Harvard Health Experts and Contributors

Sharon Levy, MD, MPH

Contributor

Sharon Levy, MD, MPH is a board certified Developmental-Behavioral Pediatrician and an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School. She is the Director of the Adolescent Substance use and Addiction Program (ASAP) in the Division of Developmental Medicine at Boston Children’s Hospital, which is comprised of clinical, research, training and policy arms. Dr. Levy has evaluated and treated thousands of adolescents with substance use disorders, and has taught national curricula and published extensively on the outpatient management of substance use disorders in adolescents, including screening and brief advice in primary care, the use of drug testing and the outpatient management of opioid dependent adolescents. She is the past chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Substance Use and Prevention, the President of the Association for Medical Education and Research in Substance Abuse (AMERSA) and serves on the board of directors of the Addiction Medicine Fellowship Director’s Association.

Howard E. LeWine, MD

Chief Medical Editor, Harvard Health Publishing; Editorial Advisory Board Member, Harvard Health Publishing

Dr. Howard LeWine is a practicing internist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, Chief Medical Editor at Harvard Health Publishing, and editor in chief of Harvard Men’s Health Watch.

Elizabeth Liebson, MD

Contributor

Elizabeth Liebson, MD, is a staff psychiatrist on the Schizophrenia and Bipolar Disorders Unit at Mclean Hospital and assistant professor at Harvard Medical School. She divides her time between clinical work and teaching residents and medical students. Dr. Liebson’s clinical focus is assessment of first psychotic episodes and exploring patients’ subjective experiences. Dr. Liebson has been on staff at McLean Hospital since 2006. While primarily a clinician, Dr. Liebson has experience as an investigator in several disciplines relevant to clinical neuroscience research, including nosology and clinical pharmacology.

John Sanford Limouze, MD

Contributor

Dr. John Limouze is associate chief of the Division of Hospitalist Medicine at Cambridge Health Alliance, a lecturer in Medicine at Harvard Medical School and a Master’s Student at Harvard’s Center for Bioethics. He is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and completed residency training in internal medicine at the University of Michigan. His academic interests include medical professionalism, conscience, and providing care to vulnerable populations.

Jennifer Lin, MD

Contributor

Jennifer Lin, MD, co-directs the Melanoma Risk and Prevention Clinic, and the Multicultural Dermatology clinic at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. She also is the Dermatology Lead of the Melanoma Program at Dana Farber Cancer Institute. She has authored several papers related to melanoma as well as on lasers and light-based therapies. Dr. Lin received her medical degree from Harvard Medical School. She completed her residency at the Harvard Residency Program, and completed her fellowship at Massachusetts General Hospital.

Kristina Liu, MD, MHS

Contributor

Kristina Liu, MD, MHS, is a dermatologist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, where she serves as the director of the vitiligo clinic and director of dermatology simulation education. She received her medical degree and masters in health science from Yale School of Medicine, and completed her residency at the Harvard Combined Dermatology Program, where she served as chief resident. Her clinical and research interests include laser and cosmetic dermatology, pigmentary disorders of the skin, and medical education.

Victor A. Lopez-Carmen, MPH

Guest Contributor

Victor A. Lopez-Carmen, MPH, is a Dakota and Yaqui writer, health advocate, and student at Harvard Medical School. He is currently a member of Boston’s COVID-19 Health Inequities Task Force, and cochair of the UN Global Indigenous Youth Caucus. His commentary on minority health has been featured in the BBC, The Boston Globe, Teen Vogue, and the UN News Centre.

Kevin R. Loughlin, MD, MBA

Contributor

Kevin R. Loughlin, MD, MBA, received an AB from Princeton University, MD from New York Medical College, MBA from Boston University, and MA (honorary) from Harvard University. He practiced urology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital for 35 years, receiving an AUA research award while in training. He received the Alumni Medal of Honor from New York Medical College, the Lifetime Achievement Award from the New England Section of the AUA, and the Distinguished Service Award from the American Urological Association. He received the faculty teaching award on three occasions. He was a trustee of the American Board of Urology and a member of the board of directors of the American Urological Association. He has published over 250 articles in the medical literature, has been an author or editor of 12 books, and has served on multiple medical journal editorial boards.

