Pediatrics

Clinic Specialty Pediatrics

General Pediatrics

1524 Pinto Ln Photo

Our pediatricians examine your children regularly to assess their growth, development, and assess their general physical condition. They also refer patients to pediatric medical specialists and provide other medical referrals when necessary with healthcare devoted to the well-being of children of all ages, from infancy through adolescence.

Clinic General Pediatrics

Specialty Pediatrics

The UNLV Health Pediatric Clinic is devoted to the well-being of children of all ages. Our specialists are a referral resource to your child’s pediatrician. When a specialist is required they are conveniently located in the same building along with your child’s general practice doctor.

Doctor Specialty Pediatrics

Rabea Alhosh, MD
Pediatrics, Gastroenterology, Hepatology, & Nutrition

Photo: Rabea Alhosh, MD

Pediatric gastroenterology – it is the specialty practiced by Dr. Rabea Alhosh, an assistant professor in the Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine at UNLV Department of Pediatrics.

Because parents are often concerned and anxious when they bring their child to see a gastroenterologist, a physician specializing on the digestive system, Dr. Alhosh says he spends a lot of time helping parents understand their child’s diagnosis and treatment options.

Doctor Specialty Pediatrics

David Di John, MD
Pediatrics, Infectious Diseases

Photo: David Dijohn, M.D.

Dr. David Di John, a professor of pediatrics at the Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine at UNLV, Interim Chair of Pediatrics, and the program director of the UNLV Health Maternal-HIV program. 

He has more than 30 years of experience in research and treatment of pediatric infectious diseases, including clinical care for women, infants, children and youth with HIV/AIDS. 

Doctor General Pediatrics

Jill Humphrey, MD, PhD
Pediatrics

Jill Humphrey, MD, PhD, is an assistant professor in pediatrics in the Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine at UNLV Department of Pediatrics. Originally from Maryland, she received her bachelor’s degree from Ohio University and then earned a dual MD/PhD degree at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. Following up to this, Dr. Humphrey completed a residency in pediatrics at the Texas Children’s Hospital/Baylor College of Medicine.

Doctor General Pediatrics

Mayra Alejandra Jones-Betancourt, MD
Pediatrics

Jones-Betancourt Photo

Dr. Jones-Betancourt is originally from Vista, CA located in San Diego county. She was the first person in her family to attend college. Dr. Jones-Betancourt completed her undergraduate degree at the University of California, Berkeley where she studied environmental biology with an emphasis on human health. She attended University of California, Davis for medical school where she was involved with student run clinics and the Latino Medical Student Association. She completed her residency training at University of Southern California Los Angeles county. Dr.

Doctor General Pediatrics

Lyanna Joy LaFredo, MD
Pediatrics

Lyanna Joy LaFredo, MD, who has practiced medicine for 16 years, mostly seeing the healthcare needs of underserved children, is an assistant professor of pediatrics at the Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine at UNLV.

A graduate of the University of Philippines College of Medicine, Dr. LaFredo, who studied embryology at Chulalongkorn University in Thailand, did her graduate medical education residency training at the State University of New York at Buffalo.

Doctor General Pediatrics

Beverly Neyland, MD
Pediatrics

Photo: Beverly Neyland, MD

Beverly A. Neyland, professor of Pediatrics at the Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine at UNLV, earned the B.S. degree from Bennett College in Greensboro, North Carolina, and the M.D. degree from Meharry Medical College in Nashville, Tennessee. Additional training includes an externship at the University of Zagreb in Yugoslavia; an internship at the Long Beach Memorial Children’s Hospital, Long Beach, California; and pediatric residency at the UCLA/Harbor General Hospital in Torrance, California. She is Board Certified by the American Board of Pediatrics.

Doctor Specialty Pediatrics

David Parks, MD
Pediatrics, Pulmonology

Photo: David Parks, MD

Dr. David Parks, a pediatric pulmonologist and associate professor in the Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine at UNLV Department of Pediatrics, believes that patient education and establishing rapport with patients and their families are essential to the art of medicine.

For asthma patients, he developed a two-page “asthma action plan” that details what they should do while living with asthma, how to use an inhaler, and the actions to take when different symptoms arise.

(702) 671-2231 Office
Doctor General Pediatrics

Fateh Peera, MD
Pediatrics

Photo: Fateh Peera, MD

Dr. Fateh Peera, who at the University of Arizona College of Medicine studied the importance of calories obtained from beverages as a contributing factor to obesity in children, joined UNLV Health as a pediatrician in 2018. 

A 2007 graduate of the University of Arizona College of Medicine where he also completed his residency program in pediatrics, he worked as a pediatrician in Tucson, AZ for five years before becoming an assistant professor of pediatrics at Texas Tech University in 2015. 

