Dr. Tian grew up in the suburbs of Dallas, Texas. She received her medical degree at UT Southwestern Medical Center, completed residency at Emory University, and returned to finish GI fellowship training at UT Southwestern.  Dr. Tian joined faculty after her fellowship training.

In addition to housestaff teaching, Dr. Tian has a clinical interest in quality improvement and promoting patient health education. In 2016, she implemented an electronic consultation platform for the Department of Digestive and Liver Diseases within the electronic medical records system of Parkland Health Systems to improve primary provider access to specialist input.  The platform has since expanded to various internal medicine subspecialties. She continues to be one of the digestive and liver disease providers for electronic consultation.