Experience
Clinical rotations in the United States and Pakistan, research training in five laboratories, teaching, leadership and awards. The full record is in the CV.
Education and examinations
2021 to present
Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS)
The Aga Khan University, Karachi
- Clinical Honors in Community Health Sciences (2024)
- Clerkships include general surgery (12 weeks), surgery and critical care sub-internships, internal medicine, paediatrics, and obstetrics and gynaecology
2020 to 2021
Natural Sciences and Computational Sciences (two semesters)
Minerva University, San Francisco
- Minerva Scholarship
- Coursework in complex systems, formal analyses and empirical analyses
2016 to 2020
Secondary and Higher Secondary School Certificates
Cadet College Hasanabdal
- HSSC 2020: 1st of about 71,000 candidates, Rawalpindi Board (gold medal); class rank 1 of 108
- SSC 2018: 11th of about 125,000 candidates, Rawalpindi Board
January 2026
USMLE Step 1
Passed
2026
ACR–AMSER Standardized Tool for the Assessment of Radiology Students (STARS)
Scored 92%, against a national average of 74.4% and an institutional average of 80% (Cleveland Clinic)
Clinical electives and sub-internships
2026
Sub-internship in vascular surgery
University of New Mexico Hospital, Albuquerque
Worked at the level of a junior resident: led daily rounds on about 15 patients, joined consults and postoperative care, and scrubbed on carotid endarterectomy, peripheral revascularisation, aneurysm repair, bypass, dialysis access and venous procedures. Built the Vascular Surgery Field Guide for incoming students and sub-interns, and submitted three case reports to the American Venous Forum.
2026
Sub-internship in interventional radiology
Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, Ohio
Pre-procedural evaluation, image-guided biopsies, drainages, vascular access, angiography, embolisation and endovascular procedures, with exposure to TACE, TARE and tumour ablation.
2026
Elective in diagnostic radiology
Cleveland Clinic Imaging Institute, Cleveland, Ohio
Rotated through thoracic, abdominal, paediatric, musculoskeletal, neuro and emergency reading rooms, dictating preliminary reports for attending sign-off. Presented an AMSER Case of the Month and scored 92% on the ACR–AMSER STARS examination.
2024
Elective in interventional radiology
Aga Khan University Hospital, Karachi (4 weeks)
Research training
2026
Demehri Lab, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science
Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine (Dr Shadpour Demehri)
Quantitative musculoskeletal imaging and deep learning. Contributed to an NIH grant proposal on automated vertebral bone density, spinal sarcopenia and fracture risk from chest CT in COPD (MESA, COPDGene, CARDIA, RURAL), and co-authored a study of statin use and MRI-derived 3D knee bone shape in the Osteoarthritis Initiative.
2026
Gadani Lab, Interventional Oncology Research Laboratory, Lerner Research Institute
Cleveland Clinic (Dr Sameer Gadani, Dr Dola Das, Dr Susmita Dey)
Translational hepatocellular carcinoma research: hepatoma and hepatic stellate cell co-culture, doxorubicin cytotoxicity assays, immunocytochemistry and fluorescence microscopy, 3D liver spheroids, and flow cytometry and confocal imaging of PEG–folate drug carriers. Co-authored a review of interventional oncology for HCC, published in Cancers.
2026
Hasan Lab, Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine
The Aga Khan University (Dr Zahra Hasan)
Designed a high-throughput pipeline for host–pathogen transcriptomics in COVID-19: Kraken2 and DIAMOND filtering, STAR alignment to GRCh38, featureCounts, DESeq2, and GO and KEGG enrichment.
2025
Fatima Lab, Department of Biological and Biomedical Sciences
The Aga Khan University (Dr Ambrin Fatima)
Genetics of rare lysosomal storage and neuro-ophthalmic disorders: DNA extraction, hybridisation capture, Illumina sequencing, variant calling and ACMG interpretation, including a novel TPP1 nonsense variant.
2023
Shafiq Lab, Department of Biological and Biomedical Sciences
The Aga Khan University
BCL2 dysregulation in colorectal cancer: immunohistochemistry on FFPE tissue with blinded scoring, and survival and mutation analyses across TCGA, MSK and DFCI datasets.
2018 to 2020
Early research training
Codon Corps, Islamabad; Institute of Integrative Biosciences, CECOS University; Pakistan Institute of Nuclear Science and Technology; National STEM School, Pakistan Innovation Foundation.
