Dr. Gelman completed his urology residency at the UCLA Medical Center and a Fellowship in Adult and Pediatric Male Genitourinary Reconstruction at the Devine Center in Norfolk, Virginia, under the mentorship of Dr. Gerald Jordan. He was then recruited to UCI in 1998.  At UCI, he established the first tertiary Center for Reconstructive Urology in Southern California, and he has performed over 3,000 urethral-penile reconstructive surgeries over the past 27 years, which included patients who traveled to UCI from 46 states and 34 different countries.  He is the founder and co-director of a Society of Genitourinary Reconstructive Surgeons (GURS) approved Endowed Fellowship program in Male GU Reconstruction at UC Irvine, the Eric S. Wisenbaugh Fellowship. His research interests include both clinical research in urethral stricture disease and R01 NIH Funded Urethral Tissue Engineering basic science research. He has been an invited speaker nationally and internationally, having been asked to present and teach reconstructive surgery in 14 countries. His publications have described new surgical instrumentation, including the first direct vision balloon dilator that is now commonly used with a drug coating to treat urethral strictures (Optilume), new combination flap-graft urethroplasty techniques, and the double-faced buccal graft urethroplasty. He has served on the Board of Directors of the GURS and the Western Section AUA.  Dr. Gelman was recently awarded the Distinguished Member of the Western Section for 2025.

As a leader in global health, Dr. Gelman is actively involved in international outreach as a mentor in Vietnam and Thailand, where he has created an expanded mentorship paradigm for international partnerships that has been transformative and can serve as a model for bringing new sub-specialty expertise to low-middle income countries.