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Dr. Douglas J. Rhee arrived to the University Hospitals Eye Institute in 2013 as the Chair of the Department of Ophthalmology & Visual Sciences. He is a glaucoma specialist, molecular biologist, and board-certified ophthalmologist. In 2016, Dr. Rhee was voted by The Ophthalmologist as one of the Power 100 (the most influential people in ophthalmology worldwide). Previously, he had served at the Massachusetts Eye & Ear Infirmary (MEEI), Children’s Hospital Boston (CHB) and was the Associate Chief of Operations for the Department of Ophthalmology and Associate Professor at Harvard Medical School. Prior to MEEI and CHB, Dr. Rhee was an attending physician at Wills Eye Hospital and was an Assistant Professor at Jefferson Medical College the departments of Ophthalmology as well as Pathology, Anatomy, and Cell Biology. Dr. Rhee was born in Buffalo, New York and raised in Detroit, Michigan. After graduating valedictorian of his high school, he entered the combined pre-medical / medical program at the University of Michigan Medical School. After graduating in the top 10% of his class (Alpha Omega Alpha), he then finished an internship at the University of Michigan affiliated Oakwood Hospital (Dearborn, MI). Dr. Rhee completed his ophthalmology residency at Wills Eye Hospital where he also served as co-chief resident. He was awarded a competitive Heed Fellow award and completed a clinical glaucoma fellowship at the Bascom Palmer Eye Institute and a postdoctoral laboratory fellowship at the National Eye Institute of the National Institutes of Health (Bethesda, MD) investigating the molecular biology of intraocular pressure regulation. Dr. Rhee went on as an attending physician on the glaucoma service of Wills Eye Hospital for four years, a clinical consultant of the National Eye Institute for five years, and Massachusetts Eye & Ear Infirmary for eight years prior to coming to the UH Eye Institute. Clinical Interests and Contributions Dr. Rhee cares for both adult and childhood glaucomas. He has an interest in complex and high-risk cases, rare clinical syndromes, as well as the more common forms of glaucoma. Some of Dr. Rhee’s clinical research interests include the outcomes of both traditional and novel/advanced surgical procedures. Combining his research and personal experience with these procedures, Dr. Rhee is a surgical innovator and strives to optimally customize the treatment for an individual patient. He has introduced the surgical procedure, ab interno trabeculotomy (i.e. Trabectome), to New England in 2006. The trabectome is a less invasive approach to filtration surgery. Dr. Rhee was the fifth surgeon worldwide to perform the procedure and has pioneered its surgical techniques. His clinical research has helped to define its place within the glaucoma surgical armamentarium. In 2013, Dr. Rhee introduced the iStent, a microstent that enhances aqueous humor drainage to lower eye pressure, to New England. Dr. Rhee is one of the few surgeons in the Midwest who also offers deep sclerectomy, an alternative to traditional glaucoma filtration surgery trabeculectomy. With the resources of the glaucoma service of UH/CMC, Dr. Rhee can offer the widest array of surgical procedures and implant devices (e.g. Baerveldt, Ahmed, Molteno, and ExPress drainage implants) available in the Midwest. Dr. Rhee has been included in the prestigious Best Doctors (Boston, MA) since 2007. Dr. Rhee was recognized by Boston magazine as one of its “Best Doctors 2007-2008,” as well as Cleveland magazine since 2015. The University Hospitals glaucoma service participates in numerous FDA phase 3 device and implant studies to include sustained release medication platforms and novel microshunts [e.g. hydrus (Ivantis) and supra (Glaukos)] to lower intraocular pressure. Dr. Rhee has also contributed to our understanding of rare clinical syndromes, such as plateau iris, medication-induced (sulfonamide, corticosteroid, etc.), and idiopathic elevated episcleral venous pressure associated glaucoma. For example, Dr. Rhee discovered that plateau iris syndrome is a familial condition and described the autosomal dominant inheritance pattern in 50% of affected individuals. He was one of the first to describe the rare condition of bilateral acute angle closure glaucoma that can be caused by the medication topiramate; Dr. Rhee went on to describe the only effective treatment for severe cases of topiramate-induced angle closure. Dr. Rhee has also furthered the knowledge base of medication-induced (sulfonamide, corticosteroid, etc.) and idiopathic elevated episcleral venous pressure associated glaucoma. At the UH Eye Institute, Dr. Rhee has received regional, national, and international referrals. Dr. Rhee sees patients at UH Eye Institute’s main facility as well as our Landerbrook, and Westlake Hudson satellites. Laboratory Research Interests In addition to his main interest of caring for patients, Dr. Rhee’s scientific research is aimed at determining the cellular and molecular causes of glaucoma while developing disease modification/interruption as a novel treatment paradigm. Dr. Rhee’s laboratory is elucidating the fundamental mechanisms of extracellular matrix dysregulation in the trabecular meshwork. They have identified key molecular mechanisms that may significantly alter the pathogenesis of glaucoma and are endeavoring to now translate this into new disease modifying therapy. Although the matricellular protein, SPARC, was described in the trabecular meshwork (the principle drain of the eye) in the late 1980’s, Dr. Rhee’s group was first to fully characterize its expression pattern within the trabecular meshwork and discover SPARCs previously unrecognized importance to regulating eye pressure. His group has demonstrated some of the structural, functional, and mechanistic regulatory pathways of these proteins in normal and abnormal aqueous outflow. Using prostaglandin analogues and lasers as model systems, Dr. Rhee’s laboratory has further demonstrated the importance of the relationship of matrix metalloproteinases and their inhibitors as effector enzymes for the control of eye pressure. Dr. Rhee co-founded, along with Case Western’s Carol Toris, the International Trabecular Meshwork and Aqueous Humor Dynamics Society which meets biennially in Cleveland. Because of Dr. Rhee’s scientific