By Merin C. MacDonald
In this month’s Chair’s Spotlight, we highlight Madona Azar, MD, MPH, associate professor of medicine in the Division of Endocrinology, Diabetes, and Metabolism. In April, we sat down with Dr. Azar to learn more about her work at UMass Chan Medical School and UMass Memorial Health.
Dr. Azar moved to New England in 2022 after spending much of her career at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center (OU Health) in Oklahoma City and more recently, the Lebanese American University (LAU) in Beirut, Lebanon.
“After I completed my fellowship at Penn State College of Medicine, my husband and I moved our family to Oklahoma City where he was doing his training, and I was fortunate to be recruited to the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center as faculty,” said Dr. Azar. “My work with my mentor at the Harold Hamm Diabetes Center got me interested in working with indigenous populations in Oklahoma on the epidemiology and complications of diabetes during pregnancy. This led to my ongoing clinical and research interests in diabetes and pregnancy.”
While at OU Health, Dr. Azar led projects on population health and public policy that focused on diabetes education and outreach programs in the community. Specifically, she worked on a project that consolidated clinical and research collaborations between the Harold Hamm Diabetes Center (HHDC) and the Choctaw and Chickasaw Nations of Oklahoma, which led to increased awareness of the importance of screening for, and diagnosis of, diabetes early in pregnancy in high-risk indigenous women. She also served in several leadership positions, including as the Paul H. and Doris Eaton Travis Chair in Endocrinology, medical director of the OU Physicians Endocrinology and Diabetes Clinic, director of the Adult Clinical Services and Diabetes Education and Outreach at HHDC, and the Endocrinology fellowship director.
After ten years at OU Health, Dr. Azar and her husband moved their family to Lebanon, where they are originally from, so that their children could experience and connect more directly and deeply with their culture. There, in addition to her clinical practice, Dr. Azar served as the Internal Medicine Residency program director and the Endocrinology fellowship director at the Gilbert and Rose-Marie Chagoury School of Medicine at LAU.
A series of events, due to political unrest in Lebanon, led Dr. Azar and her family to move back to the United States, where they settled in New England. They had long desired to come to this area where they had ties to family. “When I came back to America, there were job opportunities in Boston, but it really felt like home here in Central Massachusetts,” said Dr. Azar. “I love the campus, the nature, and the space [at UMass].”
Since she joined the faculty at UMass Chan/UMMH in 2022, Dr. Azar has primarily focused on her clinical work. Her main interests remain in diabetes and pregnancy, but she is also working in the diabetes center as well as with patients with cardiometabolic diseases as part of the Advanced Therapeutics Program with Michael Hyder, MD, MPH, executive director of the Center for Digital Health Solutions, and Sandy Aiello, ACNP, the lead cardiometabolic APP for the program. Additionally, she is interested in increasing awareness and screening for metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease (also known as nonalcoholic fatty liver disease). She is currently collaborating with Anita Krishnarao, MD, and Deepika Devuni, MD, of the Division of Gastroenterology on referrals and treatment. As she continues to make connections across the department and institutions, she hopes to expand her work with pregnant patients. “My first love was always diabetes and pregnancy and I'm trying to build upon that,” said Dr. Azar. “We have a diabetes in pregnancy program and we share patients with maternal and fetal medicine. There is a clinical collaboration there, but I am interested in building that out more so that we can offer the best care for patients.”
We thank Dr. Azar for her innovative approach to patient care and her many contributions to the Department of Medicine and across our institutions.