Vasanti Malik, ScD

Contributor

Vasanti Malik, ScD., is a Research Scientist in the Department of Nutrition at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. She obtained a MSc. in Nutritional Sciences from the University of Toronto and a dual doctorate in Nutrition and Epidemiology from the Harvard Chan School. Her research focuses on evaluating risk factors for obesity, type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease with an emphasis on diet quality. Dr. Malik also studies nutritional drivers of the global obesity and diabetes epidemics in countries undergoing epidemiologic transition and currently directs the Global Nutrition and Epidemiologic Transition Initiative; a collaborative project with 13 low- and- middle income countries that aims to reduce diabetes risk by improving diet and lifestyle. She is an Associate Editor for BMC Obesity and a Review Editor for Frontiers in Public Health. The ultimate goal of Dr. Malik’s work is to inform future large-scale community-based interventions and policy strategies to reduce the risk of obesity and related chronic diseases nationally and globally.

Anant Mandawat, MD

Contributing Editor

Dr. Anant Mandawat has been a medical columnist for several years translating scientific papers for the public. He graduated with a MD with honors from Yale. He completed his residency at Massachusetts General Hospital, a teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School, and is currently a cardiology fellow at Duke. His research interests are in clinical and economic outcomes for the elderly using large datasets. He has multiple publications in the field and has received the Marvin Moser Award and Bechtel Award for his research.

Nandini Mani, MD

Contributing Editor

Dr. Nandini Mani is a Hospitalist at the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and an Instructor in Medicine at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Mani is board-certified in both Internal Medicine and Pediatrics. Her clinical interests include Hospital Quality Improvement, Healthcare Disparities, and International Health. She is dedicated to teaching both medical students and resident physicians in both Internal Medicine and Pediatrics, and has received an Ambulatory Teaching Award from the MGH Med-Peds residents. She earned her medical degree from the Penn State College of Medicine, and completed her Med-Peds residency at the University of Rochester.

Brad Manor, PhD

Contributor

Brad Manor is an associate scientist at the Hinda and Arthur Marcus Institute for Aging Research; the associate director of the Mobility and Falls Translational Research Center; director of the Mobility and Brain Function Lab; and assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. Dr. Manor’s career goal is to alleviate the burden of balance decline that often accompanies biological aging into senescence. As the director of the Mobility and Falls Program, he works to achieve this goal by directing interdisciplinary, translational research in the fields of human balance and rehabilitative medicine. His research combines biomechanical assessments of human movement with advanced medical imaging, noninvasive brain stimulation, and nonlinear signal processing techniques to identify the link between brain function, balance and falls in older adults; and design rehabilitative interventions that improve balance via optimization of brain function and exploitation of its adaptive properties.

JoAnn Manson, MD, DrPH

Editorial Advisory Board Member, Harvard Health Publishing

JoAnn E. Manson, MD, DrPH, MACP, is professor of medicine and the Michael and Lee Bell Professor of Women’s Health at Harvard Medical School; professor in the department of epidemiology at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health; chief of the division of preventive medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH), and scientific advisor to the BWH Connors Center for Women’s Health and Gender Biology. Dr. Manson is a physician epidemiologist, endocrinologist, and principal investigator (PI) or co-PI of several research studies, including the Women’s Health Initiative Clinical Center In Boston; the cardiovascular disease (CVD) component of the Nurses’ Health Study; the VITamin D and OmegA-3 TriaL (VITAL); the COSMOS trial; and the VItamin D for COVID-19 (VIVID) trial. Her primary research interests include randomized clinical prevention trials of nutritional and lifestyle factors related to heart disease, diabetes, and cancer; the role of endogenous and exogenous estrogens as determinants of chronic disease; life course–related risk factors for cardiometabolic outcomes in women; and biomarker predictors of CVD.

