A Message from the Chief
What's New in the Division
Many exciting changes are underway in the Division of Otolaryngology and Head and Neck Surgery. All of those changes have been made with one goal in mind: To establish the division as a comprehensive center offering the entire breadth of state-of-the-art diagnostic and therapeutic services for patients with disorders of the ears, skull base, nose, throat, head, and neck.
I am pleased to report that with the recent recruitment of a new faculty member (fellowship-trained neurologist Selena E. Heman-Ackah, MD, MBA) and the addition of new state-of-the-art outpatient and operative equipment, we have achieved that goal. We are now able to provide the entire complement of otolaryngology-head and neck services for patients in one location, providing convenient "one-stop shopping" for patients and referring physicians.
We are fortunate to have Dr. Heman-Ackah as the latest member of our
team, which also includes rhinologist David Caradonna, MD, DMD, fellowship-trained laryngologist Pavan Mallur, MD, and me, a fellowship-trained head and neck surgical oncologist.
Dr. Heman-Ackah received her MD at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine and completed her internship and residency training at the University of Minnesota Medical Center in Minneapolis. She completed fellowship training in neurotology at New York University prior to joining the BIDMC faculty during the summer. Dr. Heman-Ackah also has an MBA from the University of Cincinnati College of Business Administration.
Possessing a broad range of expertise, Dr. Heman-Ackah is able to provide expert care for patients with a wide variety of neurotologic disorders. Her clinical interest include chronic ear disease, acquired and congenital hearing loss, tumors of the ear, cerebellopontine angle masses, vertigo, and facial paralysis.
Based on Dr. Heman-Ackah's interest and expertise in age-related hearing loss, one of her goals in the coming year is to start an Adult Cochlear Implant Center. This service would also provide additional options for patients with hearing-loss, such as bone-anchored hearing aids, in conjunction with the services of our excellent and expanding audiology program.
In addition, Dr. Heman-Ackah is collaborating with Ekkehard Kasper, MD, Division of Neurosurgery, Co-Director of the BIDMC Brain Tumor Center, and Director of Neurosurgical Oncology in the BIDMC Cancer, to establish a comprehensive Skull-Base Surgery Clinic. This new clinic will provide multidisciplinary evaluation and advanced surgical treatment for patients with benign and malignant skull-base conditions including such as cerebellopontine angle masses, meningiomas, encephaloceles, paragangliomas, and acoustic neuromas, among others.
We are also continually upgrading our equipment to provide cutting-edge care in both the operative and outpatient setting. For example, we now have the latest videonystagmography (VNG) for vestibular assessment. In addition, we have new office-based distal chip endoscopes, which are connected to flat-screen monitors, enabling patients to view and thus better understand their condition and procedures. These technologies are in addition to the state-of-the-art equipment we introduced last year, such as Olympus video towers and Aura XP KTP lasers for in-office and OR treatments.
I also want to introduce Dr. Pavan Mallur, the fellowship-trained laryngologist who joined our faculty in the summer of 2011. Dr. Mallur provides medical and surgical management of all voice disorders, including care of the professional voice, and the diagnosis and surgical treatment of upper airway stenosis and swallowing disorders. Due to his clinical expertise, in a short period of time Dr. Mallur has built a busy clinical practice that provides the latest, most effective therapies to patients with voice disorders, including novel therapies not often available elsewhere. We are fortunate to have a specialist of his caliber in our group.
As we have built this comprehensive program, we have continued to maintain focus on all aspects of our mission by conducting clinical research in several areas, remaining actively involved in educating our residents, and maintaining our commitment to providing high-quality, cost-effective care.