LECOM Alumna, a AFIT Civilian Institution Medical Doctor, Earns Prestigious Fellowship

Tuesday, 3 December 2024

[Link]Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT) Civilian Institution Programs Medical Fellow, Major Viviana De Assis, DO, was awarded the 2023 Gottesfeld-Hohler Benacerraf Visiting Ultrasound
Fellowship. The 2014 Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine (LECOM) graduate is one of only two recipients of this prestigious award in the United States.

The Fellowship, named in honor of Dr. Beryl Rica Benacerraf, a pioneer in the field of obstetrical and gynecologic ultrasound, expands the ultrasound training of physicians who are dedicated to high quality imaging in women's healthcare. The Fellowship will enable de Assis to further her education in fetal echocardiography.

She will spend one month at Eastern Virginia Medical School, learning from world-renowned fetal echocardiography specialists, Drs. Alfred Abuhamad and Elena Sinkovskaya, to perform and interpret diagnostic ultrasounds and ultrasound-guided procedures. "We perform numerous fetal ultrasounds as surveillance to ensure that babies do not have heart conditions as unrecognized heart conditions in the womb could lead to death at the time of birth," explained De Assis. "Being able to accurately recognize pathology, or things that are abnormal in the baby's heart, is very important," she continued.

De Assis emphasizes the importance of this training, especially as a military doctor where access to specialties can be more limited than in civilian hospitals. "If I can help catch an abnormal heart in a patient, I may be able to spare that baby's life because we will do the right thing when the baby is born," she said. "The biggest fear that I have in my career is missing a diagnosis and it not being recognized until after birth. That could put the baby in danger as well as complicate the work of pediatric colleagues as they try to figure out what's going on. So any opportunity that I can take to make myself better for my patients is important to me," the keenly focused physician affirmed.

Dr. De Assis recently completed a three-year Maternal Fetal Medicine Fellowship at the University of South Florida Morsani College of Medicine through the AFIT Civilian Institution Program. As an AFIT Fellow, she was the first author on three research papers with an educational reach to over 43,000 health professionals.

In recognition of her groundbreaking thesis research, de Assis received the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecologists' Armed Forces District Founders Award for best original research
at the ACOG Annual Meeting in September 2023. De Assis recently began an assignment as an attending physician in Maternal Fetal Medicine at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas. A first-generation immigrant from Colombia, she learned about the Air Force Health Professions Scholarship Program from friends and she attended a recruiter presentation during her first year at LECOM. "I felt very compelled at that point to apply because the people who I am serving are the people protecting our nation and I am very grateful for the country that we live in," she stated.

De Assis completed her undergraduate studies at the University of Central Florida, majoring in molecular biology and microbiology. She attended medical school at Lake Erie College of
Osteopathic Medicine (LECOM) Bradenton, Florida, completed an internship at St. Petersburg General Hospital, and she trained in obstetrics and gynecology at Brooke Army Medical Center
in San Antonio, Texas.

From medical student to published researcher to skilled physician, Major Viviana de Assis, DO has shown herself to be an emblematic LECOM alumna evocative of the worthy endeavors of
the medical calling. LECOM extends its hearty congratulations to Dr. De Assis.