During Welcome Weekend in August I had the opportunity to meet many of our new students from all four schools.  I would like to once again welcome you to our campus.  We are glad you have joined the UTMB family, and wish you every success in the future.

___________________________________________________

The following includes information regarding upcoming events, hospital/clinic news, news from the four schools, and funding opportunities.

UPCOMING EVENTS

• Walk the Walk With UTMB:

Do your part to help cure cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer’s disease, heart disease and stroke - join the UTMB health walk teams for the following events:

Alzheimer's Memory Walk (10/9)
American Heart Association Bay Area Heart Walk (10/16)
D’Feet Breast Cancer Run/Walk (10/30)
Walk, Run, Stop Diabetes! (11/6)

• Join Employee Health Promotion for the UT System America on the Move Physical Activity Challenge Kick-off October 7th, 2010

Employees at UTMB, including off-site locations, will have the opportunity to help us win the "traveling trophy" presented to the UT System Institution with the most employees completing the America on the Move Physical Activity Challenge.  The free, six-week program will allow you to record and track your progress along the Pacific Crest Trail.  You can count steps, activity minutes and miles to complete the trail by November 17, 2010.

To help you get started, we will kick-off the event with three one-mile walks at 7:15am, 11:45am and 3:45pm, starting at the Moody Medical Library Plaza.  Off campus events will be held during the six-weeks time period as well.  All those who register at www.americaonthemove.org will receive a FREE "goodie bag" from the Employee Health Promotion Program.  Once you are at the site, type in University of Texas in the search box and join our group. For more information, contact Gerald Cleveland at gtclevel@utmb.edu.

• Register Now:  “Regulations and Ethics in Clinical Research” Course 

“Regulations and Ethics in Clinical Research” is a series of 10 weekly sessions as a module in the Institute for Translational Sciences Education Program titled, “Clinical Research:  Tools and Techniques.”  This module will begin Monday, October 11, 2010, 5:15 pm, Children’s Hospital, Room 2.312.  The sessions provide an overview of regulations and ethical principles involved in clinical investigation.  A brochure further describing the sessions is available upon request or at http://www.its.utmb.edu/learning/research_education.html.   IRB ethics preparation, Risk Education, and GME credits are available for selected sessions. 

To register, complete and submit the registration form located on the brochure Internet site, or contact the Institute for Translational Sciences – Education Office by email CTSA@utmb.edu or phone 772-1484.  The course fee of $50 covers registration, letter of completion, Risk Education, GME credit, and refreshments.  (Those who have already registered for this year’s course, “Clinical Research:  Tools and Techniques” do not need to register again for this module.)  To find out more about the Institute for Translational Sciences, click on the following link: http://www.its.utmb.edu/index.htm. 

• Halloween Carnival, October 29, 2010

UTMB Osler Student Societies and Student Government Association invite you to:

HALLOWEEN
at Moody Medical Library plaza
(North corner of 9th Street and Market)
Friday, October 29, 2010
5 p.m. - 7 p.m.

Join us for safe trick-or-treating, snacks, games, costume contest, and more.  Please support efforts to help the Galveston community by bringing canned food donations for a local food pantry.

If you have any questions, please call Rosemary Lindley at ext. 79680 

• Save the Date - Faculty Development Day

The Academy of Master Teachers will host a Faculty Development Day on December 10, 2010, 8 am - 5 pm at the Galvez Hotel – Galveston.   Craig E. Nelson, PhD, Professor Emeritus of Biology at Indiana University, will give a talk on “Fostering Critical Thinking in Healthcare & Biomedical Sciences.”He also serves as a faculty development consultant.

Click for more information

Contact:     Email: Carol McCoggins     For: Academy of Master Teachers     Phone: 409.747.0203

HOSPITAL/CLINICS

• Epic Upgrade Notice to All Users 

KEY MESSAGES:

On Saturday, October 9^th, the EPIC system will be unavailable from 10:00 am through 11:30 pm for a software version upgrade.

