Penn Medicine and the Department of Ophthalmology are pleased to announce the appointment of Joan M.
Joan M. O’Brien, MD, has been appointed chair of the department of ophthalmology and director of the Scheie Eye Institute at Penn Medicine. Dr. O’Brien previously served as professor and vice chair of ophthalmology and director of the ocular oncology division at the University of California at San Francisco.
In her new position, Dr. O’Brien oversees the multiple specialty services in the department of ophthalmology and its mission of advanced patient care; basic, clinical and translational research; and medical education. She assumed her new role January 1, 2010.
Dr. O’Brien received her medical degree from Dartmouth Medical School. She completed an internship in internal cialis at Beth Israel Hospital in Boston, followed by research fellowships in immunology at Harvard Medical School and in ophthalmic pathology at Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary.
Dr. O'Brien subsequently completed a residency in ophthalmology at Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary and a fellowship in ocular oncology at the University of California at San Francisco. She joined the faculty there in 1992 and was appointed director of the ocular oncology division in 1995.
Dr. O’Brien specializes in the treatment of ocular tumors, including retinoblastoma, ocular melanoma, conjunctival malignancies, ocular metastases, and ocular and CNS lymphoma. Her research interests include development of targeted therapies and genetic screens for retinoblastoma. She is also involved in the study of genetic pathways common to both cutaneous and ocular melanoma. Dr. O’Brien’s laboratory is currently supported by the National Eye Institute to provide cost-free genetic screening to retinoblastoma patients nationally. She also receives National Cancer Institute support for her studies of ocular melanoma.
Widely published in her field, Dr. O’Brien’s work has recently appeared in Nature and Clinical Cancer Research. She has received numerous honors, including a Young Investigator Award and a Physician-Scientist Award from Research to Prevent Blindness, a Career Development Award from the American Association for Cancer Research, and an Honor Award and a Senior Achievement Award from the American Academy of Ophthalmology. Dr. O'Brien also has a long history of awards from both the National Cancer Institute for clinical trials and the National Eye Institute for basic science investigations.
Dr. O’Brien sees patients at the Scheie Eye Institute and the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Beginning October 2010, Dr. O’Brien will also see patients at the Perelman Center for Advanced Medicine.
If you would like to schedule an appointment, please call 800-789-PENN (7366) or log on to PennMedicine.org/appointments.