Edward Buckley, MD, has been named the permanent chair of the Department of Ophthalmology, effective immediately. This decision was made after an extensive national search.
Dr. Buckley has served as interim chair of the department since March of 2014 and has done an outstanding job leading the department during an especially difficult transition in the wake of former chair Dr. David Epstein’s untimely death and through construction of the new Hudson Building.
The Joseph A.C. Wadsworth Clinical Professor of Ophthalmology, Dr. Buckley is a highly respected administrator, educator, researcher and renowned pediatric ophthalmologist. He serves as director of the pediatric ophthalmology fellowship program and has trained and mentored more than 55 fellows. He has served as president of the American Association of Pediatric Ophthalmology and Strabismus (AAPOS), chair of the American Board of Ophthalmology, chair of the Section of Ophthalmology of the American Academy of Pediatrics, president of the American Orthoptic Society, and is the current editor-in-chief of the Journal of AAPOS. He has received the Life Time Achievement Award from the American Academy of Ophthalmology and AAPOS.
Dr. Buckley has served as the Vice Dean for Education for the School of Medicine since 2008 and will continue to serve in that role as well.
Dr. Buckley received his undergraduate degree in electrical engineering and his medical degree from Duke University. He completed an internship in medicine and a residency in ophthalmology at Duke before performing a two-year fellowship in pediatric ophthalmology and neuro-ophthalmology at the University of Miami’s Bascom Palmer Eye Institute. He returned to Duke in 1983 as assistant professor in the Department of Ophthalmology.