Clinicians, managers, and department heads must:

• review EMR downtime procedures for their areas,
• anticipate needs while the system is offline for a prolonged period of time, and
• communicate any site / department messages to staff and faculty. 

All users are highly encouraged to take advantage of in-service resources for version 2009, which will be offered through various venues including:

• in-services provided at various departmental meetings
• workflow bulletins that will be distributed through email and on-site
• online training 

Information concerning the available training sessions is available from this web site: http://intranet.utmb.edu/IS/EPICUpgrade/ 

• UTMB Victory Lakes Performs Texas’ First High-Definition CT Scan 

The Specialty Care Center at Victory Lakes has performed the first high-definition coronary angiogram in Texas. UTMB Victory Lakes is the first medical facility in the state to install the GE Healthcare Discovery CT750 HD and joins leading hospitals around the globe with this powerful, high-definition computed tomography technology. Read more

• UTMB To Expand Pediatric Care Services in Galveston County
  Pediatric outpatient center to open this Fall 

UTMB will open a comprehensive outpatient pediatric facility in Fall 2010. The UTMB Health Pediatric Specialty Center at Bay Colony will bring together in one location the majority of off-island UTMB pediatric specialty services, as well as general academic pediatric care.

The 20,000 square-foot facility will be located in League City at 2785 Gulf Freeway South, across the highway from the Specialty Care Center at Victory Lakes and above the UTMB Dermatology Clinic. The location will be the home of cutting-edge diagnostics and treatments for patients, parents and referring physicians, with staff and faculty all specially trained and focused on children.  Read more

2010 PRESIDENT’S CABINET AWARDS RECIPIENTS ANNOUNCED

• Congratulations to the recipients of the 2010 President’s Cabinet Awards, totaling $210,704, for innovative programs that will help advance the university’s patient care, educational and biomedical research missions. This year’s proposals and programs include a library in John Sealy Hospital, a program to help people learn to develop healthier diets and a free exercise group for people with Parkinson’s disease.  The  awards were given to the following individuals.  Click here for details of their projects. 

SCHOOL OF MEDICINE

Faculty

• Leonard E. Swischuk, MD, Professor, Department of Radiology and Director of the Division of Pediatric Radiology, received the Gold Medal award, the highest honor of the American Society of Emergency Radiology (ASER), in recognition of his hard work and dedication to Radiology and the Emergency Radiology journal.  Click here to read a tribute to Dr. Swischuk. 

Students 

• 2010 White Coat Ceremony 

The School of Medicine welcomed the class of 2014 at the annual White Coat Ceremony on Sunday, August 22. Excited first year students donned their white coats in front of family, faculty and friends.. The white coats they receive symbolize entrance into the medical profession. During the ceremony, new medical students pledge to always do their best for their patients.  

• DIG Members Awarded the AOA Medical Student Service Project Award 

The UTMB Dermatology Interest Group (DIG) Galveston President, Lindsey Hunter (MS3), and Vice President, Rebecca Philips (MS4), were awarded $850 by the National AOA Office to continue the very successful AOA Medical Student Service Project, "Stay Shady!" a program for dermatologic awareness and screening for Galveston youth.  This activity will be featured in The Pharos and on the AOA website later this year. The "Stay Shady!" project was initiated in 2008 by the former UTMB DIG Austin President and current PGY-1, Dr. Alison Wiesenthal. 

• 2010 Humanism in Medicine Essay Contest  

Congratulations to Derek Russell, MS4, who received honorable mention in the 2010 Arnold P. Gold Foundation Humanism in Medicine Essay Contest.  Students were asked to draw on their personal experiences and observations to respond to the following: Describe a barrier a physician might face to practicing humanistic patient care. How might this be overcome and what can be learned in the process?  More than 300 essays were submitted.

SCHOOL OF NURSING

Faculty 

• Kathryn Fiandt, DNS, FAANP, Professor and Associate Dean for Clinical Affairs and Graduate Programs, and holder of the Lena Finke Chair of Nursing Arts endowed by Mary Strasburger Cade, was awarded a $1.5 million grant from Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) for her project titled, “Affordable Care Act: Nurse Managed Health Clinics.”  

