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campus news C HICAGO PEORIA R OCKFORD URBANA- C HAM P AIGN COLLEGE OF MEDICINE TRUSTEES APPOINT DIMITRI T. AZAR 18TH DEAN OF THE Dean Azar shares his vision as he assumes permanent role A FTER SEVEN MONTHS AS INTERIM DEAN of the College of Medicine, ophthalmologist Dimitri Azar, MD, MBA, officially took the job effective Dec. 16. "With his experience as a researcher, administrator and clini- cian, Dr. Azar is uniquely qualified to lead the College of Medicine in this era of translational, collaborative science and medicine," said Paula Allen-Meares, vice president of the University of Illinois and chan- cellor of the University of Illinois at Chicago. Azar expressed enthusiasm and high hopes for the level of excellence the college will continue to achieve under his leadership. He envisions a closer collaboration amongst the Chicago, Peoria, Rockford and Urbana campuses through cooperation of administrative and faculty leadership to achieve the College of Medicine's mission of excellence. "The College of Medicine is our nation's largest and most diverse medical school," Azar said. "I am honored to lead our students and distinguished faculty in our mission of academic achievement and leadership in education, research and patient care." He hopes to "stimulate new discoveries through clinically relevant basic and translational research and to serve the needs of our local community, especially the underserved minority population." An expert on diseases of the cornea, Azar arrived at the college in 2006 upon leaving the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary and Harvard Medical School, where he was a tenured professor. Prior to becoming interim dean, Azar had served as a professor, head of ophthalmology and visual sciences and B.A. Field Endowed Chair of Ophthalmologic Research. In those roles he recruited more than 20 full-time faculty, secured three endowed professorships and established a modern satellite clinic, while expanding educational programs, putting into place two international resident exchange programs, and leading an intensive course attended by more than 250 ophthalmology trainees annually. As head of the department, Azar presided over a patient care center that serves 55,000 patients per year, a laboratory- and patient-based research enterprise engaged in treating the most serious and complex eye conditions and an educational program that trains medical students, residents and clini- cal fellows. In addition, Azar established the department's first clinician-scientist readiness program and received a five-year K12 award from the National Eye Institute to support the UIC K12 Independent Clinical Scientist Development Program. As a result of these efforts, the number of NIH-funded clinician-sci- Dimitri Azar hopes to forge a closer working relationship amongst the Chicago, Peoria, Rockford and Urbana campuses. entists in the department has grown from two to nine over the past five years. An innovative researcher who has championed both translational and multidisciplinary research, Azar has made major contributions to state-of-the- art treatment of corneal diseases and refractive surgery. He has increased the field's understanding of corneal wound healing, the applications and com- plications of laser keratectomy, and the contrasts in molecular organization between a normal and an injured cornea. He has published over 400 scientific articles and book chapters, serves as editor of 14 books in ophthalmology and holds 15 patents. Azar received his medical degree from the American University in Beirut, Lebanon, started his fellowship and residency training at the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary at Harvard Medical School and received a research fel- lowship at the Schepens Eye Research Institute. He earned an executive MBA with high honors from the University of Chicago. "Our College of Medicine is poised to become one of the nation's premier urban-serving medical institutions, focusing on outstanding basic and translational research directed at those issues affecting urban popula- tions, and the education of a uniquely diverse medical corps trained to deliver excellent health care to all persons, and especially to those from underserved populations," said Lon Kaufman, provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs. "I am confident that as dean, Dr. Azar, through his own commitment to these virtues and his certain excellence in these areas, is the leader we need to move us toward our goal." 4 | WINTER 2012 PHOTO: ROBERTA DUPUIS-DEVLIN