About Us

The following are brief biographies of the six persons selected in the fourth year of this award. As you can see, they represent broad disciplinary diversity and bring impressive and relevant training and experience to the CASE/Cleveland Clinic MCRTP.

Rebecca Boxer, M.D.
Dr. Boxer received her B.A. at Barnard College and M.D. from the University of Pennsylvania. She subsequently completed an Internal Medicine Residency at the University of California, San Francisco.  After time in private practice, she completed a Geriatric Medicine Fellowship at the University of Connecticut followed by Heart Failure Fellowship at Case Western Reserve University. Dr. Boxer was appointed to the Case Western Reserve University Medical School faculty in November 2006 with joint assignments in the Departments of Family Medicine and Internal Medicine, Divisions of Geriatrics and Cardiology. Dr. Boxer’s research focuses on functional decline and heart failure. She serves as Principal Investigator for a Randomized Controlled Trial of Vitamin D Therapy in Heart Failure Patients and for TeleCare Ohio, a telemonitoring study of heart failure patients statewide.  Dr. Boxer is also the recipient of a grant from the McGregor Foundation to improve heart failure care in the skilled nursing facilities.  Dr. Boxer has clinical responsibilities at The Harrington McLaughlin Heart and Vascular Institute at University Hospitals/Case Medical Center. She is on faculty for the National Heart Failure Training Program (N-HeFT) and Adjunct Professor of Pharmacy at Ohio Northern University. Dr. Boxer is a recipient of the Young Investigators Award from the American Society of Bone and Mineral Research, and has published papers in Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, The American Journal of Geriatric Cardiology, Current Treatment Options in Cardiovascular Medicine, The Aging Male, and Osteoporosis International.

Ruth Farrell, M.D.
Dr. Farrell received a B.A. in Philosophy from University of Chicago, M.A. in Bioethics from Case Western Reserve University, and a M.D. from Case Western Reserve University. She completed her residency in obstetrics and gynecology at University Hospitals of Cleveland. Following her clinical training, Dr. Farrell was accepted as a Greenwall Fellow of Health Policy and Bioethics at the Berman Bioethics Institute of Johns Hopkins University and the Kennedy Institute of Ethics at Georgetown University. During her postdoctoral training, she also served as a Reproductive Policy Fellow at the Genetics and Public Policy Center and a J. Benjamin Younger Fellow of Public Policy at the Office of Public Affairs for the American Society for Reproductive Medicine in Washington DC. She has served on several local and national committees, including the Committee on Ethics for the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and the Ethics Committee for the American Society for Reproductive Medicine. Dr. Farrell is currently Associate Staff at the Cleveland Clinic with a dual appointment in the Departments of Bioethics and Obstetrics/Gynecology and an Associate Professor of Surgery at Case Western Reserve University.  Dr. Farrell’s research is dedicated to facilitating the translation of new reproductive technology to the clinical arena by developing mechanisms for patient decision-making and informed consent. Her work during the MCRTP includes an examination of patient decision-making for first trimester aneuploidy screening, a genetic screening test offered to women during pregnancy. This work will serve as a model for the translation of future genetic technologies as they are developed and transitioned for patient care.

Ronald Hickman , M.S.N., Ph.D.
Dr. Hickman received his BA in Biology, his MSN in Acute and Critical Care Nursing, and his PhD in Nursing from Case Western Reserve University. Since 2002, Dr Hickman’s clinical practice as a registered nurse has focused on the management of critically ill patients who are dependent on life-sustaining technology. In 2006, Dr Hickman expanded his scope of nursing practice and received board-certification as an Acute Care Nurse Practitioner (ACNP). He completed his PhD in 2008 and has centered his research on the consequences of treatment decisions, self-management, and health services utilization in technology dependent adults. His dissertation work, supported by a Research Supplement to Promote Diversity in Health-Related Research from the National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR), focused on the psychological well-being of family decision makers of cognitively impaired chronically critically ill patients. He was appointed the 2008 Eleanor Lambertsen Scholar from the American Nurses Foundation for his study entitled “DECIDE: DEcisional Consequences in Recipients of Impantable Cardioverter DEfibrillators” that explores the perceptions and health status of patients living with implantable cardioverter defibrillators. Currently, he is conducting an investigation entitled “EXPECT: EXploring the Perceptions and Consequences of Complex Treatment Decisions,” which examines the consequences of tracheostomy and feeding tube decisions made by relatives of cognitively impaired patients. Dr Hickman is a Lecturer at CASE’s Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing and instructs nursing students in acute and critical care nursing.

Kurt Lu, M.D.
Dr. Lu received his B.S. in Microbiology and Immunology and M.D., both with Distinction in Research at the University of Rochester in 1997 and 2002.  After completing an intern year in Internal Medicine at Columbia University-St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital, he pursued combined residency/post-doctoral fellowship training at Case Western/University Hospitals in the Department of Dermatology.  Dr. Lu worked as a post-doctoral fellow on an NIH-T32 Training Grant in Molecular and Investigative Dermatology under Dr. Kevin Cooper.  He has received awards from the Dermatology Foundation and recently the 2008 Young Investigator Award from the Academy of Dermatology.  Presently, he is an assistant professor in the Department of Dermatology at Case Western Reserve University.  His research interests include molecular and cellular processes involved in wound healing, specifically the role of macrophages and inflammation.

Milton Ntragatakis, D.D.S.
Dr. Ntragatakis received his BS with honors in Biochemistry from Youngstown State University and then continued to get his DDS from Case Western Reserve University. Upon graduation, he entered the University Hospitals Health System where he completed his residency in Pediatric Dentistry. While a resident, Dr. Ntragatakis focused his research endeavors in Health Disparities and the effect of Oral Health Education in the East Cleveland School District. His career goal is to become a successful leader in patient-oriented clinical research that addresses the oral health problems of Children with Special Needs. He wants to conduct research and develop programs that enhance the collaboration between dentistry, medicine, behavioral and other allied health sciences with an emphasis on prevention and early intervention for dental caries. As a Clinical Research Scholar he is working to identify effective interventions in order to manage the unique oral health issues of Very Low Birth Weight Infants. Dr. Ntragatakis is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Pediatric Dentistry at Case Western Reserve University.

Florian Rader, M.D.
Dr. Florian Rader graduated from the Medical University of Vienna, Austria in 2002. As a research fellow in the Department of Cardiovascular Medicine at the Vienna General Hospital, he conducted a series of clinical research projects in the field of adult degenerative heart valve disorders. Dr. Rader then relocated to the United States and accepted a position as a Clinical Research Coordinator at the Children’s Hospital in Cincinnati, Ohio, where he was involved in pharmacological phase I and II clinical trials. In 2005 he entered the Physician Scientist Pathway at MetroHealth Medical Center to receive his clinical training in Internal Medicine and Cardiology. Dr. Rader is currently a clinical research fellow in an interdepartmental collaborative project with Dr. Blackstone and Dr. Costantini at the Department of Quantitative Health Sciences at Cleveland Clinic. He also is a candidate for the CRSP Master’s Degree in Clinical Investigation. Dr. Rader’s research is aimed at understanding underlying mechanisms of postoperative cardiac arrhythmias and their prediction using quantitative electrocardiographic measurements and statistical methods of machine learning.