School of Medicine
Showing 21-30 of 64 Results
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Audrey Shafer
Professor of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine, Emeritum
Current Research and Scholarly Interestsliterature and medicine, humanistic aspects of medicine and anesthesia care, language and medicine, communication, medical humanities, creative writing, arts and healthcare
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Steven L. Shafer, MD
Professor of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine (Adult MSD) at the Stanford University Medical Center, Emeritus
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsPharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics of intravenous anesthetics, including drug interactions and continuous measures of drug effect; model-based drug development; target controlled drug delivery; advanced models of drug behavior.
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Sajan Shah, MD, MBA
Clinical Assistant Professor, Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine
BioDr. Sajan Shah is a board-certified, fellowship-trained pain management specialist with the Stanford Health Care Pain Management Center. He is also a clinical assistant professor in the Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine, Division of Pain Medicine at Stanford University School of Medicine.
Dr. Shah specializes in managing acute and chronic pain. He commonly cares for people living with complex spinal conditions that have not responded to conventional treatment. He offers a range of injections to manage pain, including joint corticosteroid injections, peripheral nerve blocks, trigger point injections, and Botox injections for migraines and dystonia. He has experience with neuromodulation techniques, including spinal cord stimulation and peripheral nerve stimulation, and minimally invasive spinal procedures. He strives to provide effective pain therapies that improve the everyday function and quality of life of his patients.
Dr. Shah’s research has explored topics in anesthesiology and pain medicine. He has studied chronic pain syndromes, including how to diagnose and manage rare pain conditions. Dr. Shah has published his findings in several peer-reviewed journals and co-authored a book chapter on complex regional pain syndrome. He has presented his research at national and international meetings, including those held by the American Academy of Pain Medicine, American Society of Regional Anesthesia and Pain Medicine, and North American Neuromodulation Society. -
Pilleriin Sikka
Postdoctoral Scholar, Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsWhat makes certain experiences transformative, and how can we harness them to support resilience and mental health? I explore this question by studying emotions across various states of consciousness—waking, dreaming, anesthesia, psychedelics, and meditation. With a background in psychology, neuroscience, and anesthesiology, I bring together methods that are rarely combined: daily diaries and surveys, language and narrative analysis, neurophysiological recordings, lab experiments, and clinical trials. My work has three main aims: (1) to understand how affective experiences unfold across states; (2) to test whether these experiences can be deliberately shaped to support mental health; and (3) to identify the mechanisms that make them transformative. This interdisciplinary approach has led to the first controlled studies of anesthesia-induced dreams for trauma, new insights into peace of mind and emotion regulation, and cross-state comparisons showing how affective experiences in altered states can foster resilience. My long-term goal is to develop a new frontier in affective science: the study of how transformative experiences across different states of mind can improve well-being.
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Laura Simons
Professor of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine (Pediatric)
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsI am a Professor in the Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative, and Pain Medicine at Stanford University School of Medicine and a clinical psychologist who evaluates and treats youth presenting with chronic pain in the Pediatric Pain Management Clinic (PPMC) at Stanford Children’s Health. My program of research aims to utilize a pain neuroscience psychology approach to gain a mechanistic understanding of cognitive and affective processes in pediatric pain, perform rigorous patient-oriented research that translates targeted assessment into mechanistically informed treatment approaches for optimal clinical care and leverage the ubiquity of digital health to enhance patient access and reach. Central to these goals are projects targeting adolescence and youth adults with chronic pain that encompass defining brain signatures of threat interpretation, evaluating the efficacy of graded exposure (NCT03699007), deriving a biosignature of improvement vs. persistence of pain and disability (NCT04285112), and evaluating the impact of virtual reality on pain rehabilitation (NCT04636177). These studies along with additional work examining the journey of pain care for youth with pain and their parents form a comprehensive research portfolio in the realm of understanding and treating chronic pain in young people. My long-term career goal is to lead a robust research program focusing on alleviating the suffering of youth and emerging adults with chronic pain.
