Mary E.Klotman, T'76, MD'80,
HS'80-'85
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“Life Altering Experience” at Duke Makes Klotman Want to Give Back
The years that Mary E.Klotman, T'76, MD'80, HS'80-'85 spent at Duke were “life altering,” she says. “You really are influenced in profound ways just by being in the Duke environment. I was surrounded by faculty that were exciting and excited about what they did. It motivated me.”
The chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases, director of the Emerging Pathogens Institute, and professor of medicine and microbiology at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City was officially appointed president of the Duke Medical Alumni Association during Medical Alumni Weekend in October. She replaces William C. “Billy” Andrews, T'76, MD'80, HS'82-'86 , who held the position for 2006-2007.
Klotman says Duke medical alumni are a largely untapped and extremely valuable resource to Duke, and her goal as president is to promote broader involvement of medical alumni and strengthen the bridge and the dialogue between alums and the medical school and medical center.
Her primary research focus at Mount Sinai School of Medicine is the molecular pathogenesis and therapy of HIV infection, a disease that had just entered the clinical arena when she was training at Duke. Recent observations reported by her lab include the demonstration that HIV resides in and evolves separately in kidney cells and that anti-retroviral therapy can relieve some of the symptoms but the virus persists.
Prior to her appointment at Mount Sinai 13 years ago she was at the National Institutes of Health for several years, and is a former assistant professor at Duke.
She and her husband Paul E. Klotman, MD, HS'76-'82 , a physician at Mount Sinai Hospital, have two children—Alexander, 17, and Samuel, 18—and live in New York City.
