New Faculty in the Department of Medicine

Faculty

Samuel Bailin, M.D.

Samuel Bailin, MD

Medical School: University of Iowa

Division
ID
University of Iowa Roy J. and Lucille A. Carver College of Medicine
Hometown
Des Moines, IA

Sam grew up in Des Moines, Iowa, along with his three siblings. He attended the University of Iowa where he majored in evolutionary biology and studied population genetics. While at Iowa, he ran varsity cross-country and track for the Hawkeyes. He went on to attend medical school at Iowa where he developed an interest in nephrology and infectious diseases. He plans to pursue a career in nephrology and work at an academic center. Sam was lucky to find a group of friends that he continues to run with despite multiple running injuries. In his spare time, he also enjoys swimming, disc golfing, backpacking, and playing classical piano. While Iowa provided a great environment for growing up, he is excited to join the Vanderbilt team, meet his fellow interns, and experience the vibrant city of Nashville. He is also hoping that winter running won’t be as miserable further south. Member of AOA.

Raigan Burkall-Lewis, MD

Raigan Burkall-Lewis

Instructor in Clinical Medicine

raigan.burkall-lewis@vumc.org
Division
IM
M.D. - Michigan State University
Dr. Burkall-Lewis' clinical interests include musculoskeletal, dermatological, genetic and infectious conditions. She enjoys working with pediatric and geriatric patients as well as patients with special needs.
Meredith Gerhart, MS

Meredith Gerhart, MS

Associate in Medicine, Division of Genetic Medicine

Division
GE
MS - Northwestern University
Meredith received a Master of Science in Genetic Counseling from Northwestern University and began her career as the first cancer genetic counselor at Baptist MD Anderson Cancer Center in Jacksonville, Florida. During her time in Florida from 2014-2018, Meredith helped grow the program by facilitating the incorporation of genetics into the EMR, initiating billing for services, coordinating grant funding for genetic testing coverage, and adding an additional genetic counselor and a genetic counseling assistant. In 2018, Meredith moved to California where she worked as a cancer genetic counselor at Stanford Health Care from 2018-2020. While at Stanford, Meredith was a member of a small team that received a clinical innovation grant to create video content for pre-test counseling and coordinated cancer genetics rotations for the internal medicine residents. Meredith also served as a primary advisor for a genetic counseling student research project and worked as a primary clinical supervisor through the training program. Meredith is excited to have moved back to her home state of Tennessee with her husband and two young daughters.
Laura A Bryant Heller

Laura A Bryant Heller, MD

Instructor of Clinical Medicine

laura.a.bryant@vanderbilt.edu
Division
IM
Previous Role/Title
Resident
Specialty
Internal Medicine
MD - Indiana University School of Medicine
BS - Pharmaceutical Sciences, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana
Hometown
Indianapolis, IN

Laura attended medical school at Indiana University School of Medicine in Indianapolis, Indiana. She completed her residency in internal medicine at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, where she served as a co-chair of the Residency Health & Wellness Committee. She is thrilled to stay on at Vanderbilt as a hospitalist.

Suman Kundu, DSc

Research Assistant Professor of Medicine

Division
CA
Previous Role/Title
Biostatistician
Specialty
Cardiovascular Disease, Statistical Modeling
Hometown
Nashville, Tennessee
Prior to joining at Vanderbilt in 2015, he received his DSc in Epidemiology from Erasmus University in the Netherlands and MSc in Mathematics from Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur in India. Dr. Kundu has an extensive documented record of authorship in his field of endeavor. Dr. Kundu’s work has resulted in 23 peer-reviewed scientific articles, including Nature Genetics, JAMA and Neurology. Dr. Kundu has conducted peer review for several journals, including BMC Medical Informatics and Decision Making, the European Journal of Heart Failure, Diabetologia and American Journal of Public Health.