• Karen O’Brien, RN, PhD, ACNP-BC, Assistant Professor and Jose Mini, RN, PhD, Assistant Professor, in partnership with Galveston College, have received a grant award under the Nursing Innovation Grant Program in the amount of $239,036, for their project titled, “Increasing Clinical Education Capacity Through Advanced Simulation Technology.” 

• Elizabeth Reifsnider, PhD, APRN, BC, Professor and Associate Dean for Research, Elnora (Nonie) P. Mendias, PhD, RN, FNP-BC, Associate Professor and Jesse and Alicia Dunn Professor of Nursing and Distinguished Teaching Professor; and Yolanda Davila, PhD, RN, have been selected to serve as editors for Issue 35.2 of the Family & Community Health Journal. 

• Linda Rounds, RN, PhD, Professor and holder of the Betty Lee Evans Nursing Professorship, has received Notice of Award for the NIH Report, HRSA grant titled, “Culturally Competent Nurses in the Community.” 

• Pamela Watson, RN, ScD, Dean and Professor, Rebecca Sealy Distinguished Centennial Chair, and UTMB Vice President of Education, recently received recognition from the Southern Regional Education Board (SREB) for revising and rewriting document titled, The Americans with Disabilities Act: Revised Implications for Nursing Education Programs.  The revised document is posted on the SREB website.  Dr. Watson serves on the SREB Board of Directors. 

• Appointment of Program Directors 
  
  
  • Linda Rath, PhD, RN, NNP-BC has been appointed as Program Director for the Baccalaureate Program.
     
    
  • Bruce Leonard, PhD, RN, FNP-BC has been appointed as the Program Director for the Masters Degree Program

• Retirement Announcements  
  
  
  • Virginia Brooke, RN, PhD retired August 31, 2010
    . 
  • Shelly Leitch, RN, MSN, CPNP retired September 3, 2010

Students 

• Fall orientation was held on August 18^th and 19^th.  The School of Nursing welcomed 118 traditional BSN students, 40 RN-BSN students, and 125 MSN students.  E-Camp was held on August 20^th for the BSN students. All new SON students attended the Welcome Weekend activities at Moody Gardens on August 20^th.  The Opening Exercises were held on August 30 in the Levin Hall Main Auditorium. 

• Local news stations ran a story recently featuring the nationwide nursing shortage.  Several School of Nursing students were interviewed.  The School of Nursing is one of six educational institutions listed on the Texas Workforce Board vendor list that has signed a participation contract to offer Nursing Education and Placement Program (NEPP) grants for qualified applicants to receive free tuition and books to pursue certification in the LVN, CNA, RN-BSN, and BSN courses.  The applicants must graduate from the School of Nursing by August 2012.  The grant expires in February 2013.  All applicants chosen are encouraged to remain with a participating business partner employer for 6 months for every semester funded. 

• The School of Nursing is pleased to announce that its NCLEX pass rate for the third quarter is 100% for the first time takers.  To date, the SON has only had one first time taker who did not pass the NCLEX examination. 

• The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has announced $159.1 million in grants to health care workforce training programs.  Five of these nursing grants have been awarded to the School of Nursing.  These grants build on the multimedia dollar investments made under the Affordable Care Act and Recovery Act to strengthen and grow our primary care workforce. The grants target three types of programs: nursing workforce development programs; interdisciplinary geriatric education and training programs; and centers of excellence programs for underrepresented minority students.

SCHOOL OF HEALTH PROFESSIONS

Faculty and Staff 

• UTMB recently was awarded a four-year, $800,000 training grant funded by the U.S. Department of Education to prepare licensed physical and occupational therapists to work with infants to school-aged children who have disabilities. The Specialized Training of Occupational and Physical Therapists in Early Intervention and Related Services program (STAIRS), is designed to develop online courses to enhance the professional expertise of licensed occupational and physical therapists working in pediatric settings.  See details. Please direct questions to Christine P. Baker, PT, EdD, Associate Professor, STAIRS Project Director, UTMB, at cbaker@utmb.edu or visit the web site, http://shp.utmb.edu/STAIRS/.