Dieter Manstein, MD, PhD

Contributor

Dieter Manstein, MD, PhD, completed his PhD in Physics, in addition to his dermatology residency training at the University of Munster in Germany. He then completed a Clinical Applications of Laser fellowship at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School with Dr. R. Rox Anderson. During this time, he co-invented both fractional photothermolysis (Fraxel) and cryolipolysis (CoolSculpting) technologies. He is currently an Assistant Professor of Dermatology at Harvard Medical School. He is also the PI of his own research lab at the Cutaneous Biology Research Center, which contributes to the development of novel solutions for important clinical problems in dermatology.

Shannon Manzi, PharmD

Contributor

Dr. Shannon Manzi has practiced pediatric pharmacy for more than 20 years and pediatric emergency medicine for 15 years. She is currently the Director of the Clinical Pharmacogenomics Service and the Manager for ED and ICU Pharmacy Services at Boston Children’s Hospital. She is also an NR-EMT and has served as a pediatric expert for the Strategic National Stockpile, the National Advisory Committee on Children and Terrorism, the CDC and MADPH. In addition, Shannon is the Lead Pharmacist for the Massachusetts–1 Disaster Medical Assistance Team and has deployed twelve times, including responses to major hurricanes, the Haitian earthquake and the Unaccompanied Minor Border Crossing mission. She has been a simulation instructor at BCH for 6 years and runs several unique programs related to disaster and prehospital medicine. She holds a faculty position with the Computational Health Informatics Program at BCH and clinical adjunct faculty positions at Northeastern University and Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Allied Health Sciences University. Shannon has authored over 35 publications and presented numerous national and international workshops and lectures on pediatric emergency medicine, simulation and disaster related topics.

Julia Marcus, PhD, MPH

Contributor

Julia Marcus, PhD, MPH, is an epidemiologist and assistant professor at Harvard Medical School and Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute, with a primary research focus on pre-exposure prophylaxis for HIV prevention. During COVID-19, she has written about the importance of a harm reduction approach to the prevention of coronavirus transmission, with lessons learned from the HIV epidemic.

Luana Marques, PhD

Contributor

Dr. Luana Marques is the director and founder of Community Psychiatry PRIDE at Massachusetts General Hospital and an Associate Professor in Psychology at Harvard Medical School. She completed her PhD in Clinical Psychology at The State University of New York (SUNY) Buffalo, and her clinical internship and postdoctoral fellowship in the cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) track at Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School in 2007. Dr. Marques’ major clinical and research interests include the implementation of evidence-based practices for individuals suffering from a variety of behavioral health disorders in diverse communities. Her goal is to decrease disparities in care for individuals experiencing behavioral health difficulties, especially among low-income and ethnic minorities. Upon beginning her work in community mental health clinics, Dr. Marques became increasingly aware of the substantial implementation gap in evidence-based psychotherapeutic treatments for anxiety and trauma-related disorders. Her research now centers primarily on reducing the disproportionate mental health burden among underserved populations in resource-restricted communities.

Gad Marshall, MD

Contributor

I received my undergraduate and medical degree from Boston University. I then completed a neurology residency at the University of Pittsburgh, followed by a dementia and behavioral neuroscience fellowship at the University of California, Los Angeles. I am board certified in Neurology. I am currently the Director of Clinical Trials at the Center for Alzheimer Research and Treatment at Brigham and Women’s Hospital; Associate Neurologist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital; Assistant in Neurology at Massachusetts General Hospital; and Associate Professor of Neurology at Harvard Medical School. Over the past 17 years, I have focused on improving the clinical care of patients with Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and related conditions, in conjunction with clinical research in AD. Over the past 14 years, I have been site principal investigator for 14 clinical trials and 4 observational imaging studies in AD and am currently the site principal investigator for the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) 3 and the Anti-Amyloid Treatment in Asymptomatic Alzheimer’s Disease (A4) trial. My NIH-funded research has focused on clinical correlates of instrumental activities of daily living and neuropsychiatric symptoms with amyloid, tau, and FDG PET, structural and resting-state functional MRI, and CSF biomarkers across the early AD spectrum. More recently, I have been developing novel sensitive performance-based instrumental activities of daily living tests for early-stage AD.