Doctor General Pediatrics

David Savarese, MD
Pediatrics

Photo: David Savarese, MD

Dr. David Savarese, an associate professor in the Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine at UNLV Department of Pediatrics, was director of a community health center in Connecticut that offered medical care, behavioral health care and dental health care to children and their families who were traumatized by the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting in Newtown, Conn. That tragedy took the lives of 20 children and six adults.

(702) 944-2828 Office
Doctor Specialty Pediatrics

Rebecca Scherr, MD, MPH
Pediatrics, Gastroenterology, Hepatology, & Nutrition

Dr. Rebecca Scherr,an associate professor of pediatrics at the Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine at UNLV, is the division chief of pediatric gastroenterology, hepatology and nutrition. 

She is also vice chief of pediatrics at University Medical Center Children’s Hospital of Nevada. 

Dr. Scherr treats patients with general GI concerns as well as complex issues including inflammatory bowel disease, liver disease and patients requiring nutritional support.

Doctor General Pediatrics

Dodds P Simangan Jr., DO
Pediatrics

Photo: Dodds P. Simangan, DO, MPH, FAAP

Dr. Dodds Simangan is an an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine, and a board-certified general pediatrician; who sees patients while teaching medical students and pediatric residents at the UNLV Health Pediatric Clinic and the newborn nursery at Sunrise Children’s Hospital.

(702) 944-2828 Office
Doctor General Pediatrics

Josephine Sun, MD
Pediatrics

Josephine Sun

Josephine Sun, MD, is originally from Salt Lake City, UT and spent half of her childhood in Taiwan. She received her undergraduate and medical degrees from the University of Utah. During medical school, she was involved in many volunteer activities including the Somali Refugee Program and health fairs for the underserved community.

Article BY PAUL HARASIM

Looking Into the Life of Nevada’s First Black Pediatrician

When Beverly Neyland was growing up in the 1940s, ‘50s, and ‘60s, she came to realize that before her parents took her and her brother and sister on a long car trip, they had to know well in advance where they would stay. Even when the family was dead tired and a motel’s neon sign flashed “VACANCY,” her father wouldn’t stop unless it was lodging he and his wife planned on.

Article

Pediatrician’s Philanthropic Work Is a ‘Game Changer’

Dr Oriaku Kas-Osoka

Award-winning associate professor and nonprofit medical director shares what drew her to a career in medicine.

One of eight children, Dr. Oriaku A. Kas-Osoka, MD, an associate professor in the Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine at UNLV department of pediatrics, began reading fluently on her mother’s knee at age three. During her childhood, nothing was more enjoyable than burrowing deep under her bed covers and reading by flashlight late into the night.

Article

UNLV Health opens 2 clinics in CCSD buildings

Clark County School District students and their siblings can get access to health care at no cost at two new UNLV Health clinics.

The school-based health centers inside the district’s Family Support Center and Bailey Middle School in Las Vegas serve those ages 3 to 21.

The free clinics aim to improve access to medical care for youth and minimize the amount of time they’re missing school.

“We are really excited that our students aren’t having to miss much instructional time,” Bailey Middle School Principal Danielle Duterte said.

Article

UNLV Health Maternal Child Wellness Program Awarded Renewal of Grant To Help HIV-positive Women And Youth

Dr. David Di John, professor and section chief for pediatric infectious diseases at the Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine, is the director of the UNLV Health Maternal Child Wellness Program

 In the 1980s and 90s, when David Di John, MD, worked at and later headed an AIDS clinic in New York City, an outbreak of HIV and AIDs swept across the United States and the rest of the world. He remembers it, in part, as a time when there were numerous instances of mother-to-child transmission of HIV, which led to children dying young.

Article

Pediatrician Alerts Community About Polio, Need For Vaccinations

Polio

Assistant professor Josephine Sun offers expertise on the re-emergence of the polio virus and the importance of routine immunizations. 

When Josephine Sun, MD, finished her pediatric residency last year at the Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine at UNLV, it had been more than 40 years since a case of polio originated in the United States.

Article

Nurse Practitioner Improvises as She Earns Doctoral Degree

Dianne Galgana

Dianne Galgana focuses on well-child care and management of common pediatric acute illnesses.

You look at a photograph of UNLV Medicine pediatric nurse practitioner Dianne Galgana and her daughter, Penelope, both dressed in red graduation regalia, and you can’t help but be reminded that a single image can carry a lot of power.

There’s pure joy in the photos. Pride of accomplishment. Love for each other. Love for life.

Article

Sacrificing Family Time and Finances to Help Fight Coronavirus

Tiffany Robledo

You might say Tiffany Robledo is on the front line of the front lines — she swabs inside the noses those arriving for UNLV Medicine’s curbside COVID-19 testing program. After the medical assistant collects specimens, they are then taken to a lab for testing. She is part of the program that has tested more than 3,000 people in Southern Nevada in less than a month.

“I’m only 21 and super proud that I’ve already been put in an important position to help people,” says Robledo. “It’s something that must be done to try and curtail the spread of this disease.”