Lama A. Al-aswad MD, MPH

Dr. Lama A. Al-Aswad, MD, MPH, is a board-certified ophthalmologist with a subspecialty in glaucoma and cataract, with a strong interest in disease prevention and population health management. She is currently the Professor of Ophthalmology and the Irene Heinz Given and John LaPorte Given Research Professor of Ophthalmology II, Scheie Eye Institute, University of Pennsylvania; Vice Chair for Quality and Safety, and Director of Teleophthalmology, AI and Innovations.

She is also an affiliated faculty member at the Penn Research in Embedded Computing and Integrated Systems Engineering (PRECISE) Center at the School of Engineering and Applied Science and CEO of EnVision Health Technologies and Visi Health Technologies. She was a professor of ophthalmology and professor of population health at NYU Langone Health in New York. She was also the Vice Chair for Innovations and the Director of Teleophthalmology, Artificial Intelligence, and Director of the Ophthalmology Innovations Fellowship.

She received her medical degree from Damascus University Medical School and completed her glaucoma research fellowship at the Mass Eye and Ear Infirmary, Harvard Medical School. Subsequently, she completed her residency in ophthalmology at SUNY Downstate and her glaucoma clinical fellowship at the University of Tennessee. In 2015, Dr. Al-Aswad conferred the degree of Master of Public Health from Columbia University, Mailman School of Public Health for her work in healthcare policy and management.

Dr. Al-Aswad is the past president of the NY Glaucoma Society and the Women in Ophthalmology. She is the founder and past president of the New York chapter of Women in Ophthalmology. She is currently a member at-large of the American Academy of Ophthalmology annual meeting secretariat and the program committee, a member at-large of the American Glaucoma Society, and an examiner for the American Board of Ophthalmology. She served on multiple committees for the American Glaucoma Society, Women in Ophthalmology, and the American Academy of Ophthalmology. She is currently on the ophthalmology glaucoma editorial board, ophthalmology science editorial board, and a Section Editor for the subspecialty of AI, Big Data and Telemedicine in Ophthalmology for the Asia Pacific Journal of Ophthalmology. She holds an appointment with the FDA as a voting member on the ophthalmic device panel.

Dr. Al-Aswad has launched multiple educational curricula for medical students, residents, fellows, and, most recently in 2020-2021, the faculty development curriculum, the artificial intelligence curriculum, and the teleophthalmology curriculum at NYU Langone Department of Ophthalmology. She helped launch the glaucoma fellowship at Columbia University in 2004 and was its director from 2013-2019. In 2020, she launched the ophthalmology innovation fellowship at NYU Langone Department of Ophthalmology.