Conference Co-Chair Bios

Peter Benn is Professor Emeritus at the University of Connecticut Health Center,

Farmington, Connecticut. Dr. Benn received his undergraduate degree and also his Doctor of Science degree at the University of St Andrews, Scotland. He received his PhD at the University of Birmingham, England, with research in cancer genetics and cytogenetics. From 1977 to 1979 he was a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Human Genetics at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia. He subsequently specialized in laboratory service in the areas of prenatal screening and diagnosis. He has published over 160 peer reviewed papers and authored numerous reviews, chapters, position statements, and other articles. He is a consultant to Natera, Inc., a provider of non-invasive prenatal screening. He is currently the Editor for Genetics for Ultrasound in Obstetrics and

Gynecology.

Vincenzo Berghella is originally from Pescara, Italy, from where he moved after High School to attend Manhattanville College, New York, USA. He did medical school at Thomas Jefferson University (TJU), in Philadelphia; Ob-Gyn Residency at New York Downtown Hospital in Manhattan, New York City, and Maternal-Fetal Medicine (MFM) Fellowship at TJU, in Philadelphia, where he remained and is now Director of the MFM Division and Fellowship Program.

Dr. Cuneo is board certified in Pediatrics and Pediatric Cardiology. She is the Director of Perinatal Cardiology and Fetal Telemedicine at Children’s Hospital Colorado and University of Colorado School of Medicine. She began September 1, 2013 and her academic/research interests include fetal cardiology and fetal arrhythmias especially fetal long QT syndrome and AV block.

Dr. Cuneo earned her undergraduate degree in English Literature at Lawrence University and her medical degree at The Medical College of Wisconsin. She completed her residency at Case Western Reserve University Medical School, in Cleveland Ohio and then spent a year as the only pediatrician in Leslie County, Kentucky. Dr. Cuneo then completed her fellowship in Pediatric Cardiology at Children’s Memorial Hospital, Northwestern University School of Medicine. As a second year fellow, Dr. Cuneo won the American Academy of Pediatrics Young Investigator Award in Pediatric Cardiology. She spent the next twenty years building the largest fetal cardiology program in Illinois, including a fetal echo telemedicine network linking Chicago to rural Indiana and Northern Illinois.

In her spare time, Dr. Cuneo enjoys competing in Gran Fondos in France, Italy and the United States and loves spending time with her family.

Debra-Lynn Day-Salvatore, M.D., Ph.D., F.A.A.P, F.A.C.M.G. is Chair of the Department of Medical Genetics and Genomic Medicine at Saint Peter's University Hospital. Dr. Day-Salvatore received her undergraduate degree from Harvard University and her medical degree from Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine. Her residency training was in Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine at the Cleveland Clinical Foundation, and she completed two years of post-graduate training in Medical Genetics at UMDNJ. Dr. Day-Salvatore is also a molecular biologist with a Ph.D. and Masters from New York University Medical Center's Sackler Institute of Graduate Biomedical Sciences specializing in pharmacogenomics. She is recipient of the UMDNJ Foundation's Excellence in Teaching Award for 1994-95, has been consistently voted a Top Doctor by NJ physicians, has authored or co-authored more than 50 scientific papers and 30 book chapters, has made several guest appearances on radio and television, and has lectured both nationally and internationally. 

Dr. Mark I. Evans is President of the Fetal Medicine Foundation of America, Professor of Obstetrics & Gynecology at Mt. Sinai School of Medicine, President of the International Fetal Medicine and Surgery Society Foundation, and President of Comprehensive Genetics, PLLC. He is considered one of the major key opinion leaders in the fields of prenatal diagnosis, screening, and fetal therapy world-wide. He routinely lectures every year all over the world and is regularly invited as visiting professor to national and international obstetrics and genetics meetings. Dr. Evans has over 1200 scientific publications including 30 text books. He has had multiple NIH grants including being a principal investigator for the search for fetal cells in maternal blood. He has received
numerous national and international honors including receiving the President’s Award for Achievement from the Society for Gynecologic Investigation and was elected President of the International Fetal Medicine and Surgery Society twice.

