Director of the Expert Consultation Service, Emory
AP Resident: 1971-1975
Faculty: 1975-1976
Dr. Weiss earned her A.B from Wellesley College and her M.D. from the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.
During the last year of anatomic pathology training in the department she became the first women to hold the position of Chief Resident. Following a brief tenure on the faculty, she joined the staff of the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology (AFIP), eventually becoming the Chair of the Department of Soft Tissue Pathology. During her 13 years at the AFIP, she co-authored with Franz Enzinger the now iconic textbook, Soft Tissue Tumors, now in its 6th edition. Subsequent academic appointments included the A. J. French Professor and Director of Anatomic Pathology at the University of Michigan and Professor and Vice Chair of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at Emory University. In addition to her current responsibilities as Director of the Expert Consultation Service at Emory, she has served as Associate Dean for Faculty Development and Faculty Affairs in the School of Medicine where she created a five month "Junior Faculty Development Course," and yearlong "Chair On-Boarding" curriculum for new chairs. Additional leadership activities have included appointments to the Emory Healthcare Board of Directors, University Senate, and Dean's Leadership Council.
Over her career she has published extensively and lectured widely on all aspects of soft tissue tumors, especially prognostic factors in undifferentiated pleomorphic sarcoma (formerly malignant fibrous histiocytoma), dedifferentiation in liposarcoma, and borderline vascular tumors (hemangioendothelioma). She is also credited with the first description of numerous new entities including: epithelioid hemangioendothelioma, spindle cell hemangioma (formerly spindle cell hemangioendothelioma), giant cell fibroblastoma, ischemic fasciitis, ossifying fibromyxoid tumor, epithelioid sarcoma-like hemangioendothelioma, pleomorphic hyalinizing angiectatic tumor, and inflammatory myxohyaline tumor (myxoinflammatory fibroblastic sarcoma).
She has held key leadership positions including Chair of the Second World Health Organization Committee for the Classification of Soft Tissue Tumors, President of the United States Canadian Academy of Pathology, President of International Society of Bone and Soft Tissue Pathology (ISBSTP), member Residency Review Committee (RRC) for Pathology, and Trustee and President of the American Board of Pathology. As President of the Board she oversaw the adoption by the Board of a Physician Scientist Pathway leading to certification. She also serves on the editorial boards of American Journal of Surgical Pathology and Modern Pathology.
Her honors include: Phi Beta Kappa, Alpha Omega Alpha, Alumnae Achievement Award (Wellesley College), the Society of Scholars (Johns Hopkins University), 2013 Harvey Goldman Master Teacher and Mentoring Award (USCAP), 2015 Distinguished Pathologist Award (USCAP), 2015 Distinguished Achievement Award (ISBSTP), and the 2015 Philip Levine Award for Outstanding Research (American Society of Clinical Pathology).