Dr. Mohana Karlekar is an associate professor of Medicine and Section Chief of Palliative Care at Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC). She helped co-found the Vanderbilt Hospice and Palliative Care Fellowship.

Her areas of interest and expertise include primary palliative care education, the intersection of palliative care and trauma and more recently advancing palliative care in Africa. In 2018, she served on the Tennessee Palliative Care and Quality of Life Task Force and has served as chair of the Tennessee state palliative care council since 2019.

Karlekar received her bachelor’s degree from Cornell University and medical degree from the State University of New York at Stony Brook. She completed her internship and residency at Mt. Sinai Medical Center in New York City. Prior to joining VUMC, she served as program director at Woodhull Medical Center.

She is the recipient of the Hugh Jackson Morgan Teaching Award, Leonard Tow Humanism in Medicine Award and Thomas P Graham Award for Dedicated Service to Patient Centered Care, and is an honoree in the Alpha Omega Association. She has presented and published on subject matter in palliative care both nationally and internationally.