Career Symposium 2022

Georgina Tsakrios is currently a third-year student at SUNY College of Optometry. She received her bachelor’s degree from Drew University and obtained her Juris Doctorate from New York Law School. Georgina served as a Deputy Attorney General for the New Jersey Attorney General’s Office where she represented the New Jersey Division of Child Protection and Permanency. She still maintains her law license in New York and New Jersey and is of counsel at Seigel Law, a NJ-based law firm. As she always had an affinity for the eye, she left her position as a Deputy in 2016 and attended the post-baccalaureate program at Rutger’s University. She had the honor of presenting at the American Academy of Optometry in 2021, where she discussed legal issues such as malpractice. She looks forward to her future as an optometrist and exploring new opportunities the healthcare field has to offer. Dr. Aleksandra Wianecka graduated with Honors from SUNY College of Optometry in 2002. Dr. Wianecka then completed her residency at Northport VA in primary eyecare, low vision, head trauma, vision therapy and ocular disease. After her residency she was an Assistant Professor at SUNY College of Optometry and worked at Stony Brook Hospital Opthalmology Department. She worked at Northport VA optometry clinic as a consultant and residency supervisor. Since 2004 Dr. Wianecka has opened her private practice from scratch and now is a proud owner of 3 private optometric practices on Long Island and belongs to the vision source network of optometrists. Dr. Wianecka is the past Suffolk County NYSOA president and past NYSOA Trustee. Dr. Renee Yearwood graduated from SUNY College of Optometry in 1993 with clinical honors. She was president of the National Optometric Student Organization (N.O.S.A.) 1990-91. She did her residency in Primary Care Optometry at SUNY and East NY Diagnostic and Treatment Center. After finishing her residency in 1994, she joined the staff of SUNY Optometry. In 1997 she joined the clinical staff of St. Barnabas Hospital in The Bronx. In 2017 she became Director of Optometric Services at Union Community Health Center in The Bronx.

Dr. Nikita Shah currently serves as the OD Area Leader for the Mid- Atlantic market. Originally from Chicago, Dr. Shah completed her undergraduate studies at Loyola University and obtained her Doctorate of Optometry from the Illinois College of Optometry. Following graduation, she joined Warby Parker as a full-time optometrist in Chicago. In 2018, she made the move to NY and took on a specialized leadership role within the company, which included sharing clinical insights with internal teams and taking on professional relations with external partners. In 2021, she was promoted to her current role as the Optometrist Area Leader. She manages the talented group of Mid-Atlantic ODs and helps implement clinical and business initiatives that support OD operations under the Eye Care & Vision Services department. Dr. Shetty graduated from SUNY College of Optometry in 2013. He worked in various practices and business and after a year, he opened a practice cold with 2 colleagues in LIC. It was a full scope practice, focusing on primary care, contact lens and anterior segment issues. After 4 years, he opened a solo private practice which had no staff. For three years he worked that way, growing the practice. When COVID began, he was fortunate enough to continue growing and during the height of the epidemic, was able to procure a larger space and transition the practice to a larger space and grow the scope to include more medical optometry. Currently spends 2 days at his partnership and Dr. Huy Tran is currently an Associate Director of Field Medical Affairs at Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, supporting the ophthalmology business unit. Prior to industry, he was in clinical practice for 12+ years. After graduating from SUNY College of Optometry in 2005, he returned to his hometown of San Diego, CA to complete his fellowship in Vision Therapy and Behavioral Optometry at the Optometric Vision Development Center, where he continued to practice and serve as an Adjunct Clinical Professor for a few optometry schools. Huy then traded his flip-flops for snow boots to practice at the Neuro-Ophthalmology Service at Wills Eye Hospital in Philadelphia, PA. As life would have it, he returned to NYC where he transitioned to industry, initially at a medical device startup company, Smart Vision Labs, then Sun Pharmaceuticals as a medical science liaison (MSL), leading to where he is now at Regeneron.

4 days at his private practice.