Peter Crookes, M.D. is Associate Professor of Surgery and the director of the Bariatric Surgery Program at USC University Hospital.  He is an attending on the Emergency Surgical Service and the Foregut Service at LAC/USC Medical Center.  He graduated from medical school in his native Belfast, Northern Ireland and did fellowships in Melbourne, Australia as well as USC before being appointed to the faculty at USC.  His clinical and research interests include esophageal and gastric disease and the physiology of morbid obesity and its surgical correction.  He has had a long history of teaching students and residents, and has been the recipient of numerous awards within the department for excellence in teaching, as well as the prestigious Kaiser Permanente Excellence in Teaching award on three different occasions.  He gives formal lectures in the preclinical years on Weight Loss Surgery, and lectures to the Surgery I students on esophageal diseases in their third year.  He is deeply involved in the Student Surgical Interest Group and gives classes in medical and surgical history.  He is also known for his informal mentorship of students through research projects and other career-enhancing activities. 

pcrookes@surgery.usc.edu

Kenji Inaba, MD FRCSC FACS, is an Assistant Professor of Surgery, with the Division of Trauma Surgery and Surgical Critical Care at the LAC+USC Medical Center.  He is the Medical Director of the Surgical ICU and the Program Director for the Surgical Critical Care Fellowship.  After his undergraduate studies at McGill University, he graduated from Queen’s University Medical School, completed a Masters at the University of Toronto, General Surgery Residency at the University of Western Ontario and his Trauma Critical Care fellowship at the Ryder Trauma Center in Miami.  He is involved in the daily clinical instruction of medical students, residents and fellows as well as providing classroom lectures and research mentoring.  He has been the recipient of numerous teaching awards including the prestigious Kaiser Permanente Excellence in Teaching award on three separate occasions.

kinaba@surgery.usc.edu

Dr. Maura Sullivan is the Associate Chair of Educational Affairs and the Executive Director of the Surgical Skills Training and Education Center in the Department of Surgery, Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California.  She has a joint appointment with the Rossier School of Education where she is an Assistant Professor and a Senior Research Associate in the Center for Cognitive Technology.  Her research interests include Cognitive-Task-Analysis, the development of expertise, technical skills training and curriculum development.

Dr. Sullivan obtained her undergraduate degree in nursing from Fairfield University, her master of Nursing, Critical Care from the University of California, San Francisco, and her PhD in Educational Psychology from the Rossier School of Education at USC.  She is actively involved in the Association of Surgical Education and holds an appointment with the American College of Surgeons as an ATLS Educator

Josette Etcheverry, a faculty member at Los Angeles County + University of Southern California Medical Center, Keck School of Medicine, is the Medical Student Educator for General Surgery Clerkship and an ATLS Course Coordinator.  Josette has experience in critical care and emergency nursing.  Prior to joining the medical school, she taught nurses in both of the preceding specialties.  She is an active member of the American Association of Critical Care Nurses, Sigma Theta Tau and the Association of Surgical Education.

M. Erika Navarro joined the Surgery Clerkship in June of 2007. She serves as the Surgery II Coordinator on a part-time basis. Erika is responsible for coordinating the daily activities of students in the last six weeks of the clerkship.  She also provides assistance with front desk responsibilities. Concurrently, Ms. Navarro works for the Los Angeles Unified School District, Beyond the Bell Branch, in a before school enrichment program as a Traveling Program Supervisor.