Dr. Shuping Ge is chief of cardiology at St. Christopher's Hospital for Children. He completed his fellowship in pediatric cardiology at the University of Colorado Children's Hospital and is board certified in pediatrics and pediatric cardiology. Dr. Ge has a special interest in non-invasive imaging, including cardiac ultrasound and other imaging modalities used for the diagnosis and assessment of congenital heart defects.

Dr. Jelin is an Assistant Professor in the Gynecology and Obstetrics at Johns Hopkins Hospital. She received her M.D. from Harvard and completed her residency in Obstetrics and Gynecology as well as a combined Maternal Fetal Medicine/Genetics Fellowship at the University of California San Francisco. Following completion of her fellowship, she received a faculty position at Washington Hospital Center where she quickly became director of the Prenatal Diagnosis Center, after which lead her to Hopkins. In addition to her current position at Johns Hopkins, she is the Assistant Director of Prenatal Genetics. She also held the position of Director of Perinatal Ultrasound but has begun to focus more time on her research. She is actively participating in prenatal genomics research with a specific interest in urogenital anomalies and skeletal dysplasias. Additionally, Dr. Jelin has dedicated her time to assisting students, residents, and fellows through mentorship and educational efforts. She has also successfully been the Activity Director for the Multidisciplinary Perinatal Case Conference which is a weekly educational CME conference.

Dr. Anthony Johnson is Professor in the Departments of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences and Pediatric Surgery at The University of Texas Health Science Center, Houston, TX. He is the Co-Director of The Fetal Center at Children’s Memorial Hermann Hospital, Houston, TX. Dr Johnson is internationally known physician and researcher in fetal diagnosis and therapy. He was instrumental in the formation of the fetal surgery program at the University of North Carolina and the Texas Children & Fetal Center prior to his arrival to join the UTHealth and The Fetal Center on September 14, 2011. Dr. Johnson has served as director of the  Society of Maternal Fetal Medicine’s Special Interest Group in Maternal-Fetal Surgery and Special Interest Group in Genetics. He was a founding members of the North American Fetal Therapy Network (NAFTNet), a voluntary association of medical centers in the United States and Canada with established expertise in fetal surgery and other forms of multidisciplinary care for complex disorders of the fetus. Dr. Johnson is the chairperson of the NAFTNet fetal endoluminal tracheal occlusion (FETO) Consortium. 

Dr. Krantz is a Pediatrician and Medical Geneticist.  He is Director of the Roberts Individualized Medical Genetics Center (RIMGC), Director of the Center for Cornelia de Lange Syndrome and Related Diagnoses and PI on the Medical Genetics Training Grant (T32) at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.  He is also the Medical Director of the Genetic Counseling Programs at Arcadia University and the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Krantz’s clinical interests are focused on caring for children with genetic conditions with an emphasis on children with multisystem developmental diagnoses (such as Cornelia de Lange syndrome, Alagille syndrome, Pallister -Killian syndrome and CHOPS syndrome) and in the Genetics of Hearing Loss.  His research interests are focused on identifying and characterizing the molecular etiology of syndromic and non-syndromic developmental diagnoses and assessing the genomic implications of the genes and pathways perturbed in these diagnoses.

Lisa Levine is a Board Certified Maternal-Fetal Medicine sub-specialist. She is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Levine is a trained perinatal epidemiologist who received her Masters in Clinical Epidemiology at Penn. She is the director of the Pregnancy and Heart Disease Program at Penn, MFM

Fellowship Program Director and is also the Co-Director of Penn’s Maternal and Child Health

Research Center.

