No. 397, October 2006
Editor: Kathleen Watson, M.D., drwatson@umn.edu
Editorial Assistant: Allison Campbell Jensen, aac@umn.edu
In this issue:
NEWS: MED 2010 and more
STUDENTS
FACULTY
EVENTS
NEWS
MED 2010 report: Continued progress
Progress reports at a meeting of MED 2010 work group leaders on September 22 included a presentation on the portfolio initiative by James Nixon, M.D., as well as reports of work-group progress and draft vision statements. (Go to http://www.med.umn.edu/med2010/home.html and click on Initiatives and projects to access the Nixon's portfolio PowerPoint presentation.) The Disparities in Health work group, for example, aims to "Eliminate inequalities in health through learner-centered education, research, faculty development and community engagement... [p]repare, recruit and develop students to effectively serve in increasingly diverse health care settings with an understanding of the effects of the socio-cultural environment on the well-being of patients and communities and to hire and develop faculty who are able to support and develop the students' understanding of these concepts."
Director of Learner Development: new position, familiar face
We are pleased to announce that Marilyn Becker, Ph.D.,
is the first director of Learner Development for the Medical School. Her goals are to develop a system to:
1. Assist with and anticipate student learning needs
2. Enable students to function effectively in the learning environment
3. Enable faculty, students and staff to maximize personal well-being in the
context of being a professional as part of MED 2010.
Some of the new projects and responsibilities will include:
· Assessing student, faculty and staff needs in promotion of student learning
· Collaborating with Student Affairs to organize and make available resources for learning and well-being
· Advising the Knowledge Coop
· Providing programmatic consultation and workshops for faculty and program directors on learning
Becker's primary responsibilities are in undergraduate medical education, but
the scope extends to graduate and continuing medical education. We are
confident that this scope of activities will add value to our learners and
faculty. Becker brings to this unique position her doctoral training in
educational psychology, 17 years in medical education, and six years of
experience as director of Admissions at the University of Minnesota Medical
School. Please join us in welcoming Marilyn to this new role.
Dean's Report for 2006 available online
MED 2010, education in global health, the contribution of imaging to understanding of mental illness, Medical School researchers' contribution to advances in genetics, and continued leadership in transplantation are among the topics in the 2006 Medical School Dean's Report. It's available online as a PDF, from a link on the home page (www.med.umn.edu). In addition, hard copies are available from Allison Campbell Jensen, aac@umn.edu.
Community Fund Drive continues through Oct. 31
"As a member of this University, I know that this Community Fund Drive is one more way that we at the U make a difference for the state of Minnesota," says Medical School Dean Deborah Powell, M.D. She urges faculty and staff on the Twin Cities campus to review the brochure introducing the 2006 Community Fund Drive and to consider contributing. The Community Fund Drive is a volunteer fund-raising effort through which our University community contributes to our wider community. Powell serves as drive co-chair this year with Dean Steven Crouch of the Institute of Technology. The goal this year is to raise $1.2 million -- and to reach that goal, the Community Fund Drive needs many University faculty and staff to participate. Please consider giving to one of the federation of charities who address issues in health, community organizing, the environment, higher education, and human needs such as hunger and homelessness. Or write in the nonprofit charity of your choice on CFD forms. For more information, go online (www.umn.edu/cfd).
STUDENTS
Largest group ever of American Indians admitted this fall
This fall, the Medical School admitted its largest group ever of Native Americans as first year students. Nine started on the Duluth campus and six on the Twin Cities campus. Joy Dorscher, M.D., director of the Center of American Indian and Minority Health, attributes the increase in students to the recognized mission of the Duluth school for training Native Americans, the educational reputation of the Medical School and the support it offers with the Center programs.
