We would like to congratulate two of our faculty members for their achievements.
Sarah Myers, MD, has been promoted to the rank of Professor of Dermatology with Tenure. Her clinical career has focused on the diagnosis and management of dermatologic complications in patients with severe immunosuppression. She was involved in developing national guidelines for dermatologic care of patients with HIV for the American Academy of Dermatology. She also had a key role in the clinical trial of the HIV fusion inhibitor enfuvirtide, leading the evaluation of the cutaneous reaction pattern that occurred in these patients. With the improved treatment of patients with HIV, her effort has shifted to the management of patients immunosuppressed for organ transplants. Dr. Myers has an active clinical service managing these patients and their severe risk of skin cancer. She is working with the Duke Transplant team to develop criteria for the pre-transplant and post-transplant care of these patients. In addition, she has taken a leadership role serving on the Board of Directors of the International Transplant Skin Cancer Collaborative.
Dr. Myers has had a strong commitment to education throughout her career at Duke. She served as our residency program director from 1997-2007. She continues to teach in the clinic with dermatology and medical residents, medical and PA students on a regular basis.
Her skill as a teacher has been recognized by her twice having received the Dr. J. Lamar Callaway Teaching award and having received a Women’s Dermatology Society Mentorship Award.
In addition to her clinical and teaching contributions Dr. Myers has made major administrative contributions to our Department and to Duke. She was selected for the Chancellor’s Clinical Leadership in Academic Medicine Program in 2010. She currently serves on the Faculty Development Advisory Board and the Clinical Sciences Faculty Council. She currently serves as our Vice-Chair for Faculty Development and the Professional Accountability Program representative.
Erin Lesesky, MD, has been promoted to the rank of Associate Professor of Dermatology. Dr. Lesesky’s effort has been focused on clinical dermatology and on clinical education. Dr. Lesesky is a superb clinician who is involved in both primary dermatology and complex medical dermatology. In addition, Dr. Lesesky is skilled in dermatologic surgical procedure and has clinics focused on this area at both Duke and the Durham VA. This is an especially important focus of Dr. Lesesky’s practice as she supervises a busy procedure clinic for our residents at the Durham VA Medical Center. Dr. Lesesky is a major contributor to our teledermatology program at the Durham VA and will make important contributions as we seek to expand that program at Duke. Dr. Lesesky has a strong commitment to education and has taken a leadership role within our Department. She has assumed the role of Associate Residency Program Director. She has taken primary responsibility for many important initiatives within our residency program. She organized and complete revision of our evaluation process to reflect the newly developed dermatology milestones. She serves for many educational committees.
Dr. Lesesky has been charged with developing our educational program for residents from the Departments of Medicine, Pediatrics and Family Medicine. She has restructured the rotations by redesigning the curriculum with online didactic education and tailoring the clinical rotations to make them more ‘career’ relevant to the rotators. Dr. Lesesky’s educational ability and contributions have been recognized by our residents twice awarding her the J Lamar Callaway Teaching award.