Dr. Latifi joined the UA Department of Surgery in 2003, serving as director of Surgical Critical Care at UMC and as associate director of the Arizona Telemedicine Program. He developed the Southern Arizona Teletrauma and Telepresence (SATT) Program, which provides a live consultation link -- including state-of-the-art videoconferencing, telemetry, digital X-rays and ultrasound -- between the trauma doctors at UMC and rural emergency rooms doctors and nurses in the southern section of the state to assist in trauma care of injured and critically ill patients.

A medical graduate of the University of Prishtina, Prishtina, Kosova, Dr. Latifi completed internships at the University of Prishtina and the Cleveland Clinic Foundation, Ohio, and residency at Yale University School of Medicine. He also was a Surgical Critical Care Fellow at New York Medical College.

Dr. Latifi specializes in trauma, general surgery and critical care with special interest in re-operative surgery, advanced laparoscopic surgery, and nutrition support of surgery and critically ill patients. He has published eight books and has authored and co-authored more than 100 articles and book chapters. Most recently he directed the medical care for the marathon swimmer Martin Strel during the Amazon Swim Expedition through telemedicine and introduced telemedicine in many communities along the Amazon River in Peru and Brazil.