Dr. Melencio C. Ventura

Dr. Julie Hoover-Fong is a Professor of Genetic Medicine and Pediatrics and Director of the Greenberg Center for Skeletal Dysplasias at Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Hoover-Fong holds a bachelor’s degree in Human Nutrition from The Ohio State University, where she also completed her medical degree. She received her Ph.D. in the Graduate Training Program in Clinical Investigation at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and Bloomberg School of Public Health. Dr. Hoover-Fong completed a pediatric internship and residency at Washington University in St. Louis and a fellowship in medical genetics at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. She joined the Johns Hopkins University faculty in 2002 and progressed to Professor of Genetic Medicine and Pediatrics in 2019. She practices and oversees the clinical operations, research and educational ventures for the patients, families and healthcare providers served by the Greenberg Center. Her clinical team develops and improves diagnostic and treatment guidelines for comprehensive care of patients with all types of bone conditions including dwarfism, orofacial clefting, craniosynostosis and more. Dr. Hoover-Fong also mentors and teaches medical students, residents and genetic medicine trainees. As an active clinical researcher, Dr. Hoover-Fong is the Principal Investigator of multiple global clinical trials for achondroplasia, the first multi-center, investigator-initiated natural history study for achondroplasia, and multiple clinical studies for patients with orofacial clefting, hypophosphatasia and other conditions. She is also a co-investigator on the ELSI and Phenotype Review Committees for the Mendel Project, a whole exome sequencing venture to identify the genetic cause of Mendelian conditions. From an institutional service perspective, Dr. Hoover-Fong serves on the Johns Hopkins Associate Professor Promotions Committee and the Advisory Committee for the Graduate Training Program in Clinical Investigation. She serves on the Medical Advisory Board of the Little People of America, is a member of the Miller-Coulson Academy of Clinical Excellence at Johns Hopkins University and is a charter member of the International Skeletal Dysplasia Management Consortium, publishing best practice guidelines for patients with skeletal dysplasias. Dr. Hoover is highly rated in 26 conditions, according to our data. Her clinical expertise encompasses Rhizomelic Syndrome, Achondroplasia, Spondyloepimetaphyseal Dysplasia Strudwick Type, Adenoidectomy, and Myringotomy. Dr. Hoover is board certified in American Board Of Medical Genetics And Genomics.

Catherine Chu is the director of the Division of Pediatric Neurology and the John M. Freeman Pediatric Epilepsy Center in the Johns Hopkins Department of Neurology, as well as the vice president of child neurology at the Kennedy Krieger Institute. As a child neurologist, epileptologist and clinical neurophysiologist, Dr. Chu cares for children diagnosed with epilepsy and disorders of the nervous system (neurophysiology). She specializes in electroencephalogram (also known as EEG) analysis, seizure localization, surgical planning and neuromodulation for adult and pediatric patients with difficult to control epilepsy. She is nationally and internationally recognized for her work identifying causes of and treatment options for cognitive dysfunction and seizures in epilepsy and neurodevelopmental disorders. Dr. Chu’s team specializes in identifying and developing tools to detect and understand brain rhythms that support complex cognitive functions throughout development, including how these rhythms are disrupted by seizures and neurodevelopmental disorders. Dr. Chu earned her medical degree and a master’s degree in social anthropology from Harvard University. She completed an internship in pediatrics at Massachusetts General Hospital, and then a residency in neurology and child neurology at Massachusetts General and Brigham and Women’s Hospital. After completing two fellowships at Massachusetts General, one in epilepsy and another in clinical neurophysiology, Dr. Chu earned a master’s degree in medical science, focused on clinical investigation, from Harvard Medical School. Dr. Chu is highly rated in 10 conditions, according to our data. Her clinical expertise encompasses Benign Rolandic Epilepsy, Epilepsy in Children, Seizures, Epilepsy, and Deep Brain Stimulation. Dr. Chu is board certified in American Board Of Psychiatry And Neurology.

Dr. John P. Gearhart is a professor of pediatrics and urology at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. His clinical and surgical interests focus on the evaluation and treatment of children born with major congenital birth defects, bladder exstrophy, disorders of sexual development and childhood urinary cancers. Dr. Gearhart received his M.D. from the University of Louisville School of Medicine in 1975. After an internship in surgery and residencies in surgery and urology at the Medical College of Georgia, he completed a fellowship in pediatric urology at Alder Hey Children's Hospital of the University of Liverpool School of Medicine in 1981. Following two years as a urologist at St. Mary's Hospital in Huntington, West Virginia, he completed a second fellowship in pediatric urology at Johns Hopkins in 1985 and joined the Johns Hopkins faculty thereafter as an associate professor of pediatric urology. Over the course of his distinguished career, Dr. Gearhart has been lauded as a pioneer in pediatric urology and reconstructive genitourinary surgery. He has published extensively and has received numerous awards and guest lectureships. He is a member of several national and international professional organizations and is a founding member of the Society of Reconstructive Genitourinary Surgeons. Dr. Gearhart is highly rated in 10 conditions, according to our data. His clinical expertise encompasses Cloacal Exstrophy, Exstrophy of the Bladder, Exstrophy-Epispadias Complex, Osteotomy, and Bladder Reconstruction.