Record-setting Rural Physician Associate Program class
Around the state of Minnesota, 41 sites are welcoming 47 students -- the largest number ever enrolled in the Rural Physician Associate Program. These third-year students gathered with faculty and alumni at an Oct. 4 luncheon capping an intensive orientation. At the event, RPAP preceptor Paul Van Gorp, M.D., of Long Prairie received an outstanding achievement award from the RPAP program. He was nominated by his student Harrison Hanson, now in his fourth year. "I have a special relationship with Harrison," Van Gorp said. "I knew him before he was born." Van Gorp's wife and Hanson's mother were in pre-natal classes together. Beth Melin, who delivered 95 babies during her time as a student in Princeton, was named the 2005-2006 Student Achievement Award winner. She could not attend because of her U.S. Air Force commitment. New this year is a DVD with essential content for the RPAP students during the nine months they spend serving rural communities.
White Coat ceremonies take place this month, Oct. 7 & 21
First-year medical students receive their first white coats -- symbolic of taking on the responsibilities of their profession -- and take the oath for new physicians Oct. 7 on the Duluth campus and Oct. 21 on the Twin Cities campus. The purpose of the White Coat ceremony is to initiate these future doctors into the profession, and to convey to them, as well as their families and friends, what it means to be a physician. The Duluth ceremony begins at 2 p.m., Oct. 7, in the Weber Music Hall. For the first time, the Center for American Indian and Minority Health drum group will perform. The Twin Cities ceremony begins at 1 p.m., Oct. 21, at Northrop Auditorium. This is the 10th year for the Twin Cities event.
Kudos to our medical students
The Medical School received unsolicited praise for our students from internal medicine resident physician Jack L-M Mutnick, M.D., which he allowed us to share. "[I]t is imperative for me to point out the amazing group of medical students that the University of Minnesota continues to produce. I transferred to this program from the West Coast and performed my medical school training in Nevada. I had the opportunity to interact with many students from many different programs thus far, even if it is only a short period of time, and I must inform you that U of Minnesota puts out the utmost and top-notch medical student that I have come across. The level of knowledge, the empathy, the ability to think through difficult problems and provide insightful feedback, differentials and assessments & plans continues to amaze me. There are many great schools in this country but I do not believe any can match the aptitude of student/physician that is produced at UMN. I can only hope that I was close, in ability, common sense and caring, that I see in almost every UMN medical student." Thank you, Jack.
Far-flung experiences: Zimbabwe
A transfer patient arrives with terrible bleeding because her clinic ran out of gloves, a supposedly terminal AIDS patient recovers after a shot-in-the-dark malaria treatment, and a homebirth baby arrives with the grimace of tetanus. This was one morning at Karanda Hospital in Zimbabwe where fourth-year students Jim Lebret and Ryan Horazdovsky recently spent five months. They each had visited Africa previously and were moved to help in a medical setting. Zimbabwe's inflation rate (1000 percent) and life expectancy (36 years) have become the worst in the world through the devastation of HIV and a corrupt government. Karanda Hospital has 140 beds, a nursing school and an outpatient clinic that sees 3,000 mostly HIV-positive patients per month. A father and son team from the United States perform or supervise 100 major and 200 minor surgical cases per month. Lebret and Horazdovsky's daily duties included rounding on more than 25 inpatients each, then seeing 30 patients in clinic. In the afternoon, they helped in the surgery suite. "It was emotionally and physically difficult, but in the end, you get more than you give," they agree. Interested students can contact Lebret, Horazdovsky or the IMER office for more information.
--Jim Lebret
International clinical research training program
The Association of American Medical Colleges is seeking applicants for an international clinical research training fellowship for graduate level health professions students. The program is sponsored by the National Institutes of Health's (NIH) Fogarty International Center, in partnership with the Ellison Medical Foundation. The AAMC and the Association of Schools of Public Health manage the program, which is beginning its fourth year. This one-year program provides students with mentored research training at top-ranked, NIH-funded research centers in a diverse group of countries. Applications are due Dec. 8. For more information, go to http://www.aamc.org/overseasfellowship .
