Jasmina Cehajic Kapetanovic
MA in Physiological Sciences, 1996-99
Dr Jasmina Cehajic Kapetanovic, M.A. Phy. Sci., B.M. B.Ch. Oxon., M.Sc. I.O.V.S., Ph.D., F.R.C.Ophth. studied Medicine at Oxford under the personal tutorship of Piers Nye, and received a Distinction in Experimental Dissertation in Neuropharmacology in 1999. She was awarded the UK's first NIHR integrated clinical academic fellowship programme in ophthalmology in 2006 and has since been awarded Masters in Investigative Ophthalmology and Visual Science (First Class) and a PhD in Medicine (gene therapy and optogenetics) via the MRC Clinical Research Training Fellowship at the University of Manchester (2010). Her PhD in optogenetic vision restoration was awarded the prestigious Ruskell Medal from The Worshipful Company of Spectacle Makers Research Awards in 2016 for the best UK paper in vision research, and several outstanding awards including the MRC Centenary Award (2014) and Retinitis Pigmentosa Fighting Blindness Award (2015). As a Keeler scholar at the University of California, Berkeley (2014), she conducted postdoctoral research into adeno-associated vector biology for ocular applications. She completed the specialist training and was admitted as a fellow (FRCOphth) into the UK Royal College of Ophthalmologists. She has won over 30 awards during her early career as an academic ophthalmologist.
Dr Kapetanovic is now a trained ophthalmic surgeon specialised in cataract and vitreoretinal surgery, and as an MRC Clinician Scientist she is currently working on developing innovative surgical techniques including robot-assisted retinal surgery for future applications in genetic therapies. Dr Kapetanovic is amongst only a handful of surgeons in the world who is trained in robotic eye surgery. She is the first female surgeon in the world to operate inside a human eye with a robot. On her passion for her speciality, Dr Kapetanovic says: “Ophthalmology is innovation and technology driven, and the ability to combine innovative research to develop new tools and then deliver them directly to my patients is extremely rewarding.”
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