Maria Eleni Nikita, MD

Education

2007                    M.D., University of Crete, School of Medicine

Post Graduate Education and Training

 2009 - 2010        Internship, Pediatrics, Penn state Hershey Children’s hospital

2010 - 2012        Residency, Pediatrics, Penn state Hershey Children’s hospital             

2012 - 2015        Fellowship, Pediatric Endocrinology, University of California, San Diego

2012 - 2015        Advanced Certificate in Clinical Research, Clinical and Translational Research Institute (CTRI CREST), UCSD

Certifications

2008                    ECFMG (Educational Commission for Foreign Medical Graduates) certification

2012                    American Board Certification - Pediatrics

2015                    American Board Certification – Pediatric Endocrinology              

Dr. Maria Eleni Nikita received her Medical Degree at University of Crete in Greece. She subsequently moved to the United States and worked at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) looking into the genetic defects of patients with endocrine disorders and endocrine neoplasia syndromes. She completed her Pediatric internship and residency at Penn State Hershey Children's Hospital in 2012 and her Pediatric Endocrinology Fellowship at the University of California, San Diego in 2015. During her residency she was involved in research for the development of a new measure for eating beliefs, behaviors and burden in Diabetic Adolescents. During her fellowship at UCSD her main research focus was in pediatric thyroid cancer.
She also participated in a pilot study regarding genetic markers in adolescents with PCOS.
Dr. Maria Eleni Nikita's special interests include pediatric thyroid cancer, general endocrinology, and diabetes, disorders of sex development and care of transgender and gender non-conforming children and adolescents.
Dr. Nikita is participating at the Your Trans Care (YTC) specialty program that offers primary care and distinctive services for transgender individuals and their friends, family and significant others.

She joined the Division of Pediatric Endocrinology at University of Maryland in 2015.

Pediatric thyroid cancer, Diabetes, General endocrinology (short stature, disorders of puberty, thyroid disorders), Disorders of bone metabolism, Disorders of sex development, Transgender health

Nikita M-E, Hendy HM, Williams KE, Mueller PL 2019 The Glucose Control Resistance Scale. Journal of clinical research in pediatric endocrinology 11:118.

Nikita ME, Jiang W, Cheng S-M, Hantash FM, McPhaul MJ, Newbury RO, Phillips SA, Reitz RE, Waldman FM, Newfield RS 2016 Mutational Analysis in Pediatric Thyroid Cancer and Correlations with Age, Ethnicity, and Clinical Presentation. Thyroid 26:227-234.

Horvath A, Faucz F, Finkielstain GP, Nikita ME, Rothenbuhler A, Almeida M, Mericq V, Stratakis CA. Haplotype analysis of the promoter region of phosphodiesterase type 8B (PDE8B) in correlation with inactivating PDE8B mutation and the serum thyroid-stimulating hormone levels. Thyroid 2010; 20:363-367

Horvath A, Korde L, Greene MH, Libe R, Osorio P, Faucz FR, Raffin-Sanson ML, Tsang KM, Drori-Herishanu L, Patronas Y, Remmers EF,Nikita ME, Moran J, Greene J, Nesterova M, Merino M, Bertherat J, Stratakis CA. Functional phosphodiesterase 11A mutations may modify the risk of familial and bilateral testicular germ cell tumors. Cancer research 2009; 69:5301-5306

Maria Eleni Nikita, Carla Demeterco, Michael E Gottschalk ,Thyrotoxicosis-induced prolonged QTc in a female adolescent with history of Graves Disease, Abstract P2-620, The Endocrine Society's 95th Annual Meeting and Expo, San Francisco, June 13-18, 2013.

Maria Eleni Nikita, Wen Jiang, Robert O Newbury, Susan A Phillips, Richard E Reitz, Frederic M Waldman, Feras M Hantash, Ron S Newfield, Genotype-phenotype analysis in 40 pediatric thyroid cancer cases, Abstract P2-551, 16th International Congress of Endocrinology/The Endocrine Society's 96th Annual Meeting and Expo, Chicago, June 21-24, 2014.

Maria Eleni Nikita, Wen Jiang, Robert O Newbury, Susan A Phillips, Richard E Reitz, Frederic M Waldman, Feras M Hantash, Ron S Newfield, Genetic variability in 43 Pediatric Thyroid Cancer cases and correlation with their clinical presentation up to 6 months post-diagnosis,  84th Annual Meeting of the American Thyroid Association (ATA), Coronado California, October 18-23, 201

Maria Eleni Nikita, Carla Demeterco, A Case of Pseudopseudohypoparathyroidism and Gouty Arthritis Associated with a Novel Mutation in GNAS1 Gene  The Endocrine Socieyt's 97th Annual Meeting and Expo, San Diego, March 5-8, 2015

Maria Eleni Nikita, Marilyn C Jones,  Kenneth L Jones, Novel truncating CHD7 mutation causes CHARGE and Kallmann syndromes 2015 Pediatric Academic Societies Annual Meeting in San Diego, CA, April 25-28, 2015