achievement, leadership, and vision, he was selected to serve on the National Eye Advisory Council of the National Eye Institute, National Institutes of Health. Trainees in Dr. Rhee’s laboratory have won the James Shipman Award in 2003, Fight for Sight Student Fellowships in 2004, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010 (2), 2011, 2014, Ohio Research to Prevent Blindness in 2016, and been supported by the extremely competitive and prestigious Howard Hughes Medical Research Fellowships in 2011 (two separate students) and 2012. Publications and Awards Dr. Rhee has published over 80 scientific articles in peer-reviewed journals. He has received the competitive American Glaucoma Society’s Clinician-Scientist award in 2004 and 2005 (the maximum number allowed by the society). In 2008, the American Glaucoma Society honored Dr. Rhee with the inaugural the Mid-Career Physician-Scientist Award. In 2008, Dr. Rhee was awarded the competitive Research to Prevent Blindness Physician-Scientist Award from the Research to Prevent Blindness organization. These awards were given to support his research into eye pressure regulation. His research has been funded by various public and private sources including the National Eye Institute, Massachusetts Lions Eye Research Fund and several corporate sources. Regional, National, and International Leadership Dr. Rhee is the current President of the Cleveland Ophthalmologic Society and immediate past President of the Korean-American Ophthalmologic Society (2012-2016). Dr. Rhee is on the Governing Board for the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery (2013-Present), the Board of Directors of the American Glaucoma Society (2015-Present), one of the selected few on the National Advisory Eye Council (a.k.a. “Council”) for the National Eye Institute (2015-Present). Other Notable Facts Dr. Rhee has a long history of administrative leadership. While at Wills Eye Hospital, he served as the Medical Director of the Glaucoma Service Diagnostic Laboratory from 2004 through late 2005. He was awarded the Norman Knight Leadership Development Award in 2006 by Mass. Eye & Ear. In early 2007, Dr. Rhee began service as the Medical Director of the Mass Eye and Ear suburban centers in Stoneham and East Bridgewater, Mass. In 2008, Dr. Rhee’s duties expanded to serve as medical director of strategic network development. In 2010, his responsibilities at Mass Eye & Ear expanded to become the Associate Chief of Practice Development and finally in 2011 to Associate Chief of Operations and Practice Development. In addition to serving as Chair of the department of ophthalmology at University Hospitals and Case Western Reserve University, Dr. Rhee chairs the Access Committee of University Hospitals which has span over patient access across the entire University Hospitals health care system. Dr. Rhee is a leading educator of ophthalmologists. He serves on various scientific or curriculum committees for the American Academy of Ophthalmology, National Institutes of Health, American Glaucoma Society, American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgeons, and American Board of Ophthalmology (the certifying organization for ophthalmologists). Dr. Rhee has served as an Examiner for the American Board of Ophthalmology since 2006 and served one year in 2007 as a Special Examiner. In 2007, his contributions to the American Academy of Ophthalmology were recognized by the Achievement Award and in 2013 by the Senior Achievement Award; he was again recognized for the American Academy of Ophthalmology for distinguished educational contributions to the field by the Secretariat Award in 2014. Dr. Rhee has organized and developed the curricula for numerous regional and national meetings for the continuing education of his colleague ophthalmologists. In 2013, Dr. Rhee was named the Chair of the Glaucoma Curriculum Committee for the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery which oversees the glaucoma content for all ASCRS activities. Dr. Rhee participates in the teaching of glaucoma to medical students, residents, and fellows. He has been an invited speaker to over 230 meetings regionally, nationally, and internationally. Dr. Rhee is an accomplished writer having co-authored the Wills Eye Drug Guide (first edition 1998, second edition 2001) and was the lead editor for the third edition of the Wills Eye Manual (2001). He authored the Ophthalmic Drug Guide (first edition 2007, second edition 2010). Dr. Rhee authored and edited Color Atlas & Synopsis of Clinical Ophthalmology: Glaucoma (first edition 2003, second edition 2012). His has served as a co-editor of the Shields’ Textbook of Glaucoma (6th ed, 2011). Additionally, he contributed over 30 chapters to other textbooks whose target audience ranged from the general public, general medicine, comprehensive ophthalmologists, and glaucoma specialists. Dr. Rhee has served as a consultant for the Physician’s Desk Reference for Ophthalmology in 1997 and had been the lead medical editor for this publication since 2002 until its final publication in 2012. He reviews for several ophthalmologic journals, and in 2006, Dr. Rhee began serving as a contributing editor for the trade publication Ocular Surgery News, served as an editor for the journal Lasers in Medicine from 2009-2015, and International Glaucoma Review from 2011-2014. Dr. Rhee has participated in the training of over 125 residents, 39 clinical fellows, as well as mentored 4 post-doctoral research fellows, 15 medical and 3 undergraduate students in the lab. His fellowship trainees have gone onto leadership positions to include a department Chair and Residency Program Directors. Approximately half of his clinical fellowship and laboratory trainees are faculty in numerous ophthalmology departments nationally and internationally. Dr. Rhee inaugurated the first glaucoma fellowship at University Hospitals in 2016. Patient Advocacy and Education Dr. Rhee has served to advocate for patient safety issues at the legislative level. Dr. Rhee served as Vice President of the Massachusetts Society of Eye Physicians and Surgeons from 2009-2013 having testified before the Massachusetts House of Representatives. Aside from numerous citations in ophthalmology trade journals, Dr. Rhee has been interviewed for local newspapers, radio programs, and the Wall Street Journal.