KL2 Alumna, Dr. Gunisha Kaur, Named NAM Emerging Leader in Health and Medicine

Posted Date:
February 10, 2023

News and Congratulations

Photo of Dr. Gunisha Kaur

Congratulations to CTSC KL2 alumna, Gunisha Kaur, MD, MA, on being selected as an Emerging Leader in Health and Medicine (ELHM) Scholar by the National Academy of Medicine. Dr. Kaur is currently the medical director of the Weill Cornell Medicine Center for Human Rights and a respected human rights researcher. 

Established in 2016, the ELHM program annually selects early and mid-career professionals with demonstrated leadership and professional achievement in biomedical science, population health, health care and related fields. The ELHM Program facilitates opportunities for mentorship, collaboration, and innovation between the emerging leaders, NAM members, and experts across sectors. Participants also provide valuable input and feedback to help shape the priorities of the NAM and sustain the NAM’s impact and reputation as a national leader in advancing knowledge and accelerating progress in science, medicine, policy and health equity.

Dr. Kaur’s research interests focus on displaced populations such as migrants, refugees, and asylum seekers. She has used her extensive training and research in neuroscience as an analytical framework to pioneer the study of human rights through scientific methodology. This has involved clinical research and clinical trials on issues such as chronic pain in torture survivors, mental health of children who are displaced, and trafficking of young women and girls in refugee camps. Her innovative research has been supported by competitive awards from the National Institutes of Health, the Foundation for Anesthesia Education and Research, and Cornell University.

Currently the Director of the Human Rights Impact Lab at Weill Cornell Medicine, Dr. Kaur also serves as the Co-Medical Director of the Weill Cornell Medicine Center for Human Rights and the Director of the WCM Anesthesiology Global Health Initiative. In 2004, she published her first book, Lost in History: 1984 Reconstructed, which documents human rights violations in India, and in 2018 published an interactive, digital textbook, Essentials of Global Health and Human Rights for Physicians.

Dr. Kaur was appointed a KL2 Scholar in 2018 where her research focused on "Chronic Pain Assessment in Refugee Torture Survivors". During her KL2 training, Dr. Kaur's mentoring team included Hugh Hemmings, Jr., MD, PhD of Weill Cornell Medicine, Zhenglong Gu, PhD of Cornell University and Arthur Kleinman, MD of Harvard Medical School. 

The CTSC KL2 Career Development Core Program supports junior faculty and senior residents and fellows by providing salary support, protected time, advanced degree training, and practical skills necessary to conduct interdisciplinary Clinical Translational Investigation within a team research environment.

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