Rebecca Blatt, MD
Becca was born in Worcester, MA when her Dad attended his pulmonary fellowship there but moved to Wheeling, WV and grow up on a horse farm.  She rode horses competitively and was offered a position in Germany, after high school graduation, competing in jumpers.  After living in Germany for several months, she decided to continue her education at Boston University.  Becca returned to Boston and lived there for a year but couldn't take the city traffic and transferred to the University of Virginia to continue her riding career and to pursue medicine.  Taking a year off, Becca worked as an EMT and lab tech in a cardiology lab and transferred from riding horses competitively to competition in mountain and road biking.  During medical school, Becca continued her competitive bike riding and met her fiancé who is a flight paramedic.  She currently competes at a national level at road and mountain biking and aspires to international competition and pro sponsorship.  Her Emergency Medicine interests and background consist of ultrasound and sport medicine.

Deirdre Cronin, MD
Deirdre was born and raised in the Hartford area, starting her medical career as a volunteer EMT in her hometown of East Granby.   She received a degree in Biomedical Engineering from Boston University, and returned to become a Clinical Engineer at Saint Francis Hospital and Medical Center in Hartford.   She left to start a family that now includes three children ranging in age from 11 to 4, as well as numerous cats, dogs and horses, and one husband.   After volunteering in EMS for twenty years, she decided to pursue her long-time passion to become an EM physician and graduated with her M.D. from the University of Connecticut School of Medicine. When not working or raising a family, she enjoys spending time on the Connecticut shore and traveling to distant and remote places where she hopes to continue her interest in International Medicine.

Julia D’alo, MD
Julia was born and raised in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania, home of the Steelers!  After high school she attended the University of Wisconsin to play volleyball for the Badgers.  Julia vacillated between studying arts or sciences, but ultimately decided on microbiology and immunology.  After college she worked as a research scientist in a virology lab at the university and later attended medical school at Ross University.  In her free time she enjoys the outdoors, traveling and spending time with family and friends. 

Bradely Dreifuss, MD, MPH
Brad was born in the wilds of Ohio, and grew up in Nashville, TN.  He returned to his roots in Ohio to attend Kenyon College, where he pursued a B.A. in Neuroscience and became hooked on emergency medicine while working as an EMT for a rural fire department. While at Kenyon, he met Heather, his beautiful, headstrong, independent wife.  International interests took the form of a semester abroad in Nepal where he studied the language, culture, and the interface of western and Tibetan medicine.  He furthered his international studies in medical school with a rotation in Sri Lanka, assisting in the development of a framework for emergency medicines.  Between is travels, Brad attended Oregon Health and Science University to pursue his MD/MPH where he was active in  student government and statewide healthcare access  At this juncture he’s excited to be at UCONN’s Emergency Medicine Residency program and is interested in pursing a Pediatric Emergency Medicine Fellowship.

Dan Frees, MD
Dan was born and raised in Newport, RI, he grew up on the ocean and loving the outdoors.  After finishing high school in Newport, Dan went on to graduate from the University of Delaware, where he had a double major in Biology and Medical Studies with minors in Spanish, Philosophy, and Medical Humanities.  Dan then attended Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, where he was an active participant in his school's student run homeless shelter clinics, student government, youth emergency services, and various intramural/club sports.  Outside of school, Dan loves virtually all sports and outdoor activities, particularly skiing, biking, juggling, and watching Notre Dame Football (which is a sport).  Dan also loves to travel, having studied and rotated in Mexico, Costa Rica, Panama, and Peru during college and medical school.  In addition to his future medical career, Dan hopes to own a summer tree house in the rainforest, win the Nobel Peace Prize, and have a Ben and Jerry’s Ice Cream Flavor named after him.

