Matthew Semler, MD, MSc
Photo: Matthew Semler

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Elected 2024

Matthew W. Semler MD, MSc, is an Associate Professor of Medicine and Biomedical Informatics in the Division of Allergy, Pulmonary, and Critical Care Medicine at Vanderbilt University (tenure received 9/14/2023). Dr. Semler is a critical care physician and Associate Director of the Medical Intensive Care Unit at Vanderbilt University.  He received his Bachelors of Science and Medical Doctorate from the University of Virginia before completing residency and chief residency in internal medicine and fellowship in pulmonary and critical care medicine at Vanderbilt University.  Dr. Semler’s federally-funded research identifies non-patient-centered variation in current clinical practice, embeds pragmatic randomized trials into clinical care to understand which treatments produce the best outcomes for which patients, and implements the results into practice.  Randomized trials he has helped lead, including 11 published in the New England Journal of Medicine or JAMA, have challenged longstanding dogma around common practices in fluid management, airway management, and respiratory support. These trials have identified treatments that improve patient care (e.g., use of a video laryngoscope, bag-mask ventilation during intubation), treatments that had been recommended in international guidelines but were ineffective (e.g., fluid bolus administration during intubation), and treatments that had been administered to millions of patients per year for decades that appear to be harmful (e.g., intravenous saline).  Dr. Semler founded as serves as Chair of the Steering Committee for the Pragmatic Critical Care Research Group, a network of emergency medicine, anesthesia, and critical care clinicians and researchers at 25 centers across the US.  He is the Medical Director of the Center for Learning Healthcare at Vanderbilt.  He is co-PI of the Nashville Coordinating Center for the NIAID STRIVE network and a member of the protocol committee for trials within the NHLBI PETAL Network.