We are delighted to recognize and congratulate the following physicians who achieved faculty rank promotions since the summer of 2024.
Qiang "Charles" Chen, PhD, was promoted to Research Assistant Professor. Dr. Chen began his research career in the Department of Physics at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC. He joined our department in 2009 as a Research Associate in the lab of Dr. Pei Tang, contributing to investigations on the structures and dynamics of neurotransmitter-gated ion channels and exploring channel protein interactions with low-affinity drugs. In 2017, he transitioned from a staff role to a faculty position. Dr. Chen is a member of the Biophysical Society and has authored or co-authored over 40 peer-reviewed publications and more than 30 oral and poster presentations. His current research interests focus on the molecular mechanisms of cys-loop receptors in anesthesia and analgesia, as well as artificial intelligence-assisted pain evaluation with reduced subjectivity. Among his accolades, Dr. Chen received the Best Poster Presentation Award at the 2015 SER-CAT Users Annual Meeting. He is currently the principal investigator (PI) on the department seed grant “Objective Pain Evaluation with Deep Machine Learning Using a Long Short-Term Memory Network.”
Fatima Zahir, MD, was promoted to Clinical Associate Professor. Dr. Zahir joined our faculty in 2013 and currently serves as an attending physician at UPMC Passavant. She is a valued member of the Anesthesia Charge Team, acts as a Supervising Physician at Passavant’s Center for Perioperative Care (CPC), and serves as the Residency Rotation Director at Passavant. Additionally, she serves on the Passavant Quality Improvement Committee and the Passavant Moderate Sedation Committee. She has authored or co-authored numerous publications, including a book chapter, scientific meeting abstracts, and Guidelines for Fetal Heart Rate Monitoring During Non-Obstetric Surgery. Dr. Zahir is an active member of several professional societies, including the Pakistan Medical and Dental Council, the American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA), and the Society for Obstetric Anesthesia and Perinatology (SOAP). Since 2021, she has played an integral role in resident education, serving as Clinical Instructor for the Daily Resident Staff - Passavant Advanced General Rotation for PGY-4 residents. Dr. Zahir has contributed significantly to our department’s educational mission, having led numerous didactic lectures, workshops, and clinical procedure courses for medical students, residents, and fellow anesthesiology colleagues. She recently completed the Marshall Webster Physician Leadership Program, a collaborative initiative between the UPMC Physician Services Division and the University of Pittsburgh Joseph M. Katz Graduate School of Business.
Ryan Ball, MD, MBA, FASE, was promoted to Associate Professor. Dr. Ball serves as Chief Anesthesiologist at UPMC Passavant, a member of the cardiothoracic anesthesiology team, and Medical Director of the CPC at UPMC Passavant. He joined our faculty in 2012 as an attending anesthesiologist at UPMC Presbyterian before transitioning to UPMC Passavant in 2013. Dr. Ball is an accomplished educator, researcher, and administrator, with active involvement in research collaborations and residency training. He has authored or co-authored over 25 publications, including original peer-reviewed articles, conference papers, and editorials, and serves as an ad-hoc journal reviewer for the British Journal of Anesthesia and Journal of Clinical Anesthesia. Throughout his tenure, Dr. Ball has contributed to several key departmental committees, including the Resident Education Committee, Chief Resident Selection Committee, Faculty Professional Practice Review Committee, and Clinical Advisory Committee, as well as numerous committees within Passavant and the UPMC Health Insurance Division. His service extends to national society roles, as a member of the ASA Committee on Scientific and Educational Exhibits and the ASA Committee on Quality Management and Departmental Administration.
Joshua Knight, MD, FASE, was promoted to Associate Professor. Dr. Knight currently serves as Medical Director of Quality in our department and is a member of both the clinical team at UPMC Presbyterian and the department’s cardiothoracic anesthesiology team. He also provides care at the CPC at UPMC Montefiore and contributes to the inpatient CPC consultation service at UPMC Presbyterian. Since joining our faculty in 2018, Dr. Knight has been an integral part of medical student and resident education, serving as a clinical preceptor for medical students and residents across a range of subspecialty rotations, including cardiac anesthesiology, thoracic anesthesiology, general anesthesiology, and regional anesthesiology at UPMC Passavant, Presbyterian, Montefiore, and Shadyside hospitals. Additionally, he mentors our adult cardiothoracic anesthesiology fellows. Dr. Knight has authored or co-authored over 30 publications, including original research, meta-analyses, reviews, abstracts, commentaries, and book chapters, and has contributed to more than 20 poster presentations at local, national, and international meetings. His research interests focus on advancing cardiothoracic anesthesiology and quality improvement initiatives within anesthesiology. He currently leads the Peri-Anesthetic Registry of Orthotopic Heart Transplantation, a national multi-center repository of anesthesia-related data for heart transplant recipients. Dr. Knight is an active member of several professional societies, including the ASA, the Society of Cardiovascular Anesthesiologists, and the American Society of Echocardiography.
Siamak Salavatian, MEng, PhD, was promoted to Associate Professor. Dr. Salavatian joined our faculty in 2019 and holds adjunct faculty appointments as Associate Professor of Medicine in the Division of Cardiology and Associate Professor of Bioengineering. He serves as Director of Neuromodulation Research in our department and is a full member of the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee at the University of Pittsburgh. Dr. Salavatian is a distinguished researcher in the fields of neurocardiology and neuromodulation. His research investigates neural remodeling in the autonomic nervous system in heart diseases and explores potential cardiac neuromodulation therapies. He has authored or co-authored over 50 scientific publications and has secured funding as a PI from Presidio Medical and the Medical University of South Carolina/National Institutes of Health. He has also served as a co-PI on numerous grants funded by agencies such as the NIH, the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, and the National Science Foundation. Dr. Salavatian is the inventor on two intellectual properties and is a member of numerous professional and scientific societies, including the American Physiological Society, the International Neuromodulation Society, and the Society for Neuroscience. He is Section Editor of the Cardiovascular Disorders Section for the journal Neuromodulation: Technology at the Neural Interface.
Ryan C. Romeo, MD, was promoted to Professor. Dr. Romeo has led a distinguished academic and clinical career since joining our faculty and the clinical team at UPMC Magee-Womens Hospital (MWH) in 1999. He has been extremely active in medical student, resident, fellow, and faculty development education and teaching. Dr. Romeo is currently Medical Student Coordinator for our department at MWH and serves as a Resident Advisor in our department and a member of our Resident Education Committee and Resident Recruitment and Appointment Sub-Committee. He is also Associate Director of our Obstetric Anesthesiology Fellowship Program. He has received many teaching honors, such as the Dr. Peter M. Winter Award for Excellence in Medical Student Teaching (2016) and the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine Clerkship Preceptor of the Year Award for Outstanding Achievement in Educating Future Physicians (2015), and he is a four time recipient of our department’s award for Faculty Excellence in Clinical Teaching of Residents (2023, 2005, 2006, 2009). Dr. Romeo is a member of the ASA, SOAP, the Pennsylvania Society of Anesthesiologists, and the Society of Education in Anesthesiology (SEA), as well as a member of the SEA Committee on Faculty Development. He is the author or co-author of over 50 academic publications, including book chapters, peer-reviewed articles, and abstracts. Has been an investigator on grants funded by the Anesthesia Safety Foundation and SonoSite, Inc.
Congratulations to Drs. Chen, Zahir, Ball, Knight, Salavatian, and Romeo for their promotions, and many thanks and appreciation to them for their remarkable leadership, service, and milestones in clinical care, teaching, and research.