University of Illinois College of Medicine hosts annual alum awards

Each year, the University of Illinois College of Medicine honors alums for outstanding contributions in their fields. This year’s award winners include recipients who have made groundbreaking strides in heart and lung transplants, are deeply involved in community service and health equity and guide the country’s health data mechanisms and reporting.

Michael R. Bristow ’66, MD ’70, PhD ’71 — Distinguished Alumni Award: Dr. Bristow is a tenured professor of medicine and former head of cardiology at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus. He is the co-founder of the University of Colorado Cardiovascular Institute, a joint venture between the Boulder and Medical campuses, where he directs the section of pharmacogenomics. Earlier, he was project leader on the National Institutes of Health program that developed heart and heart/lung transplantation and co-founded the first multi-hospital cardiac transplant program in the U.S. at the University of Utah. He is the author of over 450 peer-reviewed publications in the fields of heart failure, cardiac transplantation, cancer chemotherapy, virus-induced myocardial injury, genomics and pharmacogenomics.

Bristow also founded and co-founded several biotechnology companies including Genvara Biopharma, ARCA Biopharma, Myogen and Miragen. He has received numerous awards, including the Therapeutic Frontiers Award from the American College of Clinical Pharmacy for developing B-blockade as a treatment for heart failure, the PhRMA Clinical Trials Exceptional Service Award for developing carvedilol as a treatment for heart failure, the Heart Failure Society of America’s Lifetime Achievement Award and the American College of Cardiology’s Distinguished Scientist (Translational Domain) Award.

Bristow’s education and training includes a bachelor’s degree in veterinary science from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and an MD/PhD from University of Illinois College of Medicine. He completed an internal medicine residency as well as oncology and cardiology fellowships at Stanford and received postdoctoral training in molecular pharmacology at University of Illinois College of Medicine and Duke University.

Jeanne Y. Wei, MD, PhD ’75 — Distinguished Alumni Award: Dr. Wei is the Jackson T. Stephens Professor of Geriatrics at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, chair of the Reynolds Department of Geriatrics and executive director of the Reynolds Institute on Aging. She is board certified in internal medicine, geriatrics and cardiovascular medicine and sees patients at the Thomas and Lyon Longevity Clinic at the Reynolds Institute on Aging. Earlier, she served as director of the Division on Aging at Harvard and chief of the Gerontology Division at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.

She has received continuous National Institutes of Health funding for more than 35 years and is recognized internationally for her contributions to aging research. Wei has secured six medical-related U.S. patents, published more than 200 scientific articles and authored six books, including “Aging Well: The Complete Guide to Physical and Emotional Health.” A gifted teacher, Wei has received numerous teaching awards such as the Outstanding Clinical Educator Award from Harvard as well as the Outstanding Woman Faculty Award and Red Sash Award for Excellence in Teaching, both from the University of Arkansas. In 2025, Wei was honored by having an endowed chair established in her name, the Jeanna Wei, MD, PhD, Distinguished Chair for Leadership in Geriatric Medicine at University of Arkansas.

After obtaining MD and PhD degrees from the University of Illinois College of Medicine, Wei completed an internal medicine residency and cardiology fellowship at Johns Hopkins, as well as a staff fellowship in gerontology at the National Institutes of Health and National Institute on Aging in Baltimore, Maryland.

Vijay S. Khiani, BS, BA ’01, MD ’05 — Alumni Humanitarian Award: Dr. Khiani founded New Life Volunteering Society in August 1999 during his undergraduate studies as part of the UIC Guaranteed Professional Program Admissions track. The nonprofit service organization focuses on community service, education and health care and serves those experiencing food insecurity and homelessness, those with mental and physical disabilities and underserved children. The organization offers pathways to community support such as food pantries, free one-on-one tutoring for Chicago Public Schools students and community relief for environmental disasters. Notably, Khiani oversees a free medical clinic that New Life Volunteering Society opened in partnership with the Indian American Medical Association Charitable Foundation in Chicago’s Rogers Park neighborhood which supports a diverse population with the help of student volunteers, attending physicians, phlebotomists, pharmacists and translators. The clinic has a shared medical appointment program that includes health education for those with chronic conditions such as diabetes and high blood pressure to help patients understand and manage their illness. Khiani dedicates countless hours to mentoring undergraduate and medical students to develop programs serving their community, and New Life Volunteering Society has expanded into seven universities across the Chicagoland area.

Khiani completed his internal medicine and international residency at Case Western Reserve University in 2008 and a fellowship in gastroenterology at Yale University in 2011.

Neha Goel, MD, MPH ’10 — Alumni Early Achievement Award: Dr. Goel currently serves as Jeanne Petrek Junior Faculty Chair, Chief of Disparities of the Department of Surgery and associate attending on faculty of the Breast Service, Department of Surgery at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. In 2021, she established and currently leads the Miami Breast Cancer Disparities Study, a multi-institutional and epidemiologic cohort study that led to the discovery of critical clinical distinctions in the Hispanic Black breast cancer population, including the presence of breast cancer-specific survival disparities by the neighborhoods in which patients live and the discovery that living in underserved neighborhoods is associated with more aggressive breast cancer biology. Goel also developed the Translational Epidemiological Framework, a conceptual model to bridge the field of disparities with tumor biology, and has developed a field of research called the Social Genomic Determinants of Health to understand how built and social environment influences cancer biology.

Goel was the editor of the World Health Organization’s Global Breast Cancer Initiative Navigation Technical Brief Document, associate editor of the World Health Organization’s Global Breast Cancer Initiative Technical Framework and a member of the Lancet Commission on Cancer. She has published more than 100 peer-reviewed original research articles, textbook chapters and editorials. She is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Bamberger Academic Scholar Award from the University of Illinois College of Medicine, the American Surgical Fellowship Award from the American Surgical Association, the National Cancer Institute Ecog-Acrin NCI Cancer Control Pilot Award and a National Institutes of Health R01/R37 Merit Award, among many others. Her academic achievements include a surgical internship and residency at Columbia University Medical Center-New York Presbyterian, surgical oncology training at Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia and a Center for Surgery and Public Health Research Fellowship at Harvard Medical School.

Jennifer E. Layden, MD, PhD ’05, Resident ’07, Fellow ’10 — Alumni Early Achievement Award: Dr. Layden is the director of the Nation’s Office of Public Health Data, Surveillance and Technology at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, where she oversees the country’s public health data and surveillance modernization effort. She is responsible for leading, coordinating and executing a comprehensive public health data strategy and improving the availability and use of public health data to inform decision-making and action. Earlier, Layden was deputy director in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Office of Science. She is the recipient of numerous awards and honors, including the CDC’s Charles C. Shepard Science Award. She has previously served as the deputy commissioner and chief medical officer for the Chicago Department of Public Health and as the state epidemiologist and chief medical officer for the Illinois Department of Public Health, playing key roles in public health responses to COVID-19, e-cigarette or vaping use-associated lung injury, hepatitis A and synthetic cannabinoid contamination at the state and local level. Layden has published over 90 peer reviewed articles and has been a keynote and invited speaker at national and international medical public health conferences.

In 2005, Layden received her MD and PhD in epidemiology from the University of Illinois College of Medicine and the UIC School of Public Health.