Daniel Rongo, M.D.
Doctor by Day, Software Developer by Night!
Where Medicine Meets Technology
As a practicing physician with a love for software development, I get to make cool stuff that helps people. I'm passionate about creating innovative healthcare solutions that improve patient care and outcomes. When I'm not seeing patients, you can find me coding, building web apps, and exploring the latest in AI technology. Let's connect and build something awesome together!
Looking for the formal version? View my full CV.
Projects
Doctorcraft
Doctorcraft is a web-based video game that helps medical students and residents prepare for board exams and clinical practice. It features a fun way to play a video game while caring for virtual patients. It was showcased as an interactive demonstration at CHEST 2025 in Chicago.
Virtual Ventilator
This is a virtual ventilator simulator that I built to help healthcare providers learn how to manage patients on mechanical ventilation. It's a great tool for medical students, residents, and practicing physicians.
AI Medical Assistant
This AI assistant helps me and other healthcare providers with clinical decision-making, patient care, and medical research. It's like having a virtual colleague that can help with diagnosing and treating patients.
Cosine Similarity
A simple calculator to calculate the cosine similarity between two text strings.
Sleepy Spindle
Chatbot dedicated to helping patients sift through the AASM guidelines. All guidelines used are from publically available documents provided by AASM which I stored into a vector database for retrieval.
Medical Expertise
I'm an attending Clinical Assistant Professor at UT Tyler, and I practice pulmonary, critical care, and sleep medicine at UT Health East Texas. I'm board certified by the American Board of Internal Medicine in internal medicine, pulmonary disease, critical care medicine, sleep medicine. I completed my Sleep Medicine fellowship at The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine fellowship at Baylor University Medical Center, and Internal Medicine residency at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston. My clinical interests are sleep-related breathing disorders and neuromuscular-related chronic respiratory failure, and I love teaching and finding new ways to make medical education more engaging.
Web Development and Agentic AI
I am a full stack tech developer with primary experience in HTML, CSS, Javascript, Python, React, Node.js, Next.js, with backends such as Firebase and MongoDB. I primarily build web applications with large language model AI agentic capabilities.
Machine Learning & Causal AI Development
I develop machine learning solutions for healthcare using TensorFlow, PyTorch, and scikit-learn, with expertise in NLP and predictive modeling. I'm particularly interested in causal ML, which helps understand cause-and-effect relationships to optimize medical interventions rather than just predicting outcomes.
Research & Publications
I've published 3 peer-reviewed articles in respiratory and sleep medicine and contributed 5 chapters to Sleep Disorders in Children (Springer, 2025). I regularly present at SLEEP, ATS, and CHEST, and I serve on the Artificial Intelligence in Sleep Medicine Committee. See the full CV.
Research & Teaching
Selected Publications
- "Phenotypic and polysomnographic features of children with very severe and extreme OSA" — The Laryngoscope, 2026doi
- "Navigating sleep on the silk route: insights and implications of sleep medicine training in Asia" — Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine, 2024doi
- "Clinical, radiology, pathologic patterns and outcomes of vaping related pulmonary injury in a single institution; a case series" — Respiratory Medicine, 2020doi
Book Chapters
Sleep Disorders in Children (Springer, 2025)
- Infant sleep
- Other sleep apneas: understanding central, complex, and mixed sleep apnea in pediatric populations
- Parasomnias in children
- Neurological disorders
- Sleep in special populations: genetic syndromes
Case Files Internal Medicine, 6th edition — Contributions to chapters on dementia, delirium, stroke, and alcohol withdrawal.
Invited Speaking
SLEEP 2026, Baltimore, Maryland
- Should physicians learn to code for better understanding of AI?
Teaching Contributions
CardioRenal Therapeutics Grand Rounds
- Approach to Interstitial Lung Disease (June 2024)
- Approach to Pulmonary Hypertension (March 2024)
- Viral Respiratory Infections (January 2024)
- Noninvasive Ventilation Management (October 2023)
- Chest X-Ray Imaging (September 2023)
- COPD Overview (June 2023)
Lectures & Simulation
- Chest Tube Insertions (June 2024)
- Approach to Acid-Base Disorders (June 2020)
Community & Service
Exodus 90 Leader and Co-Leader
2023-2024
Leader, January-April 2023; co-leader, January-April 2024. Led a group of eight men in faith-based personal development, structured reflection, and peer support.
Catholic Community Outreach and Altar Service
2022-2025
Volunteer service in the Catholic community of Dallas, Texas.
Argo-Noles Mentorship Program President and Mentor
2016-2018
Mentored premedical students and served as program president during the third and fourth years of medical school.
Healthcare for All
One of my biggest dreams is to contribute to free clinics in underserved communities. I believe healthcare is a fundamental right, not a privilege. I'm actively looking for opportunities to work with free clinics where I can use my expertise in general and pulmonary medicine to help those who might otherwise not have access to care.
Interested in healthcare technology innovation or collaborating on medical software projects?