• Dr. Gretchen Stone, Occupational Therapy Associate Professor and Chair, and Carolyn Travelstead Cooper in the Department of Physical Therapy were selected as SHP Stars for July in recognition of their service and commitment to SHP.

Students 

• The School of Health Professions held its commencement on Friday, Aug. 13, at Moody Gardens.   There were a total of 121 graduates, including:  

• 32 with Bachelor of Science degrees in Clinical Laboratory Sciences
• 21 with Bachelor of Science degrees in Respiratory Care
• 28 with Master of Science degrees in Occupational Therapy
• 2 with Master of Science degrees in Physical Therapy and
• 38 with doctoral degrees in Physical Therapy.  

      Dr. David L. Callender, UTMB President, conferred degrees, and Michael Pirkle, who graduated from UTMB in 1997 as an occupational therapist, served as commencement speaker. He earned a Master of Public Health degree from the University of Texas School of Public Health in 2004 and is also the school’s 2010 distinguished alumnus. Mr. Pirkle is Director of Rehabilitation Services at the Memorial Hermann Hospital-Texas Medical Center campus. His research focuses on outcomes in stroke rehabilitation. Graduating students selected Professor Jon Nilsestuen, Chairman of the Respiratory Care Department, as the Grand Marshal.

GRADUATE SCHOOL OF BIOMEDICAL SCIENCES

Faculty  

• New GSBS faculty member, Dr. Rebecca Hester, who joined the Institute for the Medical Humanities as an Assistant Professor in August, received the 2010 Dissertation Award from the Latin American Studies Association (LASA) Latino Studies Section. Her dissertation is "Embodied Politics: Health Promotion in Indigenous Mexican Migrant Communities in California." She will be publicly honored at the LASA conference in October. Dr. Hester earned her doctorate in politics with an emphasis in Latin American and Latino Studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz.  Her research interests include immigration, health and medicine; health disparities and cultural competency; and culture, medicine and the body.  

Students and Postdocs 

• Four Young Investigators Named Kempner Scholars for 2010-2011 

Two of the 2010 PhD graduates and two third-year medical students received Jeane B. Kempner Fellowships for research in 2010-2011. The Jeane B. Kempner Scholars Award Fund was established at UTMB in 1956 with a bequest from Daniel W. Kempner in honor of his wife, and receives ongoing support from the Harris and Eliza Kempner Fund.

The one-year fellowships sponsor stipends for research projects under the supervision of faculty members at UTMB or another accredited academic research institution in the United States. A faculty committee of seven, chaired by Giulio Taglialatela, PhD, Associate Professor in the Department of Neuroscience and Cell Biology, selected the scholars from applicants in the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences and the School of Medicine.

The postdoctoral scholars, who must be within five years of receiving their PhD or MD degrees from UTMB, are: 

• Erin Glynn, PhD, whose project is “Metabolomics Obesity and Insulin Resistance,” will work with Christopher B. Newgard, PhD, Professor of Pharmacology and Cancer Biology at Duke University in North Carolina.
  
  
• Rohit Jangra, DVM, MS, whose project is “Influenza Vaccine Via miRNA-mediated Attenuation,” will work with Benjamin tenOever, PhD, Assistant Professor in the Global Emerging Pathogens Institute at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York.

The medical student scholars, who will take off one year of medical school to complete their projects, are: 

• Patrick  Armstrong, whose project is “Vestibular Functional Testing in Mice,” will work with Tomoko Makishima, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor of Otolaryngology and Neuroscience and Cell Biology at UTMB.
  
  
• Brandon Driver, whose project is “NK Cell Regulation of Macrophage CXCL9/10 Production by Natural Killer Cells,” will work with Edward Sherwood, MD, PhD, Professor of Anesthesiology and Microbiology and Immunology at UTMB.
  