Jennifer Montague, MD

Instructor in Clinical Medicine, Division of General Internal Medicine and Public Health

Division
IM
MD - University of Michigan Medical School
Dr. Montague received her BS in biology from Wheaton College and her MD from the University of Michigan. She completed her residency in family medicine at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. Upon completing residency, she moved to Middle Tennessee where she has been providing family medical care in a community outpatient office for the past 16 years. She is married to a physician and has two children. When away from work, she enjoys watching her children compete in swimming and soccer. She also loves to read, quilt, and watch Michigan football.
Dawn Pedrotty, MD, PhD

Dawn Pedrotty, MD, PhD

Assistant Professor of Medicine

Division
CA
Previous Role/Title
Senior Associate Consultant
Specialty
General Cardiology
MD - Duke University
PhD - Duke University
Hometown
Massillon, Ohio
Dr. Pedrotty's clinical interests include inflammatory cardiomyopathies specifically myocarditis and cardiac sarcoidosis, as well as advanced heart failure therapies. She is intersted in arrhythmias in heart failure, specifically early detection of arrhythmias and prevention of sudden cardiac death. She is committed to myocarditis and sarcoidosis clinical research.
She also has a PhD in biomedical engineering with a research focus on translational investigation. The focus of her research includes (1) novel device development, (2) the development and application of novel cardiac biomaterials, (3) three-dimensional printing for cardiac applications, and (4) the study of cardiac arrhythmias and electrophysiology, specifically in heart failure pathology.
She is passionate about volunteering in her community and mentoring. She loves animals. She enjoys traveling, indoor cycling, and Pilates.
Mamatha Pinninti, MBBS

Mamatha Pinninti, MBBS

Assistant Professor of Clinical Medicine

Division
CA
Previous Role/Title
Advanced Heart Failure and Transplant Cardiology and General Cardiology
Specialty
Advanced Heart Failure and Transplant Cardiology
MBBS - Kakatiya Medical College
Hometown
Hanamkonda, Telangana, India
Dr. Pinninti is interested in clinical research in cardiomyopathy, general and advanced Heart Failure and cardiogenic shock. She published multiple manuscripts in different subspecialties of cardiology including Advanced heart failure and LVAD population.
Dr. Pinninti provides care for patients with heart failure, cardiomyopathy, cardiogenic shock, left ventricular assist devices, heart transplantation, heart valve problems, arrhythmias, chest pain and shortness of breath. She works hard to be the patient’s advocate and to establish trust and relationship with her patients and families to achieve successful outcomes. She is highly recommended by her patients and colleagues for her passion towards patient care.
Outside profession, Dr. Pinninti enjoys biking, gardening and traveling with family.
Robert Ramirez

Robert Ramirez, DO

Associate Professor of Medicine

Division
HO
MD - New Jersey-School of Osteopathic Medicine
Dr. Robert Ramirez is a medical oncologist specializing in the treatment of thoracic and neuroendocrine malignancies.  He earned his medical degree from the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey School of Osteopathic Medicine. He completed an internal medicine residency at Cooper University Hospital in Camden, New Jersey. He then completed a hematology and medical oncology fellowship at the University of Tennessee Health Sciences Center in Memphis, Tennessee and served as chief fellow. He is a Fellow of the American College of Physicians, and a member of American Society of Clinical Oncology, the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer (IASLC), and the North American Neuroendocrine Tumor Society (NANETS).  He is a member of the Communications Committee for the IASLC and is a member of the Nominating as well as the Scientific Review and Research Committees for NANETS.
His clinical and research interests include neuroendocrine tumors (NETs) and lung cancer.  He has a specific interest in NETs of the lung ranging from diffuse idiopathic neuroendocrine tumor cell hyperplasia (DIPNECH) and carcinoid tumors to small cell lung cancer and other high-grade neuroendocrine carcinomas. He is active in clinical trial design including investigator-initiated trials. He was part of the teaching faculty at the Louisiana State University Health Science Center and Ochsner Medical Center in New Orleans and in 2017 won the Ochsner Research Mentor of the Year for Fellows and Residents award. While he enjoys teaching trainees, he also has given many lectures for patients and the scientific community.

