Dr. David Xu grew up in Rockville, Maryland and graduated magna cum laude from Duke University. He completed medical school with distinction in Biomedical Research at the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine, where he completed a research fellowship supported by the Research to Prevent Blindness fellowship. He moved to Chicago, Illinois to complete his transitional year internship at Presence St. Joseph Hospital. Subsequently, Dr. Xu completed his ophthalmology residency at the Stein Eye Institute, UCLA in Los Angeles, California where he won the Pepose-Saltzman Young Investigator Award and the Starr E. Schulman Fellowship Award. He pursued fellowship training at Wills Eye Hospital and stayed to join the Wills Eye Hospital faculty.

Dr. Xu is dedicated to bringing his patients the latest evidence-based medical and surgical care. He has been an investigator for more than 20 nationwide clinical trials, including for age-related macular degeneration, geographic atrophy and diabetic retinopathy.

He is a member of the American Society of Retina Specialists (ASRS), American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO) and Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology (ARVO) and has contributed numerous peer-reviewed papers, textbook chapters, lectureships and editorials. His works have been published in Ophthalmology, American Journal of Ophthalmology, RETINA and the Wills Eye Manual. He has been an invited speaker to present at numerous national ophthalmic meetings. He founded EyeGuru, an educational website for beginning ophthalmology trainees.