Faculty Affairs

May 2024 Faculty Appointments and Promotions

Clinical Professor

Shi Yang, MB, MMSc, Pathology & Laboratory Medicine, established the Diagnostic Molecular Pathology Laboratory in the clinical service at Boston Medical Center (BMC) with emeritus professor and department chair Michael O’Brien, MD, MPH, in 1995 and has served as its director since its inception. The laboratory not only provides clinical service work but also has been an active contributor to translational research for nearly three decades. Dr. Yang performs the research and development of diagnostic molecular assays and implements, evaluates and validates procedures. The laboratory provides tissue-based molecular diagnostics for BMC and affiliated health centers. Dr. Yang’s research focuses on the molecular biology of colorectal and breast cancer. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the Anatomic Pathology division established one of two BMC in-house SARS CoV-2 PCR tests. Dr. Yang was a leader in mobilizing and training a team of volunteer scientists and technicians to perform this testing through the height of the pandemic in 2020. Recently, Dr. Yang has worked closely with colleagues to successfully implement in-house Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) testing in the laboratory to support the BU-BMC Cancer Center.

Associate Professor

Christopher Heaphy, PhD, Medicine/Hematology & Medical Oncology, focuses on cancer biomarker discovery and validation with the aim to utilize novel tissue-based biomarkers to improve individualized prevention, detection and treatment strategies. In particular, he specializes in abnormal telomere biology as it relates to cancer initiation and tumor progression. His seminal study published in Science demonstrated the association between inactivating somatic mutations in two chromatin remodeling genes, ATRX and DAXX, and the activation of the Alternative Lengthening of Telomeres (ALT) phenotype, a telomerase-independent telomere maintenance mechanism. His laboratory also is working to elucidate the underlying mechanisms of cancer initiation and progression, as well as to understand how the interactions between the cancer and its tissue microenvironment may facilitate this process.

Zoe Weinstein, MD, MS, Medicine/GIM, specializes in two models of addiction care: Office Based Addiction Treatment (OBAT) and Addiction Consult Services. Her retrospective study of Boston Medical Center’s (BMC) OBAT program resulted in one of the largest and longest evaluations of treatment duration for patients on buprenorphine, which now has been cited 180 times. She currently is conducting a mixed methods prospective cohort study on the impact of COVID-19 on BMC’s OBAT population and has been invited to be first author on a manuscript, in development, on a NIDA clinical trials study on predictors of retention in addiction treatment. Dr. Weinstein helped establish and grow one of the leading Addiction Consult Services in the U.S., which serves as a national model, attracting trainees as well as attendings from around the country to learn from its work. From 2019-23 she served on the board of directors for the Association for Multidisciplinary Education and Research in Substance Use and Addiction, the leading national interdisciplinary organization in the field of addiction.

Clinical Associate Professor
Thomas Hines, MD, Family Medicine, is an accomplished clinician-educator committed to community-based family medicine training. He came to BU in 1997, moving his primary care practice from Tufts University to the South Boston Community Health Center. He has seen patients and mentored students there since that time. He was director of the family medicine residency program from 2001-2018, during which time he coordinated the expansion of the program from six residents each year (18 total) to 12 per year (36 total). As part of that effort, he expanded the training sites for family medicine to include East Boston Neighborhood Health Center (now NeighborHealth), Roslindale Greater Roslindale Medical and Dental Center and South End Community Health Centers as residency-teaching sites. And in collaboration with the department of psychiatry, Dr. Hines led the effort to create a combined family medicine-psychiatry training program, expanding the family medicine residency by another two residents per year for five years.

Sohera Syeda, MD, Medicine/Pulmonology, Allergy, Sleep & Critical Care Medicine, specializes in COPD readmission prevention. Based at VA Boston Healthcare, she created the VA Boston COPD readmission reduction program. She is director of the pulmonary diseases module of the medical student PISCEs course, associate director of the pulmonary, sleep and critical care fellowship program and VA site director for the pulmonary and critical care medicine fellowship. In addition, Dr. Syeda is director of VA Boston’s Coordinated Care and Case Management Program for High-Risk Veterans with Heart Failure and Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease and director of VA Bedford’s Enclave Pulmonary Clinic.