Mallika Marshall, MD

Contributing Editor

Mallika Marshall, MD, is an Emmy-award winning journalist and physician who serves as Medical Director at WBZ-TV in Boston. A practicing physician who is Board Certified in both internal medicine and pediatrics, Marshall serves on staff at Harvard Medical School and practices at the Massachusetts General Hospital’s (MGH) Chelsea Urgent Care Clinic and MGH Revere Health Center. Marshall is currently a Contributing Editor for Harvard Health Publishing (HHP), the publishing division of Harvard Medical School, and host of HHP’s e-learning courses. She has nearly 15 years of media experience, including serving as “HealthWatch” Anchor at WBZ-TV News for 10 years beginning in 2000. A cum laude graduate of Harvard College, Marshall received her medical degree with honors at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) School of Medicine. She completed her medical residency at Harvard in internal medicine and pediatrics. She is a member of the Alpha Omega Alpha Honors Society, the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and the National Association of Black Journalists. She also has served on the Board of Trustees for the Urgent Care Foundation and the Board of Directors for Dress for Success Boston. In addition to numerous medical awards, she was an Associate Editor of the Harvard Medical School Family Health Guide.

Peter T. Masiakos, MS, MD, FACS, FAAP

Contributor

Dr. Masiakos is a pediatric surgeon, the director of pediatric trauma service at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), and co-director of the MGH Center for Gun Violence Prevention, which he founded in June 2018. He is an associate professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School and a visiting surgeon at MGH, where he has a clinical interest in pediatric trauma care and injury prevention.

Paul G. Mathew, MD, FAAN, FAHS

Contributor

Paul G. Mathew, MD, FAAN FAHS is an Assistant Professor of Neurology at Harvard Medical School (HMS), and holds clinical positions at three HMS affiliated institutions. He serves as the Director of Continuing Medical Education at the Brigham & Women’s Hospital, Department of Neurology, John R. Graham Headache Center. He is also a staff neurologist at Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates/Atrius Health and the Cambridge Health Alliance. He completed his neurology residency at Temple University Hospital in Philadelphia, PA, and then completed a fellowship in headache medicine at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN. He is board certified in neurology and headache medicine. In addition to conventional headache treatments, Dr. Mathew performs Botox injections, trigger point injections, and nerve blocks. In terms of his academic responsibilities, he has been involved in the training of neurology, psychiatry, internal medicine, family medicine, and dental residents, as well as two headache medicine fellows per year. Regarding medical student education, he is the founder and clerkship director of the Harvard Medical School Advanced Neurology Clerkship. He also serves on the faculty of the Harvard Medical School Cambridge Integrated Clerkship. He has written multiple publications, and has presented at both national and international conferences. Dr. Mathew serves as a peer reviewer for multiple journals including Cephalalgia, Headache, Headache Currents, Mayo Clinic Proceedings, Neurology, the British Medical Journal, and the New England Journal of Medicine. He is the Co-Chief Medical Editor of the journal Practical Neurology. He is a member of several medical societies including the Massachusetts Neurological Association, the American Academy of Neurology, the Headache Cooperative of New England, the American Headache Society, and the International Headache Society. Dr. Mathew also applies his passion and expertise to the role of advocate for both patients and fellow physicians. He has participated in multiple successful lobbying efforts in Washington, DC headed by the American Academy of Neurology to improve patients’ access to healthcare. In March, 2015, Dr. Mathew was appointed as the neurology representative on the advisory board of the National Board of Physicians and Surgeons. The National Board of Physicians and Surgeons (www.NBPAS.org) is an organization committed to providing board re-certification that ensures physician compliance with national standards and lifelong learning after completing initial board certification with an American Board of Medical Specialties (ABMS) Board.