Lili Wang, PhD

Research Instructor, Division of Clinical Pharmacology

Division
CP
PhD - Auburn University
Ph.D. - Auburn University
Dr. Wang’s research interest is to understand the biology of cardiac arrhythmia. Lili uses human-induced pluripotent stem cell-derived cardiomyocytes as models to study genetic arrhythmia disorders. Her research focus is in three parts: (1) Improve the maturation of hiPSC-CMs: Lili and colleagues discovered the Matrigel Mattress method, which provides the physiological load to hiPSC-CMs to generate cells with aligned myofilaments and sarcomere length similar in adult cardiomyocytes. This greatly enhances maturation of hiPSC-CMs and was published in Circulation Research (2015). Later, Lili discovered that the combination of thyroid and glucocorticoid hormone can promote structural and electrophysiological maturation of hiPSC-CMs. She presented this work at AHA scientific session (2016), which was published in Circulation Research (2017). (2) Understand the arrhythmia mechanism in sarcomeric cardiomyopathy: Lili used hiPSC-CMs as an experimental model to demonstrate myofilament Ca-buffering dependent action potential triangulation, a novel arrhythmogenic mechanism in hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM), published in Journal of the American College of Cardiology (2017) and Journal of Molecular and Cellular Cardiology (2018). In addition, Lili discovered that sarcomere mutations cause energy depletion and induce mitochondrial dysfunction, which contributes to arrhythmogenesis. She is working with Dr. Paul Brookes (University of Rochester Medical Center) to study mitochondrial function and metabolism in hiPSC-CM HCM models.(3) Study genetic arrhythmia disorders and improve personal therapy: Lili uses gene editing to generate hiPSC-CMs with mutations identified in clinic. She uses electrophysiological and biochemical methods to unravel the arrhythmia mechanism. In addition, Lili is working with Dr. Prince Kannankeril (VUMC), using high-throughput screening to test anti-arrhythmic drugs on these mutations and improve personal care.
Laura Ramirez, MD

Laura Beth Ramirez, MD

Assistant Professor of Medicine

Division
HO

Dr. Ramirez received her medical degree from the University of Tennessee College of Medicine in Memphis, Tennessee, in 2009. She then completed an internal medicine residency at the University of Tennessee Health Sciences Center in Memphis in 2012. She accepted a fellowship position at Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana, in hematology/oncology and completed in 2015. Dr. Ramirez enjoys teaching and was named Chief Fellow during her hematology/oncology fellowship. She has been involved in clinical research and has presented at several scientific meetings. Following fellowship in 2015, Dr. Ramirez joined Crescent City Physicians Inc., a subsidiary of Touro Infirmary in New Orleans, Louisiana, as an attending medical oncologist and hematologist. She prides herself in providing compassionate, individualized care and is a strong advocate for her patients. Dr. Ramirez enjoys being involved in the community and has given multiple lectures and been featured on the local news as a health educator. Dr. Ramirez grew up in Tennessee and still has multiple family members throughout Tennessee from Memphis, Nashville and Knoxville and is excited about coming home to practice. In her free time, Dr. Ramirez enjoys spending time with her husband and daughters, running and biking, gardening, reading, and cooking.

Katherine Walsh, MD

Katherine Walsh, MD, FACP

Associate Professor of Medicine, Hematology/Oncology

Division
HO

Dr. Walsh completed her hematology/oncology fellowship at Duke University in 2011 and after graduation joined the faculty at Ohio State University where she has been an integral member of the hematology division and medical education community since that time. She established a clinical niche in the care of patients with myeloproliferative neoplasms and benign hematology with a robust clinical practice. She is a founding member and leader in the newly formed Myeloproliferative Neoplasm (MPN) Clinic in the fall of 2020, and she is an NCCN panel member for Myeloproliferative Neoplasms and Systemic Mastocytosis. She has been an active contributor to clinical research in the hematology division through serving as an institutional PI or co-investigator for clinical trials in the myeloid malignancies group which has led to multiple publications. She has distinguished herself in the medical education community through institutional educational leadership positions including Internal Medicine (IM) clerkship director for the third-year medical students and hematology leader for the second-year medical students. She is actively involved at the national level through Clerkship Directors in Internal Medicine (CDIM) which is a member of the Alliance for Academic Internal Medicine (AAIM) where she has served on committees, authored manuscripts, and presented at national meetings. She has specifically been recognized within her field of hematology/oncology and education including her selection for the American Society of Clinical Oncology’s (ASCO) Education Scholars Program which ultimately led to her recruitment to Vanderbilt through her collaboration with Jill Gilbert as her small group mentor.