Dr. Levine has developed two areas of clinical research within women’s reproductive health, both addressing different aspects of maternal morbidity. The first focuses on optimizing induction of labor and labor management to reduce maternal morbidity and improve perinatal

outcomes. The second focuses on immediate and long-term outcomes for women with pregnancy related hypertension or cardiovascular disease. As a physician scientist, Dr. Levine has past and current funding (NIH, intramural, and Foundation grants) in both of these research areas.

Dr. Christa Lese Martin, PhD, FACMG, is the Associate Chief Scientific Officer at Geisinger (Danville, PA) and a Professor and the founding Director of their Autism & Developmental Medicine Institute. She is Board-certified by the American Board of Medical Genetics and Genomics (ABMGG) in Clinical Cytogenetics. Her research focuses on using a “genetics-first” approach to characterize neurodevelopmental and neuropsychiatric disorders, including autism, intellectual disability, bipolar disorder, and schizophrenia, with an ultimate goal of developing precision health-driven treatments to improve patient outcomes. She also focuses on evidence-based curation approaches for defining gene/disease clinical validity and the clinical interpretation of genomic variants. Dr. Martin is one of the Principal Investigators of the NIH-funded Clinical Genome Resource (ClinGen) and serves as a Co-Chair of the American College of Medical Genetics and Genomics (ACMG) Secondary Findings Working Group. 

Anthony Odibo is currently employed as a Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of South Florida, Tampa, FL, USA. Previous notable employments were as faculty at University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia and Washington University in St. Louis. He completed his medical training at the University of Benin, Nigeria and trained in Obstetrics and Gynecology / Maternal Fetal Medicine in the UK and USA. He is a Fellow of the Royal College of Obstetrics and Gynecology and the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology. Anthony Odibo also holds a Master’s degree in Clinical Epidemiology from the University of Pennsylvania, USA.

Anthony Odibo splits his time between an active clinical practice with focus on Prenatal diagnosis and Fetal therapy as well as research investigating prediction models and the role of the placenta in development of adverse pregnancy outcomes. He is the Medical Director of the Fetal Care Center of Tampa Bay.

Anthony Odibo is the Editor in Chief for Ultrasound in Obstetrics and Gynecology. He has previously served as the Deputy Chief Editor for ACTA and Editor for BJOG and Ultrasound in Obstetrics and Gynecology and is on the Editorial Board for BJOG and Prenatal Diagnosis.

Dr. Rebarber is a founder physician and President of Maternal Fetal Medicine Associates, PLLC and Carnegie Imaging for Women, PLLC. board-certified Obstetrician / Gynecologist with subspecialty certification in Maternal Fetal Medicine. He is a Clinical Professor, at the Ichan School of Medicine in the department of obstetrics and gynecology at Mount Sinai Hospital. He is co-Director of the Division of Maternal Fetal Medicine at Englewood Hospital and Medical Center. He completed his MFM fellowship training at Yale University and was a member of the New York University School of Medicine faculty where he served in numerous leadership positions prior to his current roles. He is an oral examiner for the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology for Obstetrics (Generalist examination). He is on the medical advisor board for Saving Mothers, a organization dedicated to providing care in resource limited areas throughout the globe.

Dr. E. Albert Reece is Executive Vice President for Medical Affairs at the University of Maryland, and Dean of the School of Medicine. He also is the John Z. and Akiko K.
Bowers Distinguished Professor. He is a member of the prestigious National Academy of Medicine (NAM) of the National Academy of Sciences. In addition, Dr. Reece a Professor in the Departments of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences; Internal Medicine, and Biochemistry & Molecular Biology, and oversees an active multi-million dollar NIH-funded research program. His laboratory studies the biologic/molecular causes and consequences of diabetes-induced birth defects, and currently is developing experimental methods for preventing such birth defects. He has over 500 publications.

