Alex Glaser, MD
Program Director
Alex Glaser, MD is the Program Director for the Internal Medicine residency program at Pennsylvania Hospital. Graduating from Middlebury College with a degree in Mathematics, he started his career teaching middle school math, science, and engineering in Washington, DC. Ultimately, he enrolled at Duke University for medical school, and completed his residency training at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania with an extra year as a chief resident. Dr. Glaser joined the faculty at Pennsylvania Hospital in 2018 as the assistant medical director of the J. Edwin Wood Clinic, the primary care site for the residency program, and transitioned to the program director role in 2020. Dr. Glaser has distinguished himself as a medical educator locally and nationally, having sat on national committees studying transitions in education, leading workshops on curricular development for residency education, and developing AI programs for medical educators. Clinically, Dr. Glaser continues to see patients with the residents in the Wood Clinic, attends on the resident Hospitalist service, and supervises inpatient consults.
Marc Shalaby, MD
Chairman, Department Medicine
Marc Shalaby, MD is the Chairman of the Department of Medicine at Pennsylvania Hospital and a Professor of Clinical Medicine at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. In addition to his administrative and teaching responsibilities, Dr. Shalaby works clinically as a general internist – serving as a primary care physician and also regularly attending on the general medicine inpatient teaching services.
Dr. Shalaby attended college and medical school at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and completed his internal medicine residency training at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Shalaby then took a faculty position at the Lehigh Valley Health Network in Allentown, Pennsylvania where he ultimately served as the program director of the internal medicine residency. Dr. Shalaby returned to Penn in 2012 to serve as the residency program director of the Internal Medicine-Primary Care Program, a position he held for nine years prior to coming to Pennsylvania Hospital to serve as the Chair of Medicine. Dr. Shalaby is a nationally recognized pioneer in internal medicine residency redesign, having developed the original X+Y program model, and has published and presented widely in this area.
David Henry, MD
Vice-Chairman, Department of Medicine
David Henry, MD is a graduate of Princeton University and received his MD degree from the University of Pennsylvania Medical School. He is a practicing medical oncologist/hematologist at Pennsylvania Hospital in Philadelphia where he is also a Clinical Professor of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.
In addition to his clinical responsibilities, he is a member of the American Society of Hematology Committee on Communications and a principal investigator for the Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group. He is also principal investigator for several AIDS oncology and cytokine studies which are his principal areas of publication and research. He is a sometime reviewer for the New England Journal of Medicine, the Journal of Clinical Oncology, and the Archives of Internal Medicine and co-editor of Community Oncology Journal. Dr. Henry also hosts Blood and Cancer, a weekly podcast for MDEdge Hematology and Oncology, which interviews leading experts in the field and covers the latest hot topics.
For his teaching, he is a past winner of the Blockley-Osler Award at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and he is the Director of the University of Vienna medical exchange program in Philadelphia.
Doug Beach, MD
Associate Program Director
Doug Beach, MD graduated with a BA from Rutgers University and received his MD degree from the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School. He completed a residency at UMDNJ-Cooper University Hospital where he was also a Chief Resident. He stayed at Cooper University Hospital for his fellowship in Hematology-Oncology. He is currently board certified in Internal Medicine, Hematology, and Medical Oncology. He is the Associate Program Director of the Internal Medicine Residency Program and a practicing medical oncologist/hematologist at Pennsylvania Hospital in Philadelphia where he is also a Clinical Associate Professor of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. He treats all blood disorders and cancers, but has special interest in CLL, multiple myeloma, lymphoma, breast cancer, and prostate cancer. Aside from his clinical responsibilities, he is the current Director of the Cell Therapy and Transplant Program, co-Chair of the Hematologic Malignancies Disease Team and the Director of the Breast-Ovarian Cancer Risk Assessment Program at Pennsylvania Hospital. He is also actively involved in clinical research and is the principal investigator on a number of clinical trials for both hematologic and solid tumor malignancies.
