Bashar Safar has been appointed chief of colorectal surgery as of January 2018. He succeeds colorectal surgeon Jonathan Efron, who has been appointed the director of the Office of Johns Hopkins Physicians.

Safar’s clinical focus includes colon and rectal cancer, inflammatory bowel disease and benign anorectal disorders. He has a particular interest in surgical management of complex Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis. He is an expert in minimally invasive and robotic procedures, as well as stoma sparing procedures, such as ileal pouch anal anastomosis. Safar’s experience includes treating other benign colorectal conditions, such as hemorrhoids, perirectal fistulas, rectal prolapse and fecal incontinence, as well as using endoscopy for screening colonoscopy and polypectomy.

His research interests include surgical outcomes of inflammatory bowel disease and establishing quality improvement measures for the surgical treatment of inflammatory bowel disease.

New Faculty

Daniel Brennan

Daniel Brennan joins Johns Hopkins as a professor of medicine in the Division of Nephrology and as medical co-director of the Comprehensive Transplant Center. His areas of clinical expertise include transplant nephrology and renal disease. His research interests include viral diseases, especially cytomegalovirus and BK polyomavirus, in kidney transplant patients; the role of induction therapy; islet transplantation; and pharmacoeconomics and outcomes.

Brennan is involved in several ongoing and upcoming clinical trials focusing on the implications of certain genetic mutations in kidney donors; the effects of inhibiting early inflammation in kidney transplant patients; development of web-based tools to personalize the risk-benefit ratio of immunosuppressive choices; noninvasive testing to predict and confirm acute rejection in heart, lung, liver, pancreas and kidney transplant recipients; and therapies to treat nephrotic syndrome and focal segmental glomerulosclerosis in kidney transplant recipients.

Richard Burkhart

Richard Burkhart joins Johns Hopkins as a hepatopancreatobiliary surgeon in the Division of Surgical Oncology and the Division of Hepatobiliary and Pancreatic Surgery. His primary areas of focus include complex minimally invasive surgery and research for cancers of the pancreas, liver and bile ducts.

His current research examines precision medicine initiatives in cancer care. He has a particular research interest in using personalized models of pancreas cancer, made from each patient’s tumor after surgical resection, to select the best chemotherapy in hopes of increasing survival and rates of cure.

Haniee Chung

Haniee Chung joins the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center as the director of its colorectal program in Washington, D.C. She is a colorectal surgeon within the Department of Surgery and an assistant professor of surgery. Chung’s clinical focus includes colon and rectal cancer, inflammatory bowel disease and benign anorectal disorders. She is an expert in minimally invasive and robotic procedures, as well as stoma sparing procedures, such as ileal pouch anal anastomosis. She is experienced in treating benign colorectal conditions, such as hemorrhoids, perirectal fistulas, rectal prolapse and fecal incontinence, as well as performing endoscopy for screening colonoscopy and polypectomy. She practices at both Sibley Memorial Hospital and Suburban Hospital.

Her research interest focuses on global health and improving access to surgical care in underserved areas and has completed service trips with the Surgical Outreach for the Americas to Dominican Republic and El Salvador. She has also contributed to numerous publications, book chapters and presentations.

Alodia Gabre-Kidan

Alodia Gabre-Kidan joins Johns Hopkins as a colorectal surgeon and an assistant professor. Practicing at Howard County General Hospital, Gabre-Kidan brings experience performing a variety of surgical procedures including minimally invasive options. Her areas of expertise include treatment of anal cancer, abscesses, colorectal cancer, fecal incontinence, hemorrhoids, Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis, diverticular disease and rectal prolapse.

Her research interests include readmission and mortality after colorectal surgery, outcomes of rectal cancer in octogenarians and nonagenarians, medical and surgical treatments of necrotizing enterocolitis in infants, pediatric perforated appendicitis and pediatric inpatient mortality rates by procedure and specialty.

Stefano Schena

Stefano Schena joins Johns Hopkins as a cardiac surgeon. His areas of clinical expertise include all aspects of adult cardiac and vascular surgery as well as transcatheter valve therapy. Prior to Johns Hopkins, Schena served as assistant professor of surgery and cardiothoracic surgery at Washington University, where he started the transcatheter aortic valve replacement program at Christian Northeast Hospital.

His research interests include long-term outcomes and quality of life following cardiac surgery in elderly patients, secondary effects following first and repeated exposure to heparin in cardiac surgery, surgical therapy of atrial fibrillation and novel technologies in structural heart valve therapy.