Faculty Profiles

Hamdee Attallah, M.D.
Assistant Professor of Medicine
Section Chief, Endocrinology
Philadelphia VA Medical Center

Business Address

Education

Residency

Biography

Dr. Attallah is a Clinical Assistant Professor of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and the Penn-affiliated Philadelphia VA Medical Center. He joined the Division of Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism in 2008. He completed his undergraduate and medical school training at Wayne State University in Detroit, where he earned a B.S. degree in Biological Sciences in 1992 followed by an M.D. degree from the School of Medicine in 1996. He completed his residency training in Internal Medicine at the McGaw Medical Center of Northwestern University in Chicago, and later moved to northern California, where he completed a postdoctoral fellowship in Endocrinology at Stanford University.

Dr. Attallah graduated Summa Cum Laude from Wayne State University and was nominated for the Grumet Award for Best Resident Teacher in 1999 while an internal medicine resident at Northwestern University. At Stanford, he received the Pfizer Clinical Scholars in Endocrinology Award in 2003. During his endocrine fellowship training, he solidified his interest in diabetes, obesity and the neuroendocrine regulation of body composition. Under the mentorship of Dr. Andrew Hoffman at Stanford, Dr. Attallah successfully obtained an F32 NRSA Award from the National Institutes of Health to study the effects of a lipolytic hormone and insulin sensitizer drug in overweight adults at risk for diabetes. While performing his postdoctoral research, he also trained and supervised Stanford internal medicine house staff and endocrine fellows at the Veterans Affairs Palo Alto Health Care System in Palo Alto, CA.

In 2005, Dr. Attallah returned to his native Michigan and joined the endocrine faculty at his alma mater, Wayne State University. He was particularly motivated by the desire to tackle the alarming increase in obesity and diabetes and the challenging health disparities issues related to these conditions in minority populations in southeastern Michigan. While at WSU, he managed thriving inpatient and outpatient clinical programs in diabetes and helped to develop one of WSU’s most highly successful satellite clinics in endocrinology and diabetes. He also maintained a prominent role as a member of the teaching faculty, helping to supervise 3-4 fellows in the endocrine fellows’ clinic and serving as Director of the Endocrine Pathophysiology Course for second year students at the School of Medicine. Dr. Attallah’s strong enthusiasm and support for the mission of teaching, leadership and high quality patient care prompted him to join the endocrine faculty at the University of Pennsylvania in 2008. At Penn, he serves as endocrine section chief at the Philadelphia VA Medical Center and also performs inpatient consultations on the thriving inpatient endocrine-diabetes service at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. He also maintains an active teaching role at Penn by supervising endocrine fellows and internal medicine house staff in the endocrine clinics as well as on the inpatient endocrine-diabetes consultation services. At the Philadelphia VA, he is actively leading a program to develop a comprehensive and multidisciplinary model of diabetes care in the ambulatory and inpatient settings.