Max Goldstein, MD
Max grew up in Brooklyn, NY and spent many of his hours during high school on the subway commuting to the Bronx High School of Science. He attended the University of Wisconsin at Madison, studying Animal Science, as he originally wanted to become a veterinarian. After dealing with many farm animals, he realized that he would much rather be a physician, and decided to transfer to Binghamton University where he majored in Biology. After college, Max was a researcher at the Primate Laboratory at SUNY Downstate Medical Center for a year and a half, and then attended medical school at St. George’s University.  Max’s interests include reading, politics, cars, archaeology, travel, and most importantly, spending time with his wife and dog.

Meghan Kelly-Herbst, MD
Meghan was born in Boston, but lived most of her life in Connecticut.  After graduating High School, she attended the College of William & Mary for her undergraduate education, during which she lived in France for over a year.  Meghan and then came back home to attend the University of Connecticut School of Medicine.  She loves to run, hike, travel (especially internationally), and spend time with her family.  Her favorite place to relax is in Falmouth, Cape Cod.  Meghan and her husband Tim currently live in Glastonbury, CT.

Forrest Hill, MD
Forrest was born and grew up in Idaho, eventually attended the University of Idaho.  He received a B.S. in Business and minors in Chemistry and Physics, but much of his time was spent working in a long term care facility as a nurse’s assistant.  He then attended the University of Washington School of Medicine through the WWAMI program, spending his first year again at the University of Idaho.  After this year, he got married to his wife, Karlene.  In his spare time Forrest enjoys karate, golf, and running.

Camielle Rizzo, MD
Camielle was born in Philadelphia, the land of cheesesteaks and soft pretzels and where she learned to say “worter” instead of water.   Being raised on Big Ten college football, she attended Penn State University where she majored in biology and minored and completed a thesis in history.  She continued at Penn State for her medical education but took a brief detour to complete an NIH-sponsored research fellowship at Mass General Hospital/Harvard Medical School.   Having decided very late in medical school that she wanted to pursue emergency medicine, she first completed a transitional year program before coming to UConn.  She is a big history/foreign affairs buff, loves baking and cooking (in between call days/nights), and needs her college football.

Mark Strickland, MD
Mark grew up in La Jolla, California where he spent most of his youth playing guitar in local bands and surfing up and down the West Coast. At 14 he got his first taste of life abroad while living on an island in France.  A few years later he played his way through Europe with a blues band. He completed his B.S. in Microbiology at UCSD and spent his nights playing guitar in local bars.  He developed his passion for Medicine while volunteering for the Indian Navajo/Hopi Reservations.  He met his wife at Berkeley just before she set off to Europe and he later joined her there to complete his medical degree at the University College Dublin. Mark and his wife traveled to remote areas of Spain and Italy to record dying languages for her research and they performed flamenco together in Ireland. Mark enjoys surfing, sailing, painting, songwriting, playing musical instruments and above all, the time that he spends with his wife and one year old daughter.

Andrew Taylor, MD
Andrew Taylor grew up in Jackson, Mississippi. He received his B.S. in Physics from the University of Mississippi.  While in Oxford, he worked in labs in The National Center for Physical Acoustics and the National Center for Natural Products Research. From there, he and his wife moved to Atlanta to attend Emory University School of Medicine.  They have a 2 year old daughter, Catherine, who has been instructed by her grandparents (all of whom still live in the South) not to attain a Yankee accent while up north.  Andrew is a compulsive reader of a variety of non-medical topics including math, physics, poetry, and philosophy.  Additionally, he enjoys going to the park with his family, cooking, and playing the piano.

Devin Tsai, DO
Devin was born in Alamogordo, NM but was raised in the small farming town of Salinas, CA (the lettuce capital of the world).  Some of his fondest memories are of working on the farm during the summers in high school.  He went to undergrad at University of California, San Diego where he majored in biology and played collegiate Ultimate Frisbee.   During his senior year, he went to Washington D.C. working as an intern at the American Public Health Association researching the cost effectiveness of needle exchange programs.  After graduation, he went on to pursue his medical degree at New York College of Osteopathic Medicine where he found his home in the emergency department.  Devin enjoys playing basketball, ultimate, golf, but not all at the same time.  He also enjoys running, backpacking, watching movies and listening to NPR.