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Timothy M. Pawlik, M.D., M.P.H.

JOHNS HOPKINS MEDICINE NAMES NEW DIRECTOR OF SURGICAL ONCOLOGY, ANNOUNCES TWO OTHER PROMOTIONS

Timothy M. Pawlik, M.D., M.P.H., head of the Johns Hopkins Liver Tumor Center, has been appointed the new director of surgical oncology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.

Pawlik succeeds Richard Schulick, M.D., who is leaving Hopkins to head the surgery department at the University of Colorado. 

In addition, the Hopkins Department of Surgery has created two new sections within the department: the hepatobiliary and pancreatic surgery section, and the gastrointestinal oncology, breast, melanoma, sarcoma and endocrine section. Hepatobiliary and pancreatic surgeon Christopher L. Wolfgang, M.D., Ph.D., will lead the hepatobiliary unit while Nita Ahuja, M.D., a surgical oncologist with expertise in sarcomas and colorectal cancers, will lead the gastrointestinal oncology, breast, melanoma, sarcoma and endocrine section.

Pawlik, a graduate of the Tufts University School of Medicine, joined Johns Hopkins in 2005. He is a hepatobiliary surgeon, an associate professor at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and co-director of the Center for Surgical Trials and Outcomes Research. Pawlik is a frequent national and international lecturer on management of hepatobiliary malignancies as well as an executive council member of the Society of Surgical Oncology, American Hepato-Pancreato-Biliary Association, and the Association for Academic Surgery.

Dr. Pawlik completed residency at the University of Michigan and a surgical oncology fellowship at the University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center.  Pawlik also has an interest in medical ethics and completed a fellowship in medical ethics at the Harvard School of Public Health as well as a master’s in theology from Harvard Divinity School in Boston. 

Wolfgang is currently the head of the pancreatic surgery section and co-director of the Multidisciplinary Pancreatic Cyst Clinic at Johns Hopkins. Along with a medical degree from the Temple University School of Medicine, Wolfgang also has a Ph.D. in biochemistry from the school. Wolfgang, an associate professor in the departments of surgery, oncology and pathology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, joined the faculty in 2005. His primary clinical interests are cancers and benign disease of the liver, pancreas, bile duct and gallbladder, while his major scientific interest is in the biological behavior of pancreatic cancers.

Ahuja is currently the head of the Gastrointestinal Sarcomas and co-director of the Peritoneal Surface Malignancy Program at Johns Hopkins.  Along with her surgical duties, Ahuja, an associate professor in the departments of surgery and oncology, maintains a laboratory studying molecular markers important in early diagnosis and prognosis of cancers. She is a member of the Stand Up to Cancer Dream Team on epigenetic therapy and is considered an expert on epigenetics in colorectal cancer. Her clinical interests are in soft tissue sarcomas and management of metastatic colorectal cancer. A graduate of the Duke University School of Medicine, Ahuja has been at Hopkins since 1993 when she started her surgical training, followed by a fellowship in surgical oncology. She joined the faculty in 2003.