Leonel Rodriguez, MD has been appointed Section Chief of Gastroenterology/Hepatology in the Department of Pediatrics.
Rodriguez joined the faculty at Yale School of Medicine in August 2019 coming from Harvard Medical School as Assistant Professor of Pediatrics and as staff pediatric gastroenterologist at Boston’s Children’s Hospital in the Division of Gastroenterology. His area of expertise and the field to which his clinical practice and research are dedicated is gastrointestinal motility.
Rodriguez’s research is specifically oriented to gastric, small bowel, and colonic motility disorders and he has received funding from the NIH, Department of Health and Sciences, hospital, and training grants to pursue his research interests. He is active among different committees, and recently served as Chair for the International Committee of NASPGHAN (2012-2015) through 2018.
Rodriguez will expand our gastrointestinal motility disorders program as well as our advanced endoscopy services. He will also expand the section’s nutrition services. Additionally, he plans to strengthen both the training and research activities of the section to make it one of the top programs in the Northeast.
In addition, Elijah Paintsil, MD has been appointed as Section Chief of Infectious Diseases and Global Health after serving as Interim Section Chief since January 2019.
Paintsil’s professional credentials are well known to the department. He joined our faculty in 2002 as a Postdoctoral Fellow in Pediatric Infectious Diseases and he soon established himself as expert clinician. During his time at Yale, Dr. Paintsil has taken leadership roles as Co-Director, Yale Partnerships for Global Health, Department of Pediatrics (2006-present), Co-Director, Yale Pediatric Global Health Program (2014), Acting Faculty Director, International Medical Education (2015), Medical Director, Pediatric HIV Program (2015), Program Director, Pediatric Infectious Diseases Fellowship (2016), Acting Chief, Section of Infectious Diseases (2016-18).
Paintsil will be expanding the clinical, education, and research portfolios of the Section. In addition, as evidenced by the addition of Global Health to the official section title, Dr. Paintsil will be overseeing and expanding the Global Health activities in the department. This is an especially opportune time for the department to expand our Global Health research and education as it coincides with the arrival of Dr. Saad Omer, the inaugural director of the Yale Institute for Global Health.