Research funding
April 2023
The Agency Fund, Global Math Talent Grant (US$183,796)
Evaluating the impact of the National Science Bowl Pakistan programme on high school students’ STEM engagement, performance and career aspirations: a randomised controlled trial. Principal investigator: Prof. Asim Ijaz Khwaja. Role: co-wrote the proposal.
Multicentre collaboratives
2026 to present
SurgWeek-2 (GlobalSurg Collaborative)
Collaborator. An international prospective cohort of consecutive surgical patients, coordinated by the University of Birmingham and the NIHR Global Health Research Unit on Global Surgery, defining global variation in postoperative complications.
2023 to present
PakSurg Collaborative
Steering committee. PakSurg 1: a prospective multicentre cohort study of surgical site infection after elective surgery across Pakistan, published in The Lancet Regional Health – Southeast Asia.
2022 to present
Global Eco-Health Collaborative
Collaborator and data collector for an international study of how clinicians and students view healthcare’s environmental footprint.
Teaching
2021 to 2025
From Data to Insights: R for research associates
CITRIC Health Data Science Centre, AKU (5-day CME-accredited workshop)
Co-organised and taught 50 research associates: descriptive and inferential statistics, regression and survival analysis.
2025
Research in Medical School: an A-to-Z approach
Student Research Forum, AKU
Three sessions on biostatistics for about 60 medical and nursing students. The OnlyStats site grew out of this teaching.
2024 to 2025
Teaching and research assistant, AI4MED Summer School
Pakistan Innovation Foundation
Taught 20 students to extract and clean MIMIC-III data and build NLP pipelines and models for length of stay and mortality.
2022 to 2025
Python programming and machine learning workshops
Society for Promotion of Innovation in Education, AKU
Coding bootcamp for more than 75 medical and nursing students, and a summit on machine learning for clinicians.
2022 to 2025
The science of learning
Society for Promotion of Innovation in Education, AKU
Taught each incoming AKU Karachi medical class active recall, spaced repetition and Anki, and gave the session to students at AKU Nairobi.
2022 to 2025
Lead trainer, Debate and Public Speaking Forum
The Aga Khan University
Coached World Schools and British Parliamentary formats: case construction, rhetoric and logical fallacies.
October 2023
The scientific method: a look inside the academic bubble
Student Research Forum, AKU
Designed and taught a workshop on p-hacking, the replication crisis and the limits of statistical assumptions.
2023
Beginners’ Guide to Research 3.0 and Research 101
Student Research Forum, AKU
National online research training series that reached more than 750 health science and pre-medical students.
Peer review and academic service
2026
Peer reviewer, Hospital Pharmacy (SAGE)
Recorded on Web of Science.
September 2025
Chair, Workshops Committee, 3rd International Student Research Conference
Student Research Forum, AKU
A conference of more than 1,500 attendees with 1,200+ abstracts from six countries. Ran 12 pre-conference workshops for 400+ participants, wrote the standardised abstract scoring rubric and reviewed more than 60 abstracts.
2024
Publications and Impact Committee, 2nd International Student Research Conference
Student Research Forum, AKU
Designed the abstract scoring criteria, now validated in a manuscript under revision, and the pre- and post-test instruments used to evaluate the conference.
2023
Technical logistics, 1st International Student Research Conference
Student Research Forum, AKU
Leadership
2021 to present
Co-President, National Science Bowl Pakistan
Centre for Economic Research in Pakistan
Led four national iterations, including legal registration, governance and the regional and national rounds. Designed the online competition format during COVID-19, wrote the app’s product requirements and maintains a 2,000+ question bank.
2021 to present
Student Research Forum
The Aga Khan University
Chair of the Workshops Committee for ISRC 2025; Director of the Academics Wing; earlier, member of the Academics Wing.
2021 to 2025
Director, MedTech Wing
Society for Promotion of Innovation in Education, AKU
Ran clinical skills workshops for ISRC, a machine learning summit and coding bootcamps, a seminar on generative AI in healthcare, and a visit to SIUT for robotic surgery simulation. Wrote the rulebook for the Innovation to Incision hackathon.
2023 to 2025
Co-Convener, Public Speaking Forum; Executive Producer, TEDxAgaKhanUniversity
The Aga Khan University
Launched AKU’s first TEDx event and wrote its playbook; scaled the AKU Debating Championship to 60 teams and co-organised the university’s first Model United Nations. As General Secretary, revived the forum and ran the inaugural 40-team championship.
