Sara Monaco

Background

About Sara Monaco

Dr. Sara Monaco is an enthusiastic and dedicated pathologist with years of impactful experience incorporating busy clinical practice, research, education, informatics, and quality improvement in laboratories to optimize diagnoses and patient care. Her career has focused on collaborative projects, committees, leadership, and taskforces to address initiatives in laboratory medicine, particularly with respect to minimally invasive small biopsies and cytopathology. She completed her undergraduate studies at Cornell University and went on to medical school at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York, where she stayed as a resident in anatomic and clinical pathology. She then completed her training at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC), where she stayed for over 12 years as a faculty member. At UPMC, she was the Cytopathology Fellowship Program Director, and the Director of the Fine Needle Aspiration (FNA) Biopsy Service at UPMC Hillman Cancer Center and UPMC Children’s Hospital. At UPMC, she was one of the key leaders implementing ultrasound-guided fine needle aspirations and telecytology to perform rapid on-site evaluations. In 2020, Dr. Monaco became the System Director for Cytopathology and Professor of Pathology at Geisinger Medical Center. She was also one of the doctoral leads in implementing EPIC Beaker for the anatomic pathology laboratory information system (APLIS) at Geisinger in 2022. In 2026, she took a larger role in the anatomic pathology leadership at Geisinger by assuming the role of Division Chief for Cytopathology & Northeast Pathology. Dr. Monaco’s career has included the publication of numerous peer-reviewed articles, book chapters, and four co-authored books in cytopathology. She has also presented several educational courses and been an invited speaker at national and international meetings. Furthermore, she has been a dedicated member and leader for the American Society of Cytopathology (ASC), where she has served on the ASC Executive Board (2019-2023, 2024-Present) and been a member or chair of numerous ASC committees, in addition to serving on important taskforces like the ASC Telecytology Validation Taskforce and the ASC Taskforce for Optimizing Small Biopsy Specimen Processing for Ancillary Studies. She will serve as the President of the ASC in 2026-2027. Her professional experience at different institutions and extensive involvement in the national societies focusing on pathology issues have provided the experience and valuable skillset to make her an impactful leader in pathology.