Lauren Catalano, MD
Associate Program Director
Lauren M. Catalano, MD, ScM graduated with her BA and MD with distinction from SUNY Stony Brook and received her Masters in Clinical and Translational Research from Brown University. She completed residency at Rhode Island and The Miriam Hospitals where she was also a Chief Resident. During her fellowship in Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at Brown University, she was named an NIH K12 Scholar in Patient Centered Outcomes Research. She is currently board certified in Internal Medicine, Pulmonology, and Critical Care Medicine. Dr. Catalano joined Pennsylvania Hospital in 2016 as a core faculty member and Medical Director of Respiratory Therapy, and her role has rapidly expanded. In addition to being a practicing pulmonary and critical care doctor at Pennsylvania Hospital and the Harron Lung Center at Washington Square, she is also a Clinical Associate Professor of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. In 2020, she was appointed as an Associate Program Director of the Internal Medicine Residency Program. Known for her bedside teaching and clinical research background, she has become a valued resource in education. She facilitates the biostatistical and research training for the housestaff, and supervises the critical reading and interpretation curriculum. She has worked to expand procedural skill training in the simulation center, and at the bedside. Dr. Catalano runs a series of “mock code” sessions where housestaff learn how to take control in the event of an emergency, and how to healthily debrief afterwards. She mentors trainees throughout the fellowship decision-making, application and selection process. She was awarded the Edward D. Viner Teaching award in her first year on staff, which is a testament to her tireless efforts to promote and encourage well rounded medical education.
Ehren Dancy, MD
Ambulatory Associate Program Director
Ehren Dancy, MD is the Ambulatory Associate Program Director for the Internal Medicine residency program at Pennsylvania Hospital. After graduating from Emory University with a Bachelor of Science in Anthropology and Human Biology, she earned her medical degree at Emory University School of Medicine in 2017. Dr. Dancy completed her residency training in Internal Medicine at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania where she met both Dr. Glaser (Chief Resident at the time) and Dr. Shalaby (the Primary Care Program Director). Following her first year of residency, she was accepted into the Penn Internal Medicine-Primary Care program where she further developed her interests in Medical Education by co-developing a method to amplify medical student shadowing experiences. She proceeded to serve as Chief Resident for the Internal Medicine residency program at Lankenau Medical Center in 2020-21. Dr. Dancy then joined the faculty at Pennsylvania Hospital as the Assistant Medical Director of the Penn Internal Medicine-J Edwin Wood practice, where the residents practice outpatient medicine. Working with Drs. Glaser and Wu, she built out the “Y” part of “X+Y” experience for Internal Medicine residents. Dr. Dancy also sees patients herself in her own primary care practice in Wood. Dr. Dancy was appointed Ambulatory Associate Program Director in January of 2023 and through this role has developed an outpatient experience for residents that allows them to grow their primary care skills and further develop their career interests. Dr. Dancy's medical education research focuses on helping residents develop intervisit care skills, enabling them to navigate the electronic medical record and the broader outpatient health care system more effectively as primary care clinicians. She is active member of the Association of Program Directors in Internal Medicine (APDIM) and the American College of Physicians (ACP).
Nicole Scaramella, MD
Associate Program Director
Nicole Scaramella, MD is the Associate Program Director for Curriculum for the Internal Medicine program of Pennsylvania Hospital. Dr. Scaramella graduated from Rutgers University with her degree in Biomedical Nutrition and then went on to medical school at Sidney Kimmel Medical College in Philadelphia, PA. She completed her residency at the University of Pennsylvania where she stayed for an additional year as a chief resident. Thereafter, she joined the J. Edwin Wood practice where she cares for her patients and oversees residents caring for their patients in the outpatient practice. She is a member of the Gold Humanism Honor Society. As part of her commitment to medical education, Dr. Scaramella co-developed a “Crash Course in Precepting for Chief Residents” workshop and is a member of the AIM Coaching and Leadership for Excellence Program at the University of Pennsylvania. In her role as Associate Program Director for Curriculum, she oversees the didactic lectures and noon time conferences for the Pennsylvania Hospital Internal Medicine Residency.
Brett Irving, MD
Associate Program Director
Brett Irving, MD graduated with distinction from the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa after which he practiced medicine in South Africa for four years before completing his Internal Medicine residency and serving as Chief Resident at Pennsylvania Hospital. He joined the faculty in 2024 as an Academic Hospitalist and Physician Advisor.
As Associate Program Director of Clinical Competency, Dr. Irving oversees resident assessment, milestone evaluation, and individualized coaching. Having navigated his own transition to graduate medical education in the United States, he is passionate about supporting international medical graduates as they adapt to training within the U.S. healthcare system.
Dr. Irving was recognized with the Darilyn Moyer, MD, FACP Professionalism Award for Trainees in Southeastern Pennsylvania and has presented award-winning educational and clinical work at regional and national meetings. He has also contributed to publications in cardiovascular medicine, quality improvement, and medical education.
Clinically, Dr. Irving cares for hospitalized patients as an academic hospitalist while supervising residents on the inpatient teaching services. He is actively involved in hospital and health system committees focused on patient safety, quality improvement, clinical operations, and care transitions. His educational interests focus on creating systems that promote learner growth while maintaining excellence in patient care.