2022 to 2023
Member, Provincial Youth Assembly of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
Took part in assembly sessions and planted 1,500 trees with the Billion Trees Tsunami project.
Hackathons
April 2026
1st place, RUFAYDA Anti-Burnout Hackathon
Rufayda, National Incubation Center and British Asian Trust, Pakistan
Baat Karo, a burnout support system for healthcare workers. Prize of PKR 300,000.
April 2024
Most Innovative Team, DISRUPT Quality of Care Hackathon
World Health Organization, Milan
A neural network for early sepsis detection in intensive care, presented to WHO experts.
March 2024
2nd place, Innovation to Incision Hackathon
AKU Annual Surgical Conference
A neural network predicting surgical site infection from routine laboratory markers, deployed on the web. Prize of PKR 75,000.
Awards
2026
Outstanding Poster Award (two), International Student Research Conference
For the Kv7 channel opener meta-analysis and a case of ANCA-negative crescentic membranous nephropathy.
2026
1st place, RUFAYDA Anti-Burnout Hackathon
For Baat Karo (PKR 300,000).
2024
Poster of Distinction, 2nd International Student Research Conference
For the glucocorticoids and pain flare meta-analysis.
2024
Most Innovative Team, WHO DISRUPT Quality of Care Hackathon, Milan
2024
2nd place, Innovation to Incision Hackathon, AKU Annual Surgical Conference
PKR 75,000.
2024
Clinical Honors in Community Health Sciences, Aga Khan University
2022 to present
Parliamentary debating
Semi-finalist at several national championships; 7th of 100 speakers at the Karachi World Style Debating Championship; 4th best team at the 2024 AKU Debating Championship.
2020
1st position, Higher Secondary School Certificate, Rawalpindi Board
Of about 71,000 candidates.
2020
2nd nationally, National Biology Talent Contest (Higher Education Commission)
Selected for the training camp at NIBGE.
2019
Outstanding Performance Award, National STEM School
Best overall performance, and captain of the winning Science Bowl team.
2017
Jinnah Scholarship for academic excellence
Programmes
July to August 2025
Students United for Regional and Global Education (SURGE)
Yale Global Health, Yale School of Medicine
Presented on privacy and data sovereignty in AI for global health; co-authored an op-ed on a global health problem.
2020 to 2021
Curriculum Development Intern
Minerva University Curriculum Committee, San Francisco
Designed course frameworks and analysed the academic performance of more than 500 students.
September 2020
Head Student, Sakura Science Exchange Program
Japan Science and Technology Agency, Tokyo
One of ten students selected from across Asia; lab work at the University of Tsukuba, JAXA and NIED.
Certifications
2025
Artis Q biplane angiography system application training
Siemens Healthineers
2024
Machine Learning Specialization
Stanford University and DeepLearning.AI
2024
Systems Biology and Biotechnology Specialization
Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai
2024
Introduction to Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis
Johns Hopkins University
2024
Biomedical Responsible Conduct of Research
CITI Program
2023
Biomedical Research, basic course
CITI Program
Methods and skills
- Evidence synthesis
- Pairwise and prevalence meta-analysis (GLMMs, Freeman–Tukey and logit transforms), meta-regression, risk of bias, RevMan
- Statistics
- Regression, survival analysis, propensity score matching and inverse probability weighting, sensitivity analyses (Stata 19, SPSS 27, R)
- Psychometrics
- Content validity, inter-rater and test–retest reliability (ICC, Krippendorff’s alpha, Gwet’s AC1)
- Computation
- Python and R; neural networks, gradient boosting, NLP; medical image segmentation (TotalSegmentator, nnU-Net)
- Bioinformatics
- Kraken2, DIAMOND, STAR, featureCounts, DESeq2, GO and KEGG enrichment, variant calling
- Laboratory
- Cell culture and co-culture, cytotoxicity assays, immunocytochemistry, flow cytometry, IHC, DNA extraction, NGS library capture
- Qualitative
- Interview and focus group coding and thematic analysis in NVivo
- Design and web
- Websites and interactive teaching tools; figures in Datawrapper, Lucidchart, Canva and Photoshop
- Languages
- English and Urdu (native)
Outside medicine
Squash, horseback archery, and playing the rubab, the Afghan lute.