[2] El-Dahr attended Jefferson Medical College, completed both her residency and her fellowship at the University of Virginia Health Science Center, and completed an internship at Yale New Haven Hospital in 1986.
[4][5][1][6] However, she is best known for her autism-related research, and has written both chapters 7 and 8 of the book "Understanding Autism for Dummies".
[7] She gave a presentation before the Institute of Medicine regarding what she described as the biological plausibility of a thimerosal-autism link in 2001.
[9] Her research, conducted with James B. Adams and Jeff Bradstreet as coauthors, has concluded that chelation therapy is a safe and effective treatment for autism.
[13][14] Her father was a general pediatrician, and often made house calls after picking her up from school while she sat in the car and did homework.