Office of Well-Being Faculty Associate Profiles
The Michigan Medicine Office of Well-Being received an impressive, diverse cohort of applicants for the Faculty Associate program. We are pleased to announce the selection of seven Faculty Associates to participate in scholarly work addressing drivers of workplace well-being. They will identify solutions to inform decision-making at the organizational level. The associates are listed below, including their priority areas of focus and brief biographies:
Clinical Assistant Professor of Medicine
Division of Hospital Medicine
Internal Medicine
avamin@med.umich.edu
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Dr. Amin is a graduate of the U-M Patient Safety and Quality Leadership Scholars (PASQUAL) program in 2019. She has also participated in the University of Pennsylvania’s Wellbeing and Resilience program and was selected as a Trainer for the material for the University of Michigan’s Faculty Development office. She has also been one of the co-leads for the Division of Hospital Medicine’s Wellness committee since its inception in December 2018. She is also part of the Wellness Advocate Network through the Michigan Medicine Wellness Office, as well as a Peer Supporter for the COMPASS program run by the Office of Counseling and Workplace Resilience.
After earning a Bachelor of Science in Chemical Engineering at the University of Michigan, Dr. Amin worked at Alcan Plastics Packaging (formerly Pechiney) as a Research and Development Engineer in the peelable seals division. She later went to medical school at the Chicago Medical School at Rosalind Franklin University in North Chicago, IL. After medical school, Dr. Amin completed her internship and Internal Medicine Residency at Oakland University/William Beaumont School of Medicine in Royal Oak, MI.
Dr. Amin has been a Hospitalist since 2012. She initially worked in private practice at St. Joseph Mercy Hospital in Ann Arbor for 5 years, before joining the U-M faculty in 2015 as a Clinical Lecturer. She was promoted to Clinical Assistant Professor in March 2020. She is a member of the American College of Physicians (ACP) and Society of Hospital Medicine (SHM).
Outside of work, Dr. Amin has a black belt in karate. She enjoys spending time with family and friends, doing puzzles, making craft cocktails, and traveling the world. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, she traveled to Italy and Japan in 2019, with more exciting travel plans in the future.
Associate Professor
Otolaryngology
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Dr. Michael Brenner is a faculty member of the Department of Otolaryngology – Head & Neck Surgery. Dr. Brenner is a clinician-scientist who enjoys integrating well-being into the tripartite mission of patient care, medical education, and research. In the medical school, he serves as co-Director of Branch Science and is a passionate advocate for well-being, diversity, equity, and inclusion across the career continuum. He also serves as president of the Global Tracheostomy Collaborative, a quality improvement initiative whose interprofessional learning community spans over 200 institutions across over 25 countries. One of his greatest joys is growing leaders by mentoring learners in surgery, medicine, neuroscience, nursing, speech-language pathology, and respiratory therapy. Within his role as an Associate in the Office of Well-Being, he is excited to partner with Dr. Amy Zhang to study vacation utilization and cross-coverage, with the goal of improving well-being among clinicians at Michigan Medicine.
Associate Chair
Computational Medicine and Bioinformatics
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Dr. Burmeister is a trained geneticist who is Associate Chair for education in Computational Medicine and Bioinformatics, directs the graduate program in Bioinformatics, and also serves as Research Professor in Michigan Neuroscience. After training in Germany, Israel and California, she has been at the University of Michigan for 32 years, where she also holds appointments in the departments of Psychiatry and of Human Genetics. She has identified many novel genes in a rare neurological disorders, and also works on gene x environment interaction related to depression, collaborating with her former student, Srijan Sen, who now directs the depression center and the Intern Health Study, a large study of stress-induced depression in medical interns.
In 2022 she was a public engagement faculty fellow and is involved in bringing genetics to the public.
In her 32 years at the University, she has observed a huge increase of paperwork in all aspects of research and education, and realizes that administrative burden is always among the top concerns in surveys. As faculty associate, she will focus on ways to decrease administrative burden for faculty, primarily focusing on the research and educational aspects, in collaboration with Brigid Gregg, who will focus on reducing administrative burden in the clinic.
Associate Professor
Urology
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Dr. Kristin Chrouser is a graduate of Princeton University (BA), Mayo Medical School (MD), Mayo Graduate School of Medicine (Urology), and John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health (MPH). After practicing first in Baltimore and then in Minneapolis (at the University of Minnesota), she joined the urology faculty at the University of Michigan in 2018. The majority of her clinical practice is at the Ann Arbor VA, where she focuses on urological reconstruction and general urology. She leads the surgical CRQS program, training new surgeon leaders in quality improvement and patient safety. Dr. Chrouser’s research interests include intraoperative surgeon stress, surgical team dynamics, surgeon ergonomics, and wellness. She is also dedicated to improving access to surgical care in low-income countries through surgeon training.
