UPMC orthopaedic surgeon Vonda Wright, M.D., specializes in sports medicine and cartilage repair. Dr. Wright sees patients in the clinic at the UPMC Center for Sports Medicine and performs surgery at UPMC Shadyside and UPMC South Side. One of few women in the field of orthopaedic surgery, she is assistant professor of orthopaedic surgery at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and assistant team physician for the University of Pittsburgh Panthers football team.
One of Dr. Wright’s main research interests has focused on aging athletes. She is director of UPMC’s Performance and Research Initiative for Masters Athletes (PRIMA), the first program of its kind in a medical setting. PRIMA provides services to help aging athletes remain fit and perform their best. The program recently added an additional service called START, which is designed for all adults over 40 who seek to get in shape.
A valuable source of information for healthy aging and orthopaedic issues, Dr. Wright has been quoted in several national publications, including the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, U.S. News & World Report, USA Today, CNN.com and MSNBC. She also has made numerous television appearances, including a segment on CBS affiliate KDKA-TV’s Pittsburgh TODAY Live.
Dr. Wright was the research coordinator for the 2005 Summer National Senior Games – The Senior Olympics, held in Pittsburgh. Since 2003, Dr. Wright has been looking at health research data related to Senior Olympians, with the hypothesis that athletes over age 40 who maintain high levels of functional capacity and quality of life throughout their life spans may be the best model of healthy aging, free from the variable of disuse. Such research findings may assist physicians in caring for seniors more effectively.
Dr. Wright’s research has been rewarded in the form of grants, numerous awards, peer-reviewed publications and international and national presentations. Her other research interests include muscle and tendon aging, gene therapy for the enhancement of bone healing, and osteoporosis in men.
She first came to Pitt in 1999 as an orthopaedic surgery resident. She had completed a research fellowship in Pitt’s Musculoskeletal Growth & Development Lab under the direction of Johnny Huard, Ph.D., and was one of only 10 residents to participate in the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons Clinician Scientist Development Program. Following the 2005 Summer Games, Dr. Wright completed a one-year Sports Medicine and Upper Extremity Fellowship at the Hospital for Special Surgery in New York City.
She received her bachelor’s degree in biology from Wheaton College, in Wheaton, Ill.; her master’s degree in oncology nursing from Rush Presbyterian St. Luke’s Medical Center in Chicago, and her medical degree from the Pritzker School of Medicine at the University of Chicago.
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