationship with national Belizean healthcare leaders. Dr. Kuzminski is the Associate Director of the Pediatric Global Health Program for the Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW). She is an assistant professor of pediatrics and works at Children's Hospital of Wisconsin as a pediatric hospitalist.
Dr. Theodore (Ted) MacKinney received his undergraduate education at Wheaton College in Wheaton, Illinois and medical degree at the Medical College of Wisconsin in 1985. He completed his internship and residency at Francis Scott Key Medical Center (Now Bayview Med Center), Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland. Later he earned a Master’s in Public Health at John’s Hopkins University in 1991. Before coming to the Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW), he was also a clinical instructor at John’s Hopkins University, Medical Director of the Highlandtown Health Center in Baltimore, Maryland and Medical Director at Francis Scott Key Medical Center. Dr. MacKinney joined the MCW in 1991 and currently serves as Associate Professor of Medicine, a position he has held since 2010 and Director of Internal Medicine Continuity Clinic Rotation at the Medical College of Wisconsin. Dr. MacKinney has devoted most of his personal and professional life to educating and serving the people of Nepal. In 1993 he founded the Living River Health Services in Nepal of which he was Medical Director until 2000. His work in Nepal also includes starting a teaching and mission hospital, directing two hospitals, managing hospital staff and establishing the first diabetes specialty clinic in the country. Dr. MacKinney has trained countless Nepalese physicians, residents and medical students. While still maintaining a fulltime faculty position at the Medical College of Wisconsin with an abbreviated clinical schedule, he now provides clinical care and teaching in Nepal ten months out of the year.
Dr. Paula North received her undergraduate training at the University of Virginia, doctoral training in Molecular Biology at Vanderbilt University and medical school training at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. She completed her Pathology residency at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. She has been a Professor of Pathology with Tenure and Chief of Pediatric Pathology since 2005. Also since 2005, Dr. North has been the Pathology Specialty Practice Unit Leader for Children’s Specialty Group and Director of Children’s Research Institute (CRI) Histology and Imaging Core Research Laboratories. In 2008, she founded and became Director of the CRI Pediatric BioBank and Tissue Analytical Core at the Medical College of Wisconsin. Moreover, since 2010 Dr. North has been an Associate Director of the Children’s Research Institute of the Medical College of Wisconsin/Children’s Health and Hospital System. Dr. North has a strong and long-standing academic partnership with the Yantalo Peru Foundation, a non-government, not-for-profit organization providing healthcare and education in the Peruvian Amazon. She was recently awarded, as Principal Investigator, a grant from the National Institutes of Health’s Fogarty International Center grant (Exploratory Planning for a Proposed GEOHealth Hub in Peru).
Dr. Nicole (Nikki) St Clair received her undergraduate and medical school training at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and her pediatric residency training at the Boston Combined Residency Program in Pediatrics, with Harvard Medical School and Boston University. Dr. St Clair has worked internationally in Mexico, Haiti, Lesotho and Belize. Dr. St Clair is the Director of the Pediatric Global Health Program, which was founded in 2007 when she arrived at the Medical College of Wisconsin. She is an assistant professor of pediatrics and works at Children's Hospital of Wisconsin as a pediatric hospitalist. She has developed global health residency training programs with pediatric residents at Children's Hospital Boston, Boston Medical Center, and in 2010 started a 3-year global health residency training track at Children's Hospital Wisconsin. Dr. St Clair’s primary global health areas of interest are in exposing US-based medical trainees to health disparities, providing insight into how to practice medicine with limited resources, developing sustainable academic partnerships with international colleagues, and utilizing educational and clinical services to address health disparities.
Dr. Lauren Wiebe received her undergraduate training at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts and medical school training at Columbia University in New York City. She completed both her internal medicine residency and fellowship in medical oncology at the University of Chicago Medical Center. In 2008, Dr. Wiebe received the ASCO Foundation Merit Award for an oral abstract of a phase ll trial in gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GIST). She also participated in a NIH Student Summer Research Fellowship in Clinical Breast Cancer and another NIH Student Research Fellowship in Basic Science, Target Validation Testing. Dr. Wiebe also completed a fellowship in Clinical Medical Ethics at the MacLean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics, University of Chicago and another fellowship in Hospice and Palliative Medicine at Northwestern Memorial Hospital. She serves as an Executive Board Member of Hospice Africa USA, an organization whose mission is to support affordable, suitable and accessible Palliative Care to those in need in Uganda and other African countries. Dr. Wiebe travels to Uganda regularly to assist in advancing their clinical and research efforts. Dr. Wiebe is currently Assistant Professor of Medicine in the Division of Hematology and Oncology.