A native of Jamaica, West Indies, Dr. Reece received a Bachelor of Science degree with honors (Magna Cum Laude) from Long Island University and an MD degree from New York University School of Medicine; completed his residency in OB/GYN at Columbia University Medical Center, and a fellowship in maternal-fetal medicine at Yale University School of Medicine. In addition, he has a PhD degree in Biochemistry from the University of the West Indies, Kingston, Jamaica; and an MBA degree from the Fox School of Business; Management at Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He was a member of the Yale faculty for almost 10 years before being recruited to serve as the Abraham Roth Professor and Chair of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the Temple University School of Medicine. Prior to joining the University of Maryland School of Medicine, he served as Vice Chancellor and Dean of the University of Arkansas College of Medicine.

Katie Sagaser is a certified genetic counselor and Assistant Professor of Gynecology & Obstetrics at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, MD. She completed her Masters degree in Genetic Counseling at the University of Texas Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences in Houston, TX. Katie and her 5 genetic counseling colleagues see patients with a wide variety of prenatal and preconception genetics indications in the Johns Hopkins Prenatal Diagnosis and Treatment Center as well as the Johns Hopkins Center for Fetal Therapy. Katie is a clinical supervisor for genetics trainees from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, the National Institutes of Health, and the University of Maryland. She is the 2020 Senior Co-Chair of the NSGC Prenatal Special Interest Group, and the recipient of the 2019 NSGC New Leader Award and the 2020 American College of Medical Genetics & Genomics Carolyn Mills Lovell Genetic Counselor Award. Katie’s professional interests include genetic counseling for complex congenital anomalies, fetal dysmorphology, intricacies of expanded carrier screening in the general population, and the role of spirituality in health care.

Adele Schneider, MD, FACMG, recently retired after 28 years as Director of Medical Genetics at Einstein Medial Center Philadelphia. From 2002 until 2017 she was the

Medical Director of the Victor Center for the Prevention of Jewish Genetic Diseases at Albert Einstein Medical Center in Philadelphia, which she helped found with Lois Victor.

Adele was on the committees at the American College of Medical Genetics and Genomics that has written changing guidelines for screening for Jewish genetic diseases over the past 10 years. She has published extensively about her internationally recognized

research in the area of anophthalmia (absent eyes) and microphthalmia (small eyes). Adele is a graduate of the Witwatersrand University Medical School in Johannesburg, South Africa and trained in genetics at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Dr. Schneider

is a recipient of the Einstein Physician Leadership Award and has been featured in “Top Docs” in Philadelphia magazine. She was named a 2005 Weizmann Institute of Science Distinguished Scientist.

Dr. Amanda Shillingford is a board certified pediatric cardiologist at Nemours / Alfred I. DuPont
Hospital for Children in Wilmington, Delaware. She is a board certified pediatric cardiologist
specializing in echocardiography and fetal cardiology. Dr. Shillingford currently serves as the
Director of Fetal and Perinatal Cardiology and the Associate Medical Director of the Nemours
Partners for Perinatal Management, a Nemours based program which provides care coordination and support for a mother and family after a prenatal diagnosis of a congenital abnormality. This is her 3 rd year participating as faculty in the Philadelphia Prenatal Diagnosis Conference. Dr. Shillingford received her medical degree from Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons. At the Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia, she completed a pediatric residency, a pediatric cardiology fellowship, and an advanced fellowship in pediatric echocardiography/ fetal cardiology. Dr. Shillingford previously worked at the Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin before joining Nemours in 2015.

Dr. Shubhika Srivastava is the Chief of Cardiology and Co-Director of the Nemours Cardiac Center at AI DuPont Hospital Wilmington Delaware. She received her training in Pediatric cardiology  at Mount Sinai Medical center , New York and continued her career at Mt. Sinai in imaging and fellowship training and was the Director of Fetal and Congenital Echocardiography, Fellowship training and Director of Non Invasive Imaging before she started her career at Nemours on January 1st 2020. Her interests are in fetal and congenital echocardiography and outcomes research and education. She is involved in multicenter studies and in the education committee with the fetal heart Society and is the current Co-Chair of American Society of Echocardiography Scientific Sessions and is on the executive committee of Society of Pediatric Echocardiography. She is passionate about education, clinical research in outcomes and quality standards in imaging.

