AO VET North America Board

Dr. Kerwin received her DVM from Texas A&M University, completed a small animal rotating internship at Louisiana State University and completed a small animal surgery residency at LSU along with a Master of Science degree in veterinary physiology. She is a diplomate of both the American College of Veterinary Surgeons and the American College of Veterinary Internal Medicine (neurology). Her clinical and research interests involve orthopedics and neurology, with a special interest in fracture repair and spinal surgery, as well as feline orthopedics and neurology.

Dr. Shanti Jha, earned a Bachelor of Veterinary Science and Animal Husbandry (BVSc&AH) with honors from Nagpur Veterinary College, Maharashtra, India in 2001. After BVSc, he did an MS from Oregon State University in 2005. Dr. Jha was a general small animal veterinarian for one and a half years in Syracuse, NY after completing an ECFVG certification from Tufts Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine. He then completed a surgical internship at Veterinary Specialists of Northern Colorado, Loveland in 2009. Following this, he completed a Small Animal Surgery Residency at Tufts Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine in July 2012. In 2013 Dr. Shanti Jha became a Diplomate of the American College of Veterinary Surgeons (board-certified small animal surgeon). Before coming to AMSC, Dr. Jha spent time working as Chief of Surgery at VCA Veterinary Specialist of Seattle for the last four years (2012-2016), building an efficient team that helped him in helping small animals needing surgical services. Currently, Dr. Jha owns Dhruva Veterinary Services and provides surgical consultation to OREV Specialty Vet Care in Portland, OR. Apart from general orthopedic and soft tissue surgeries, Dr. Jha has also been heavily trained in minimally invasive surgery (MIS) techniques. He has been doing minimally invasive fracture repairs and arthroscopic correction of joint abnormalities for the last ten years. Dr. Jha is also an AOVET faculty and enjoys teaching orthopedic courses in the US and abroad. His orthopedic areas of expertise include arthroscopy, fracture management of limbs and spine, angular limb deformity correction and joint surgeries.

Dr. Laurent Guiot is a world-class orthopedic surgeon with a passion for excellence. He obtained his degree in veterinary medicine from the University of Liege (Belgium) in 2004 and completed a general internship in small animal medicine and surgery at the same institution. Laurent then worked for one year in Paris where he was in charge of the general surgery program. He rejoined academia in 2006 as an international surgical fellow at Michigan State University where he also completed a three-year residency program with a strong emphasis in orthopedic surgery and focus in minimally invasive osteosynthesis under Dr. Loic Dejardin’ s mentorship. He became boarded by the American and European Colleges of Veterinary Surgeons in 2011. Following his residency, Laurent became an assistant professor of orthopedic surgery in the Department of Small Animal Clinical Sciences and an attending orthopedic surgeon at the Veterinary Teaching Hospital at Michigan State University. He was then recruited to lead the creation of a new orthopedic surgery facility for the Ohio State University in Dublin, Ohio. In 2016, he created the Bone & Joint Center at ACCESS in Los Angeles with Dr. Reunan Guillou. This center is establishing itself as one of the prime location for advanced orthopedics and includes a comprehensive total joint replacement center, a strong minimally invasive orthopedic surgery program, and a tertiary referral service for revision cases. Dr. Guiot’s major interest is orthopedic trauma and minimally invasive orthopedic surgery. He routinely presents his work internationally and is an active member of major national and international orthopedic programs including the Veterinary Orthopedic Society, the AO, and the Orthopedic Research Society. Laurent is committed to the improvement of patient care through the development of surgical techniques, instrumentation, and implants used for the treatment of orthopedic patients.

Dr. Sushmitha Durgam is an Associate Professor of Equine Surgery at The Ohio State University in Columbus, OH. She earned her BVSc degree from Bidar Veterinary College, Karnataka, India in 2007. Sushmitha then completed a combined Masters and rotating Equine Internship at University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, IL in 2010, which was followed by a Large Animal Surgical Internship with an emphasis in Equine Sports Medicine at Tufts University, North Grafton, MA. She then completed a combined Equine Surgery Residency and PhD at University of Illinois in 2015 and became a Diplomate of the American College of Veterinary Surgeons in 2016. Sushmitha joined faculty at Ohio State in 2016. Her research program focuses on understanding structure-function adaptations influencing tendon injury development and identifying biological processes that enhance tendon healing while incorporating innovative large animal models.

Born and raised in Taiwan, Dr. Chou earned his veterinary degree from National Taiwan University. He stayed at National Taiwan University after graduation, completing a combined master's degree and small animal surgery residency from 2004 to 2008. In 2009, Dr. Chou completed a small animal surgery fellowship at Michigan State University and his rotating internship and small animal surgical residency in 2015 at Atlantic Veterinary College, University of Prince Edward Island in Canada. Dr. Chou is board-certified as a American College of Veterinary Surgeons Diplomat. He is a Clinical Associate Professor in Small Animal Orthopedic Surgery at the University of California Davis and enjoys educating future veterinarians and veterinary surgeons. Dr. Chou’s clinical areas of interest are total joint replacement, angular limb deformity, fracture repair, surgical site infection prevention, and management.