Assistant Professor
Pediatric Endocrinology, Pediatrics
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Dr. Brigid Gregg, Assistant Professor of Pediatric Endocrinology, Diabetes, and Metabolism serves as the inaugural Director of Wellness and Culture for the Department of Pediatrics. Since joining the leadership team in 2021, Dr. Gregg has taken ownership of a Departmental Wellness Plan and oversees a committee of individuals focused on analyzing data on well-being, burnout, and professional fulfillment. She is also passionate about nutrition and how it can create a lifetime of health. A lot of her research has been focused on nutrition and health, and she currently teaches a culinary medicine elective program at the Medical School. Dr. Gregg’s Faculty Associate project will focus on reducing administrative burden among the faculty clinician population at Michigan Medicine. Outside of work, she loves traveling, cooking, and spending time with friends and family. In the winter, she loves to ski or stay in and play board games.
Clinical Assistant Professor
Rheumatology, Internal Medicine
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Dr. Deeba Minhas is a clinical assistant professor in the division of Rheumatology. She is a member of the DOIM IMPOWER (Inspiring Medicine to Promote Opportunities for Well-Being, Equity, and Diversity) Council. Her interests include non-pharmacologic pain management. She has teacher training in Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) and co-leads weekly groups as part of her research agenda. The focus of her faculty associate project will be working on mitigating problems and managing patient expectations related to the electronic health record patient portal messaging using a trauma-informed lens.
Clinical Professor
Obstetrics and Gynecology
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Helen Kang Morgan is a Clinical Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology and Learning Health Sciences at the University of Michigan Medical School. She was born and raised in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and completed her undergraduate degree at Wellesley College. She returned to Ann Arbor for medical school and OBGYN residency at the University of Michigan. She has focused on improving the continuum between medical school and residency and she is the Director of Residency Preparatory Courses at the University of Michigan Medical School and is currently Co-Investigator and Program Evaluation Lead on the $1.7 million AMA Reimagining Residency Grant for APGO Right Resident, Right Program, Ready Day One. Her other primary areas of scholarly research include diversification of the physician workforce, physician well-being, and gender equity in medicine.
Associate Professor
Medical Physics
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Dr. Kelly Paradis is an Associate Professor of Medical Physics and the Associate Chair of Equity and Wellness within the Department of Radiation Oncology at Michigan Medicine. She received her PhD from the University of Michigan in 2010 with her thesis entitled, “Rydberg Atoms for Quantum Information”. Dr. Paradis has been a faculty member in the Department of Radiation Oncology since 2014, with a primary clinal focus of advanced radiation treatment planning. In partnership with the Wellness Office and another faculty associate, Dr. Helen Kang Morgan, Dr. Paradis published Parenting on the Frontlines in 2023, a collection of stories written by caregivers at Michigan Medicine. Dr. Paradis is passionately committed to gender equity and provider wellness throughout the medical workforce.
Associate Professor
Department of Surgery and Department of Learning Health Sciences
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Dr. Gurjit Sandhu is a Surgical Education Scientist, Associate Professor in the Department of Surgery and the Department of Learning Health Sciences. She also serves as the Vice-Chair for Resident Professional Development in the Department of Surgery. Additionally, she is an Associate Program Director for the Section of General Surgery. Dr. Sandhu completed her B.A. in 1996 at the University of British Columbia, Canada, and earned her Ph.D. in 2006 from Queen's University, Canada. Dr. Sandhu's research focuses on the scholarship of teaching and learning, specifically looking at professional education, teaching methods, intraoperative entrustment, and assessment. Dr. Sandhu also uses her strengths as a qualitative researcher to support her work on social accountability in medical education, health equity and disparities, and physician wellness. She has served as the Vice-Chair and Chair of the Membership Committee for the Association of Surgical Education.
Clinical Assistant Professor
Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences
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Dr. Amy Zhang is an assistant clinical professor of the glaucoma service at the University of Michigan Kellogg Eye Center. She grew up in Michigan and is happy to return to the state and join the faculty at the University of Michigan after being an assistant clinical professor at Case Western University where she was the glaucoma fellowship director. Among her many interests are her work in minimally invasive glaucoma surgery and novel drug delivery methods which aim to improve glaucoma management and quality of life for patients. Prior to her well-being role, she served as a medical director of ophthalmology at Northville Health Center. She has an interest in improving ergonomics and looking into drivers of burnout. Her special interest in looking at vacation utilization is the focus of her faculty associate project and is excited to partner with Dr. Michael Brenner on this important topic.