  
• Community of Scholars Celebrates 90 New Graduate Students

More than 90 incoming graduate students heard what to expect in the next few years at UTMB from their predecessors and peers, current students in the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, and a faculty member at the annual Community of Scholars celebration, August 25.

The Basic Biomedical Science Curriculum enrolled 31, while the degree program with the most new students is PhD Nursing, with 17 nurses seeking doctorates.

Katie Taylor, President of the Graduate Student Organization, welcomed everyone to the event. Smitha Krishnan, GSO Secretary, led them in the recitation of the Graduate Student Code of Conduct. Frances Valencia, GSO Vice President, presented Community of Scholars pins to the incoming graduate students.

Darren Boehning, PhD, Associate Professor in Neuroscience and Cell Biology and recipient of the 2010 Distinguished Teaching Award from the GSO, was keynote speaker. His remarks, Excelling in Academia, focused on the hard work success requires in completing the degree and dissertation, obtaining a postdoctoral appointment, and ultimately earning a faculty position.

Students who spoke were Mathieu Bakhoum, MD-PhD student in the Neuroscience graduate program; Christof Straub, PhD student in the Biochemistry and Molecular Biology graduate program and Chair of the UT System Student Advisory Council; and Anita Reno, PhD student in the Cell Biology graduate program.

• Hector P. Garcia, MD Award

Two students in the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences received the Hector P. Garcia, MD, Cultural Competence Award for their entries in the 2010 essay competition. Linda Benskin, Doctoral Nursing, received the Garcia award, and Carla Kantara, Cell Biology, received the Garcia honorable mention in ceremonies September 17 at Levin Hall. Ms. Benskin’s essay discussed lessons she learned while growing up in a multicultural family and community and her five-year experience in a remote area of northern Ghana, treating patients and writing a handbook for village health workers, whom she taught. Ms. Kantara, who was born in Lebanon and spent her childhood living in other parts of the world before coming to the United States, discussed how those experiences shaped her life.

• National Postdoc Appreciation Week

National Postdoc Appreciation Week, September 20-24 at UTMB, culminated in a half-day symposium featuring research presentations in the basic research and translational/clinical research categories. Dr. Ediane Silva, Pathology, earned first place in basic research for her presentation, “Regulatory Immune Response in Bovine Vitamin A -Deficient Challenged with M. Bovis.” Dr. Ahmed Al-Mousawi, Surgery, received the top prize in translational/clinical research for “Propranolol Does Not Impair the Benefits of Exercise-Training During Pediatric Post-Burn Rehabilitation.” Second place winners were Dr. Hazem Ali, Obstetrics and Gynecology, basic research, for “Formulation Development and In Vitro Characterization of Solid Lipid Nanoparticles and Polymeric Nanoparticles of Dexamethasone,” and Dr. Monisha Dhiman, Microbiology and Immunology and Pathology, translational/clinical research, for “Role of NADPH Oxidase Derived Reactive Oxygen Species in Progression of Myocarditis During Trypanosoma Cruzi Infection and Chagas Disease.”

RESEARCH - FUNDING OPPORTUNITIES

• New Research Grant Program from the Melanoma Research Foundation 

In collaboration with the Dermatology Interest Group Association (DIGA), the Melanoma Research Foundation (MRF) has opened up a new medical student research grant program. This program provides opportunities and funding for medical students to engage in short clinical or laboratory-based research projects focused on better understanding the biology and treatment of melanoma. Grant awards are $3000. The application process is open now and will close on October 31st. For more information about the grant program, please visit the Melanoma Research Foundation (MRF) website:

http://www.melanoma.org/research/mrf-medical-student-research-grant

• The American-Scandinavian Foundation Announces 2011/12 Award Competition 

Information on grants and awards for educational and cultural exchange opportunities is available for individual applicants, American universities and non-profit organizations. Visit the following web site.  http://www.amscan.org/.   

Sincerely,

Garland D. Anderson, MD
Executive Vice President and Provost
Dean, School of Medicine
Thomas N. and Gleaves T. James Distinguished Chair