This new Medical School News e-newsletter is intended for our whole community of Medical School faculty, staff, and students. It expands the scope of the former Med Ed e-newsletter beyond education, to research, care, and points of pride. Please send your feedback, contributions, or suggestions for another name to aac@umn.edu . Access to the archived Med Ed is available.
Faculty and staff are invited to a forum on the state of the Medical School budget and where we are heading, led by Dean Deborah E. Powell, M.D., and Peter Mitsch, associate dean for finance and administration. The forum begins at 4:30 p.m., Monday, April 13, in Mayo Auditorium. It will be videostreamed to Duluth campus room 165.
Li-Na Wei, Ph.D., was honored with a 2009 Distinguished McKnight University Professorship. Professor Wei is a leading scientist in vitamin A signaling and mechanisms for regulating genes. She was one of four mid-career professors recognized this year and receives a five-year $100,000 grant. More.
Please join your colleagues when the Medical School and Minnesota Medical Foundation recognize great faculty and students at a ceremony starting at 11:30, April 17, in Mayo Auditorium.
MICaB graduate student Laura Okagaki recently was honored with two awards. The Genetics Society of America recently presented her with an outstanding poster award. She was one of five people honored in a field of nearly 700. She also was one of 10 people named an Outstanding Young Investigator by the American Society for Microbiology.
Coping with the first patient death – that’s something medical students need to learn. Rural Physician Associate Program students can post these and other experiences to a secure Web site and gain feedback from peers and faculty. Therese Zink, M.D., M.P.H., looks at their work for universal themes. Students who show potential to go beyond simply recording to deeply reflecting will be invited by Zink to work with her. “Some do; some don’t,” she says. Eleven pieces have been published, the most recent in Minnesota Medicine by former RPAP student, now physician, Cesar Emilio Ercole on the profound implications of an immigrant’s accident. “This is much more than Norman Rockwell’s doctor,” Zink says of today’s rural practice. More.
More than 200 people attended the premiere of Walking Into the Unknown, a 65-minute health documentary featuring alumni Arne Vainio, M.D., and David Jorde, M.D., on March 23, 2009 on the Duluth campus. “Making this film changed me as a physician,” Vainio told the audience. “I never knew what it meant, as a physician, when I sent my patients to see a dietician or to get a colonoscopy. Now I know, and I can be a better physician because I can empathize as well as educate them.” More.
Mustafa al’Absi, Ph.D., recently was elected a fellow in the Association for Psychological Science. Fellow status is awarded to APS members who have made sustained outstanding contributions to the science of psychology in the areas of research, teaching, service, and/or application. A Duluth campus faculty member, al'Absi also is the founding member of the Duluth Medical Research Institute.
In the past 30 years, our Medical School has graduated nearly 130 Native American physicians, second only to Oklahoma, a success for which our Center of American Indian and Minority Health deserves much credit. CAIMH's program was outlined in a recent issue of Academic Physician and Scientist, a recruitment publication of the Association of American Medical Colleges. For Native American students from high school through college, CAIMH offers summer enrichment programs. Go to www.caimh.org for information.
The Residency Review Committee for our Orthopaedic Surgery residency program recently not only accredited the program but also commended it on a letter to residency director Ann Van Heest, M.D. The letter read: "The Committee commended you and your staff for the excellent overall quality of the education you provide, noting particular strengths in the faculty's dedication to teaching, didactic activities, a broad and balanced clinical experience, and an improved sports medicine experience."
Faculty can learn more about promotion and tenure or about mentoring someone through the process at a couple of information sessions offered by the Faculty Affairs office. All faculty are welcome to attend general information sessions on promotion and tenure, 7:30-8:30 a.m., or 4:30-5:30 p.m., April 30. These sessions may be most helpful to those submitting a dossier in 2009. Faculty who mentor others through the promotion and tenure process can take advantage of the session 11:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m., April 21. All sessions take place in B646 Mayo. (Sessions also will be videostreamed to 148 SMed Duluth). Please indicate dates and times you'd like to attend and register by e-mail to msfacaff@umn.edu .
During free health screenings of 250 people on March 14, students identified a man with previously undiagnosed diabetes. The screenings for glucose, cholesterol, vision, blood pressure, and body mass index were part of the Student National Medical Association’s annual free health fair at the Mall of America March 14. Screenings were carried out by about 80 student volunteers from the Medical School, including physical therapy students, and the School of Dentistry, along with six physicians. New this year: students at Northwestern Health Sciences University provided free massage therapy and information on alternative health. --Fran Lebajo Wu
Manik Chhabra and Catherine "Katie" Pastorius are two of 29 medical students nationwide to receive Fogarty Fellowships for next year. They will receive training in clinical research at NIH before connecting with their mentors and traveling abroad. Chhabra will work with Chris Beyrer, M.D., M.P.H., of Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, at Chiang Mai University and the Research Institute for Health Sciences in Thailand. Their research will likely focus on HIV prevention strategies in high-risk populations. Pastorius will be part of a team based out of University of Washington that will carry out projects in Lima, Peru. Our previous Fogarty fellow is Melanie Lo, now based in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
Maggie Mahar, author of Money-driven Medicine: The Real Reason Health Care Costs So Much, will screen and discuss the documentary based on her book. This free screening is open to the public 5-7:30 p.m., April 24, in Murphy 130. The event is sponsored by the School of Journalism & Mass Communication.
The Beckman Center for Transposon Research has officially changed its name to the Center for Genome Engineering. While transposons are still at the heart of the Center’s research, the new name reflects a broader mission to develop tools for manipulating nucleic acids in vivo. The Center has new office space in MCB 5-113 and a new Web page (www.cge.umn.edu).
Cornell professor Eloy Rodriguez will present “The Healing Forest: The Origin and Discovery of Natural Organic Medicines from the Forbidden Forests of Africa and the Amazon in Peru,” 7:30 p.m., April 7, Bell Museum of Natural History, located at 10 Church St. S.E., Minneapolis. More.
Contributing Editor: Kathleen Watson, M.D., drwatson@umn.edu
From the cowardice that dares not face new truth
From the laziness that is contented with half-truth
From the arrogance that thinks it knows all truth,
Good Lord, deliver us.
Submissions or questions, contact: Allison Campbell Jensen, aac@umn.edu