Radiologist couple tag teams at UF Health and at home
They’re respected radiology experts who have led efforts to bring some of the most modern imaging equipment on the market to Jacksonville.
But at home, they’re simply known as Mommy and Daddy.
Martha Wasserman, MD, chief of women’s imaging at UF Health Jacksonville and UF Health North, and Paul Wasserman, DO, chief of musculoskeletal radiology at UF Health Jacksonville and UF Health North, are a power couple both in the hospital system and at home. Martha serves as program director of the women’s imaging fellowship program and Paul is the program director of the diagnostic radiology residency program at UF Health Jacksonville.
Martha Wasserman was the first doctor in Northeast Florida to offer tomosynthesis, a 3D breast imaging technique that gives radiologists a clearer view of the breast than traditional 2D mammograms. It is offered at UF Health North, UF Health Jacksonville and UF Health Emerson.
Paul Wasserman is imaging patients with one of the region’s first – and North Jacksonville’s only – high field open magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) machines. The imaging device obtains the same high quality images of a traditional, tunnel-like MRI, but it offers a more pleasing and comfortable experience for patients.
The couple has been together since “before medical school” and has always worked in the same hospital.
“We both understand the challenges in dealing with overlapping schedules and calendars,” said Paul Wasserman
“Even though we’re very busy, we are sure to make time to spend with each other and our children every day,” Martha Wasserman said, adding that she appreciates “just having someone who understands what your day was like.”
At home, they take off the white coats and “divide and conquer” as parents to their son Noah, 7, and daughter Sara, 9. At the end of their workdays, they are involved with their kids’ many after-school activities. At dinnertime, Paul, also known as “Iron Chef Daddy,” is the culinary master of the household.
The Wassermans met the year before they both started medical school, when they took summer jobs working in the same pathology lab at the University of Mississippi. Martha, originally from Mississippi, and Paul, originally from Maryland, immediately hit it off.
They dated long distance during medical school and then went through the residency match together. They were in residency training at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and then moved to Winston-Salem, North Carolina for fellowship training at Wake Forest University School of Medicine and North Carolina Baptist Hospital.
They were married 15 years ago in 2000 and came to Jacksonville four years ago. They were attracted to the area for many reasons, including being able to work with their former University of Pittsburgh mentor, Barry McCook, MD, who is the chair of radiology at UF Health Jacksonville and UF Health North.
Living on the First Coast has become a great fit for them, their children, and even Martha’s parents, who moved to Jacksonville to be closer to them.
“Jacksonville’s definitely home,” Paul Wasserman said.
“Jacksonville is fantastic…a wonderful place to live, work and raise children,” his wife agreed.