Invitation to medical students to hear Tracy Kidder Oct. 11
Medical students are welcome to join the Physician and Society class when Tracy Kidder speaks, 3:30-5:30 p.m., Oct. 11, in PWB 2-470. Kidder is the author of Mountains Beyond Mountains, about the work of Paul Farmer, M.D., Ph.D., to help poor people in underdeveloped areas be treated for HIV/AIDS and drug-resistant tuberculosis. (For more information on Farmer's work, go to www.pih.org, the Partners in Health Web site.)
Calling all students: For future issues, we'd love to hear your news about volunteer efforts, research work, or medical experiences in new environments. Send an e-mail to Allison Campbell Jensen, aac@umn.edu.
FACULTY
DocTalks resumes
"The causes of atherosclerosis, Alzheimer's disease, and multiple sclerosis: insights from evolution and the stuff swept under the rug," will be presented 7:30 p.m., Oct. 5, on the Medical School's Duluth campus by Paul W. Ewald, Professor of Biology and Director of the Program on Disease Evolution at the University of Louisville. Ewald's presentation is part of a public seminar series on current medical issues, DocTalks, which launched this year on Sept. 12 with Gary Davis, Ph.D., L.P., and Jane Hovland, R.N., Ph.D., L.P., discussing "Suicide and its Aftermath."
EVENTS AND LECTURES
Author Tracy Kidder to visit Oct. 10 & 11
The Medical School is co-sponsoring a Creative Writing Program event, "Good Societies," featuring Tracy Kidder, 7:30 p.m., Oct. 10, at Cowles Auditorium. See Students section for another event featuring Kidder.
Alum Mukherjee speaks on providing equal medical treatments, Oct. 13
Joia Mukherjee, M.D., M.P.H., M.S., medical director of the international medical charity Partners in Health, is the featured speaker at the next Harvard Street Forum, noon, Oct. 13, Grace University Lutheran Church, 24 Harvard St., S.E. Mukherjee will lead a discussion on her efforts to provide equal medical treatment to communities in need, the importance of caring for the underserved, and the need for worldwide health care rights. Mukherjee's presentation will be preceded and followed by a performance by jazz musician Bruce Henry. Mukherjee is an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and clinical director of the school's Program in Infectious Disease and Social Change. As medical director of Partners in Health, she oversees community health care programs in Haiti, Mexico, Peru, Russia, Rwanda, and inner-city Boston, where she and her colleagues treat people with HIV and tuberculosis, and provide quality health care to all. The Harvard Street Forum is a collaboration of the Medical School Department of Family Medicine and Community Health, the Academic Health Center, the Center for Medical Humanities, and Grace University Lutheran Church, providing a venue for members of the University and the surrounding community to discuss issues of relevance and controversy.
Ethical implications of health professional participation in interrogation, Oct. 25
The systematic use of psychological torture and other forms of abuse against detainees in U.S. custody since Sept. 11, 2001, has presented the health professional community with an enormous ethical challenge. This challenge will be discussed at a Physicians for Human Rights' event led by Michael Glenn, M.D., a retired psychiatrist, 12:15-1:10 p.m., Oct. 25, Moos Tower 2-650. Glenn served as a military physician in the U.S. Air Force during the Vietnam War era and now works with the PHR Campaign against Torture. Health professional ethics codes call on their members to oppose torture wherever it occurs and prohibit them from participating in detainee abuse in any way but military guidelines have placed certain health personnel in critical positions in the interrogation process. Glenn will discuss with the audience the role of the health professional community, including students, in preventing abuse and health professional complicity in it.
Minnesota Alliance for Patient Safety conference, Nov. 15-16
Keynote speaker will be the author of the best-seller Internal Bleeding: The Truth Behind America's Terrifying Epidemic of Medical Mistakes, and Chief of the Medical Service at University of California, San Francisco Medical Center Bob Wachter, M.D. He will discuss how far health care systems and providers have come since 1999, and how far they need to go in sustaining our commitment to address medical mistakes. Registration at the conference is $310; for details, see the MAPS Web site (http://www.mnpatientsafety.org/).