Florida, Yale, UT-Chattanooga fellows join UMMC faculty

Medical Center leadership is proud to announce the following additions to its faculty and leadership staff.

Oscar Alam Mendez, M.D.

Dr. Oscar Alam Mendez, recently an anesthesiology, acute pain management and perioperative ultrasound fellow at the University of Florida, has joined the Medical Center faculty as an assistant professor of anesthesiology.

After receiving his M.D. from the University of Carabobo, Valencia, Venezuela in 2008, Mendez served as a house physician and rural physician in Venezuela. He had pulmonary residency training at Rafael Gonzalez Plaza Hospital, Naguanagua, Carabobo, Venezuela, in 2009. Upon completing several observerships in the U.S., Mendez had a surgery internship at New York Presbyterian Hospital from 2014-15 and anesthesiology residency training from 2015-18 and a regional anesthesiology, acute pain management and perioperative ultrasound fellowship from 2018-19 at the University of Florida, Jacksonville, where he was chief resident in the Department of Anesthesiology from 2017-18.

The coauthor of The Anesthesia Machine, a peer-reviewed publication, and a chapter in the textbook Pathogenesis of Neuropathic Pain: Diagnosis and Treatment Status, Mendez has given four presentations and had coauthored 11 posters presented at scientific meetings nationally. He is an active member of the American Society of Anesthesiology, the American Society of Regional Anesthesia and Pain Medicine and the American Academy of Pain Management.

Marc E. Walker, M.D.

Dr. Marc E. Walker, who recently completed the hand and microsurgery fellowship at Yale University School of Medicine, Connecticut, has joined the Medical Center faculty as an assistant professor of plastic surgery and orthopaedic surgery.

A native Mississippian, Walker graduated with the B.S. degree summa cum laude in biological sciences from the University of Mississippi in 2006. From 2006-11, he attended Harvard Medical School, where he received his M.D., and Harvard Business School, where he received his M.B.A. Thereafter, Walker was appointed associate research scientist in the Department of Surgery from 2011-12 before completing the Integrated Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery Residency Program at Yale University School of Medicine, where he served as chief resident from 2017-18. Most recently, Walker completed the hand and microsurgery fellowship at Yale-New Haven Hospital in New Haven, Connecticut in 2019.

Walker has received numerous regional, national and international honors and awards, and has participated on several institutional and professional committees. He is the author or coauthor of 20 peer-reviewed articles in professional journals and chapters in academic textbooks. He has presented more than 35 abstracts at local, national and international scientific meetings. Walker is currently on the leadership board of Hand Help, Inc., an international pediatric hand surgery organization.

Kelly E. Wingerter, M.D.

Dr. Kelly E. Wingerter, recently cardiovascular disease chief fellow at the University of Tennessee College of Medicine, Chattanooga, has joined the Medical Center faculty as an assistant professor of medicine.

After receiving her B.S. in biological sciences from Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, in 2008, Wingerter earned her M.D. at the St. George’s University School of Medicine, Grenada, West Indies, in 2013. She then had internal medicine residency training at the University of Kentucky Medical Center, Lexington, from 2013-16 and a cardiovascular disease fellowship from 2016-19 at the UT College of Medicine, where she was chief fellow from 2018-19.

An active member of the American Society of Echocardiography and the American College of Cardiology, among other professional organizations, Wingerter has given a pair of invited lectures nationally. She is the author or coauthor of a peer-reviewed article in Vascular Medicine and five posters presented at scientific meetings nationally. Her research interests include chelation-based strategy in patients with diabetes and prior myocardial infarction, as well as studies evaluating cardiovascular disease in women.