Ira Paul Michaelson, MD, is a board certified gastroenterologist with extensive experience caring for people with digestive disorders and other conditions affecting the G.I. tract.  A lifelong Boston-area resident, Dr. Michaelson graduated from Trinity College in Hartford, CT, and earned his medical degree from the University of Florence in Italy.  He completed his internship and the first year of his Internal Medicine residency at Carney Hospital in Boston.  His second and third years of residency were completed respectively at Cook County Hospital in Chicago and Brigham and Women’s Hospital of Boston.  He practiced briefly as an emergency physician before pursuing a two-year fellowship in Gastroenterology at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center in Worcester.  He then began a 35-year association with Lawrence Memorial Hospital, Medford, MA, where he provided gastroenterology and advanced endoscopic care to G.I. patients throughout the Medford area.  A member of the American College of Gastroenterology, Dr. Michaelson is dual boarded in Internal Medicine and Gastroenterology, with clinical interests in Plant Based Medicine and cancer prevention following the work of Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn of the Cleveland Clinic.  An avid cross-country skier, he and his wife, Shari, have four children and six grandchildren.