Our success is intimately linked to the accomplishments of each and every member of our department. Each month, four members are nominated and featured to celebrate their commitment to patient care, education, and research.
Current Featured Anesthesiology Department Members
Nathan Achilly, MD, PhD
Resident, Class of 2026
Kelsey Arends, MBA
Marketing & Communications Specialist
Bobbie Brown
DBBS Pre Doc Trainee
Katy Spal, CRNA
Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist
Featured Anesthesiology Department Members Archive
Heather Acuff, PhD, MD
CA-2 Resident & WU Scholar
Heather is a CA-2 resident in the anesthesia department. She grew up in Pittsburgh, PA, attended undergrad at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and then completed an MD/PhD at the University of Pittsburgh. She is now in the WU Scholars Program conducting research on postoperative delirium with Dr. Ben Palanca.
When she’s not working on her research, she can be found rotating through the various anesthesiology specialties. Her goal is to complete two fellowships after her residency training, one in obstetrics and one in cardiothoracic anesthesiology. In her spare time, she enjoys exploring St. Louis, going dancing, and doing crafts such as knitting stuffed animals and making custom cross-stitch patterns. She is very happy that she chose to come to WashU for residency, and she is excited to continue her anesthesia training!
Oluwafunmilayo Adebayo-Adonis, MD
Assistant Professor of Anesthesiology; Division of Critical Care Medicine
Dr. Oluwafunmilayo Adebayo-Adonis also known as “Funmi” has been a part of this department since 2018. She has had the pleasure of training here as a critical care fellow and is now an assistant professor in the department. One thing she loves most about her career is that she is able to work in different settings in anesthesia. If she’s not in the OR or in the unit (ICU), she’s spending time on L&D. Funmi is married to a pediatrician and is a mother of two beautiful children. A fun fact about her is that she enjoys traveling. This is a recent picture of her in Paris at Arc de Triomphe (Oct 2022). Au revoir!
Zekeriyya Alanoglu, MD, DESA
Instructor, General Anesthesiology
Zekeriyya (aka Zek) was born and raised in Ankara, Turkey. He attended Medical School of Ankara University where he obtained his MD degree. He joined Department of Anesthesiology and Reanimation of Ankara University for his Anesthesia training. He joined the same department as a Specialist in Anesthesia in 2000. Zek specialized in different clinical work and studies in solid organ transplantation, airway management and teaching-assessment in Anesthesia training. He obtained his board certifications from Turkish Anesthesiology and Reanimation Society and European Society of Anesthesiology (ESA) in 2005 and 2006, respectively. He contributed to the ESA as Examination Committee Member and Council member starting 2008 till 2017. He hosted Part I and Online Assessment of European Board Exam in Ankara for many years, translated the exam into Turkish, wrote and reviewed exam content, examined as an examiner and senior examiner for Part II exam all around different exam center in Europe. He is still contributing to the ESA and Turkish Board mission as an examiner for online oral board exams. He served at the University of Ankara as an Associate and afterward as a Full Professor for more than 12 years. He was appointed as the Co-Director of the Cebeci Hospital of Ankara University and served almost 6.5 years till he departed for WashU in 2018. He officially retired from his position at the Ankara University in the summer of 2020 after serving 25 years.
Zek’s involvement with WashU goes back to 2007/2008. He joined the International Specialist program at WashU in 2007 but returned to Turkey in 2008. He and his family never forgot their time, friends and great memories in St. Louis and returned to St. Louis in 2018. It was of course very attractive to work again for WashU for many reasons, including the outstanding opportunity to watch live St. Louis Cardinals games with his youngest son at baseball heaven, Busch Stadium.
Zek played basketball for many years and still enjoys watching the sport. He also supports his hometown soccer team, AnkaraGucu, by hanging its flag on the main entrance of his home, enjoys his free time with his family of two young gentlemen and his wife, Betul. The Alanoglu family always misses their beloved daughter who lives in Turkey and studies Psychology.
Mark Arcario, MD, PhD
Mark is a third-year resident originally from Orlando, FL. He completed the Medical Scholars Program at the University of Illinois College of Medicine, earning an M.D. and a Ph.D. in Computational Biophysics. He is on the ASAP Residency Research Track and is looking forward to starting his Cardiothoracic Anesthesiology fellowship next year. His research interests are focused on understanding the molecular mechanisms of general anesthesia and developing new computational tools to tackle biomedical problems. When not training to be a future leader in the field of Anesthesiology, he enjoys spending time with his wife, Rachael, and daughter, Eleanor, as well as playing bass guitar.