Elizabeth Matzkin, MD

Contributor

Elizabeth Matzkin, MD, is the chief of the Women’s Sports Medicine program at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) and assistant professor of Orthopedic Surgery at Harvard Medical School. Highly regarded for her accomplishments in education, research, and patient care, she has developed a world-class program for female athletes, which includes a research component. Matzkin completed her surgical and orthopedic residency training at the University of Hawaii. From there, she completed a fellowship in Shoulder and Sports Medicine at Duke University School of Medicine. During that time she served as an assistant team physician to the Duke University football and men’s basketball teams. Before coming to at BWH, she was an assistant professor at Tufts University School of Medicine. Matzkin’s clinical practice focuses on disorders of the shoulder, knee, and sports-related injuries. She specializes in advanced open and arthroscopic surgical techniques to restore damaged joints, ligaments, and bones. Her memberships include the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons, American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine, and Arthroscopy Association of North America. She also serves on the Women’s Health Issues Advisory Board and the Council of Delegates for the American Society for Sports Medicine. In her free time, she enjoys running, playing ice hockey, and spending time with her husband and three daughters.

Maria Mavrikaki, PhD

Contributor

Maria Mavrikaki, PhD, studied psychology and neuroscience at the University of Crete in Greece. After obtaining her PhD, she pursued a postdoctoral research fellow position at The Scripps Research Institute in Florida, where she utilized genetic mouse models to study mechanisms underlying motivation for food. She then pursued a postdoctoral research fellowship and an assistant neuroscientist position at McLean Hospital, where she studied neurobiological mechanisms underlying prescription opioid addiction. Dr. Mavrikaki is currently staff scientist in Dr. Frank Slack’s lab at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. Since March 2017, she is also an instructor in psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. Her ongoing research assesses the role of small molecules called microRNAs in opioid addiction.

Alice Maxfield, MD

Contributor

Alice Maxfield, MD, is an otolaryngologist with specialization in sinus and endoscopic skull base surgery at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. She is an instructor at Harvard Medical School and the BWH residency program director of the Harvard Otolaryngology Residency Program. Her clinical and research interests include sinus disease and outcomes of sinonasal surgery.

Candice Mazon, MD

Contributor

Dr. Candice Mazon is a second year adolescent medicine fellow at Boston Children's Hospital. She's a board certified pediatrician and received her training at MedStar Georgetown University Hospital. She earned her MD degree from Drexel University College of Medicine. Her interests include sexual health and reproductive justice, as well as addressing various health inequities.

Harvard Health Experts and Contributors

List of Experts

Sharon Levy, MD, MPH

Howard E. LeWine, MD

Elizabeth Liebson, MD

John Sanford Limouze, MD

Jennifer Lin, MD

Kristina Liu, MD, MHS

Victor A. Lopez-Carmen, MPH

Kevin R. Loughlin, MD, MBA

Vasanti Malik, ScD

Anant Mandawat, MD

Nandini Mani, MD

Brad Manor, PhD

JoAnn Manson, MD, DrPH

Dieter Manstein, MD, PhD

Shannon Manzi, PharmD

Julia Marcus, PhD, MPH

Luana Marques, PhD

Gad Marshall, MD

Mallika Marshall, MD

Peter T. Masiakos, MS, MD, FACS, FAAP

Paul G. Mathew, MD, FAAN, FAHS

Elizabeth Matzkin, MD

Maria Mavrikaki, PhD

Alice Maxfield, MD

Candice Mazon, MD