New faculty join UMMC academic ranks

Published on Monday, November 15, 2021

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

Dr. Maha Wasef

Dr. Maha Wasef, recently director of anesthesiology and physician advisor at Delta Health-Northwest Regional in Clarksdale, has joined the Medical Center faculty as an assistant professor of anesthesiology in the School of Medicine.

Wasef earned her medical sciences degree in 1993 at Cairo University Medical School in Egypt and worked for a year at Al Salam Hospital in Egypt. She did her internship at Kasr-El Eini hospitals in Cairo before completing a residency in anesthesiology at UMMC in 2003, earning the Resident of the Year Award.

She was an instructor in the Department of Anesthesiology at UMMC before joining Delta Health-Northwest Regional, which was then known as Northwest Mississippi Medical Center, and served as chair of the peer review committee. For two years she served as vice chief of the medical staff before becoming the medical staff chief.

For 17 years, Wasef was the director of the anesthesiology department at Delta Health-Northwest Regional before she joined UMMC.

Dr. Musunkumuki “Muki” Kadochi

Dr. Musunkumuki “Muki” Kadochi, recently a pediatric cardiology fellow at Children’s Hospital of New Orleans/LSU Health Sciences Center, has joined the Medical Center faculty as assistant professor of pediatrics-cardiology in the School of Medicine.

Kadochi studied medicine at the University of Zambia in Lusaka, graduating in 2008, before completing her residency in pediatrics at the Homer Stryker M.D. School of Medicine at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo in 2018, then did her pediatric cardiology fellowship in New Orleans.

Prior to her residency, she served as a junior resident intern in the pediatric, internal medicine, surgery and OB-GYN departments at The University Teaching Hospital in Lusaka, and as a general practitioner in Kafue District Hospital in Kafue, Zambia.

Kadochi has served as principal investigator or co-investigator for a variety of research projects, including one to establish the long-term effects of hydroxyurea, a medication used to treat cancer, on pulmonary hypertension in children with sickle cell disease.

Dr. Nilesh Dankhara

Dr. Nilesh Dankhara, recently a neonatology fellow at UMMC, has joined the Medical Center faculty as an assistant professor of pediatrics, neonatology, in the School of Medicine.

Dankhara earned his medical degree in 2008 at C.U. Shah Medical College in Surendranagar, India, and finished his residency in pediatrics at East Tennessee State University in Johnson City in 2015.

He also served as an attending pediatrician at Southern Tennessee Regional Health System in Winchester, Tennessee, for three years.

An award-winning researcher, Dankhara is the co-author of several peer-reviewed publications and the author of numerous abstracts presented at national and regional scientific meetings.

He is a member of several professional organizations, including the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Society of Pediatric Research and the Group on Women in Medicine and Science at UMMC.