#  Eyes On: Alessandro Jammal, MD, PhD 

 





April 06, 2026

 

 

***Eyes On** is our monthly spotlight feature highlighting faculty and staff across Harvard Ophthalmology*

## Alessandro Jammal, MD, PhD

### **Instructor in Ophthalmology at Harvard Medical School; Member of the Glaucoma Service at Mass Eye and Ear** 

   ![Alessandro Jammal ](/sites/g/files/omnuum9886/files/styles/hwp_1_1__360x360_scale/public/2026-04/QA49U%202.jpg?itok=ndFNoLDX) 

 

**1. How does your clinical work shape the questions you bring to your research, or vice versa?**

Many of the questions I study, such as improving risk prediction or detecting disease progression earlier, come directly from what I see in clinic, especially when caring for patients who continue to lose vision despite appropriate treatment. Those experiences highlight the limits of our current tools and motivate the research work I do.

My research work in large-scale data and artificial intelligence helps me bring a more structured and data-informed perspective back to clinical decisions, while time in the clinic keeps me grounded in the individual experiences of patients and the challenges they face managing chronic disease in their daily lives. That perspective has also been shaped by my experiences providing care in resource-limited settings, including volunteer work in the Amazon, Haiti, and Kenya, where access to diagnostic tools and care is often limited.

**2. Can you tell us about a current or recent project and what excites you most about where it is heading?**

I’m working on a clinical trial project that began enrolling last month to evaluate virtual reality–based perimetry as a home monitoring tool for glaucoma. The goal is to make glaucoma testing more accessible and more frequent, which could significantly improve our ability to detect progression earlier. What I find most compelling is the potential to move part of glaucoma care beyond the clinic, allowing for more continuous and patient-centered monitoring.

**3. What is a problem in the field you think is underappreciated or overdue for more attention?**

   ![Jammal Global Health Trip](/sites/g/files/omnuum9886/files/styles/hwp_1_1__360x360_scale/public/2026-04/IMG_8525.jpg?itok=HZvRu9F5) 

 

Dr. Jammal with a group of volunteers on a medical mission trip in the Amazon.I think the role of systemic factors in glaucoma progression, particularly blood pressure variability and epigenetic aging, remains underrecognized in routine care. While controlling intraocular pressure is central, there’s growing evidence that systemic physiology plays an independent role, and we have not yet fully integrated this into clinical decision-making.

**4. What does collaboration look like in your work—are there unexpected partnerships or disciplines you have drawn from?**

My work is inherently collaborative and often extends beyond ophthalmology. While I enjoy coding myself, I frequently work with data scientists, engineers, and statisticians to develop predictive models and analyze large-scale datasets. These collaborations are essential for applying machine learning methods to clinical problems and for translating complex data into tools that can be meaningfully used in practice.

**5. What are you looking forward to—in your work or beyond—in the coming year?**

I am looking forward to further integrating new technologies, particularly artificial intelligence and virtual reality, into clinical research and patient care. I am especially interested in how these tools can improve early detection, risk prediction, and monitoring of glaucoma in real-world settings. I am also excited to continue building collaborations within the department and contributing to both clinical and research initiatives as I establish my practice at Mass Eye and Ear.

   ![Jammal working in the lab](/sites/g/files/omnuum9886/files/styles/hwp_1_1__360x360_scale/public/2026-04/huthphoto-kah_1429%20%28002%29.jpg?itok=6Ot-k6ee) 

 

Dr. Jammal working in the lab at the University of Campinas, where he earned a PhD. **6. What is something that you enjoy doing outside of your work?**

Outside of work, I enjoy staying active through running, hiking, and traveling. I ran the New York City Marathon just before my first day in clinic at Mass Eye and Ear, which was a memorable way to start this chapter. I have additional races planned this year and hope to run the Boston Marathon in the future.



 

 

 



 

 See also:- [ Faculty ](/news-categories/faculty)
- [ Glaucoma ](/news-categories/glaucoma)
- [ Research ](/news-categories/research)
 
 

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