'Stepping Stones' series provides career inspiration and insight on your lunch hour

Wednesday, Sept. 3

Laurie Gutmann is professor and chair of neurology at the IU School of Medicine and and co-director of the IU School of Medicine-IU Health Neuroscience Institute. Her role includes leading a department of 90 faculty and building a statewide network for neuroscience clinical research. Under her leadership, the Department of Neurology has seen significant growth in clinical, translational and basic science research.

Her funding and research target clinical studies of neuromuscular disorders, rare diseases and acute stroke trials, with special interest in hereditary muscle and nerve disorders.

Gutmann’s background includes more than 20 years at West Virginia University School of Medicine Department of Neurology, where she established a certified ALS clinic and the neurology department’s clinical research program, served as the director of the WVU Comprehensive Stroke Center, and worked under contract as Extramural Office of Clinical Research program officer for the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS), part of the National Institutes of Health. Her work led to her co-chairing the neuromuscular Common Data Elements at NINDS.

Gutmann serves on several NIH study sections and is currently co-chairing the NIH’s National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute’s RECOVER Clinical Trials Steering Committee for post-acute sequelae of COVID (“long COVID”).

She received her medical degree from WVU School of Medicine and completed both a neurology residency and neuromuscular fellowship at University of Virginia. She has published in multiple areas, including clinical research outcomes, education and policy. She has been an invited speaker at national and regional meetings, as well as for endowed lectureships.

A Big Ten Academic Alliance presentation*

Tuesday, Jan. 13

Lauren Nephew is assistant professor of medicine in the Division of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, and the associate vice chair of health equity for the Department of Medicine at IU School of Medicine. Her NIH-funded research program focuses on understanding how the structural and social determinants of health contribute to disparities in liver disease, as well as developing interventions that improve access to care.

Nephew earned her medical degree from Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine at Case Western Reserve University, where she also completed a master’s program in bioethics. She has an additional master’s degree in clinical epidemiology from the University of Pennsylvania. She completed an internal medicine residency at Massachusetts General Hospital and fellowships in gastroenterology and liver transplantation at the University of Pennsylvania.

She is a champion of social justice, wife and mother of two. 

Thursday, Feb. 12

Michele Saysana is executive associate dean for clinical affairs and professor of clinical pediatrics at IU School of Medicine. She is also president for the IU Health Metro Region and IU Health Methodist and University Hospitals.

Saysana has been a hospitalist with the Department of Pediatrics at IU School of Medicine and Riley Children’s Health since 2002. She joined the IU School of Medicine faculty in 2006. Saysana has served as adviser to the IU School of Medicine Patient Safety Residency Council and developed an elective in patient safety. She is a clinical educator in the medical student clerkship, pediatric residency program and pediatric hospitalist fellowship.

At IU Health, she served as medical director of quality and safety for Riley Children’s from 2011 to 2017. In that year, she was named vice president and IU Health’s first chief quality and safety officer. Prior to beginning her current role at IU Health in October 2024, she served for two years as chief medical officer at the system's adult academic health center, ensuring the highest standards of quality and service at IU Health Methodist and University hospitals. She has co-chaired the IU Health Physicians Quality Committee, served as the board chair of the Indianapolis Coalition for Patient Safety and co-led the Riley Physicians Quality Network.

She earned a bachelor’s degree in biology from IU and a medical degree from the IU School of Medicine.

Wednesday, March 4

Elizabeth Yeh is a professor of pharmacology and toxicology, vice chair of research and a cancer biologist with experience in cellular transformation, in vivo mouse tumor modeling and experimental therapeutics. Research in her lab focuses on breast cancer biology and Alzheimer’s disease, with expertise in pharmacology and experimental therapeutics. She seeks to understand changes in cell signaling pathways that allow breast cancer cells to evade treatments.

Since joining the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology as a faculty member at IU School of Medicine in 2019, she has held a number of leadership positions, which she says have shaped her overall vision for how community-building supports the tripartite (research, education and service) mission of higher education.

Prior to joining the IU School of Medicine faculty, she was a faculty member in the Department of Cell and Molecular Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics at the Medical University of South Carolina.

Yeh received a PhD in pharmacology from Duke University, where she studied cellular transformation to understand how normal cells become cancerous. She completed postdoctoral fellowships at the University of Pennsylvania and Duke University. Her postdoctoral research focused on kinase signaling and in vivo modeling of breast cancer.

A Big Ten Academic Alliance presentation*