Professional Honors
Dr. Gandhi was a recipient of the 2019 American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO) Achievement Award for his many years of contributions to the courses and teaching program at the Annual AAO Meeting. He continues to be involved in AAO Programs annually.
Dr. Gandhi was inducted to the American College of Surgeons in October 2018, an organization dedicated to maintaining the highest standards in surgical education, teaching, and patient safety. He is a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons (FACS).
Dr. Gandhi has been a member of AO Faculty since 2010, and has instructed and co-chaired in numerous courses. The CMF division of this international group of trauma surgeons focuses on education towards optimizing facial reconstructive surgeries. He most recently was appointed to a selective position as AO Online Faculty for the virtual courses offered by AOCMF since 2020 due to the pandemic. He was chosen to participate as a moderator and speaker for the virtual CMF Trauma course in Davos, Switzerland in Dec 2020 and Dec 2021. He hopes to go to Davos to teach in person in the future!
Humanitarian Mission Trips
In August 2022, Dr. Gandhi returned to Riobamba, Ecuador with a team of surgeons, OR nurses, and volunteers to screen and perform oculofacial plastic corrective surgeries on patients at Hospital FIBUSPAM. He was the team leader of this group, and they performed over 30 operations on adults and children in need of sight-preserving procedures that had been delayed due to the pandemic. Their team was the first Ophthalmology group to return to this region since 2019. Dr. Gandhi continues his collaboration with Partners for Andean Community Health (PACH) to grow and expand this humanitarian program in the years ahead.
In August 2019, Dr. Gandhi went to Ecuador with a small initial team of one OR nurse and student volunteer to screen and perform oculofacial plastic corrective surgeries on patients at the FIBUSPAM Clinic. This was his first collaboration with SEE (Surgical Eye Expeditions) International to work in Riobamba in support of indigenous communities and a local ophthalmologist. Dr. Gandhi continued his collaboration with FIBUSPAM and Partners for Andean Community Health (PACH) in the subsequent years performing remote telehealth consults to guide local surgeons during the pandemic when travel onsite was restricted. He received this recognition from SEE International for his contributions.
In May 2019, Dr. Gandhi worked with The Virtue Foundation, a New York City non-profit that has been orchestrating a multidisciplinary annual Surgical & Teaching Mission Trip to Mongolia since 2010. This was Dr. Gandhi's fourth time in Mongolia with VF since 2015, and he has screened patients and performed well over 100 operations to correct eyelid, tear duct, orbital, and cancer related abnormalities in both adults and children. In 2019, he also led the Oculoplastics team in Khovd, Mongolia, a western region bordering Russia and Kazakhstan. He was awarded the honorary citizenship of Khovd Province for his humanitarian contributions. This certificate recognizes his work there in 2019.