Dr. Wayne Tworetzky is the Director of the Fetal Cardiology Program at Children's Hospital Boston. He is a senior associate in the Department of cardiology and an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School. He grew up in Cape Town South Africa and went to Medical School at the University of Stellenbosch. He completed his internship in medicine and surgery at Groote Schuur Hospital University of Cape Town as well as a senior house officer year in pediatrics and obstetrics in Cape Town. In 1991 he went to London, England where he worked for two years as a senior house officer in pediatrics at several hospital including Guy’s (Now Evelina Children’s Hospital) and Great Ormond Street hospitals. From 1993 to 1995 he completed his pediatric residency at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). From 1995 to 1998 he was a pediatric cardiology fellow at UCSF and 1998-1999 an instructor in critical care transport medicine as well as a senior fellow in pediatric and fetal echocardiography and adult congenital heart disease and exercise echo.  In 1999 he took a staff position at Children's Hospital in Boston where he has been until the present. He has been the Director of the Fetal Cardiology Program since 2004. 

Currently, Dr. Wapner is the Vice Chair of Research in Obstetrics and Gynecology for Columbia University Irving Medical Center and Director of Reproductive Genetics. Dr. Wapner is an internationally known physician and researcher specializing in reproductive genetics. He has authored or co-authored over 500 publications and he has been an active investigator in the areas of Maternal-Fetal Medicine and genetics. He is either a principal or co-principal investigator for a number of NICHD sponsored multi-center studies. He recently led a multicenter

study evaluating the accuracy, efficacy, and clinical advantages of prenatal diagnosis using microarray analysis. The Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine has

honored Dr. Wapner with both a Lifetime Achievement Award (2015) and The Dru Carlson Memorial Award for Best Research in Ultrasound and Genetics (2017). He

has had a significant role in the development of multidisciplinary research studies and clinical research centers throughout his career.

Zev Williams, MD, PhD, is the Chief of the Division of Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility and an Associate Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Columbia University Medical Center and is a nationally-recognized clinician and researcher in the area of recurrent pregnancy loss and infertility. Dr. Williams completed his MD and PhD training in Molecular Biology and Biochemistry at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine before continuing to the Brigham and Women’s Hospital/Massachusetts General Hospital for his residency in Obstetrics and Gynecology. After completing his fellowship in Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility at Weill-Cornell, Dr. Williams then did a post-doctoral fellowship in RNA biology in the laboratory of Dr. Thomas Tuschl at Rockefeller University. Dr. Williams has also achieved success in federally-funded research projects in several different areas of study, having received numerous NIH grants to support his work. Currently, as part of NIH R01 and U19 grants, Dr. Williams is engaged in research projects to develop novel technologies to prevent genetic diseases, reduce miscarriages and to use placental RNA as a screening tool for diseases and complications of pregnancy, to enable early intervention, and to provide insights into disease pathogenesis. Dr. Williams has also taken a leading role as an educator, serving as a mentor and adviser to medical students, residents and fellows.

I hope you and your family, colleagues and students are well. 

We will all get through this pandemic together. Keep calm, wear a mask and wash your hands! I was taught early in my career to share what I have learned. I have had the great good fortune to work with giants in congenital heart disease, including Bill Rashkind, Vicky Vetter, Bill Norwood, Saemundur Gudmundsson, Jim Huhta, Vincenzo Berghella and many others who

guided my research in congenital heart disease physiology and my efforts in teaching fetal

cardiovascular ultrasound. Over the last 45 years, I have been privileged to work with Project Hope and WHO in training lots of fellows in pediatric cardiology, neonatology and maternal fetal medicine, many of whom have now become the giants of our fields. My rewards have been to present papers and give lectures and courses around the world. Have slides, will travel..