Irina Timofte, M.D.

Biography

Irina Timofte, M.D., is an Associate Professor in the Department of Internal Medicine at UT Southwestern Medical Center. She specializes in lung transplantation, interstitial lung disease, and pulmonary hypertension.

Dr. Timofte earned her medical degree at Carol Davila University of Medicine and Pharmacy in Bucharest, Romania. She completed an internal medicine residency at Cleveland Clinic’s Huron Hospital and received advanced training through fellowships in pulmonary and critical care at the University of Florida and lung transplantation at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. She also holds a master’s degree in epidemiology and clinical research from the University of Maryland.

Certified by the American Board of Internal Medicine in critical care medicine and pulmonary medicine, Dr. Timofte joined the UT Southwestern faculty in 2021.

Dr. Timofte is the Lung Transplant Fellowship Program Director at UT Southwestern. She serves on the Lung Transplant Selection Committee, the Endoscopy Lab High Performance Committee, and the Compliance Committee, among others.

She is also a member of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute’s Genomic Research Alliance for Transplantation and the International Society for Heart and Lung Transplantation, for which she serves on the Consensus Statement Committee on Lung Transplant Patients with Connective Tissue Disease.

Dr. Timofte's clinical interests include critical care medicine and many advanced lung diseases, such as pulmonary fibrosis, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), scleroderma, rheumatoid arthritis-related interstitial lung disease, and pulmonary hypertension.

Her research focuses on discovering safer noninvasive diagnostic approaches for evaluating graft integrity and predicting lung rejection through the integration of data obtained from cell-free DNA microbiome and microarray analyses. She seeks to improve clinical outcomes and develop superior immunosuppressive strategies for patients who have had lung transplants by using a less toxic immunosuppressive regimen.

Dr. Timofte has served as Principal Investigator and Co-investigator in several National Institutes of Health-sponsored clinical trials; has given multiple local, national, and international lectures; and has written several peer-reviewed articles and abstracts in her areas of expertise.