Jeffrey B. Matthews, MD, Dallas B. Phemister Professor of Surgery and chair of the Department of Surgery at the University of Chicago Medicine, has been named president-elect of the Chicago Surgical Society.

The Chicago Surgical Society has served as a platform for continuing medical education and the exchange of ideas affecting surgical practice for more than 100 years. In his new role, Matthews will support the Society’s pursuit in hosting educational conferences for practicing and attending surgeons, residents, fellows and medical students in Chicago. Matthews’ term as president begins in 2014. Matthews will succeed Allan Fredland, MD.

“The Chicago Surgical Society brings together our vibrant community of surgeons from Chicagoland’s many outstanding hospitals, independent practices and academic medical centers,” Matthews said. “The camaraderie and intellectual exchange of the CSS is invigorating, and I feel truly honored to follow in the footsteps of so many distinguished leaders of Chicago surgery over the past century.”

Matthews, who has served as chair of the Department of Surgery since joining the University of Chicago Medicine in 2006, is an international authority on the surgical treatment of diseases affecting the pancreas, bile ducts and liver. He also has clinical expertise in the treatment of acute and chronic pancreatitis, bile duct reconstruction, and islet autotransplantation. Matthews has been honored as one of America’s Best Doctors by Best Doctors Inc., since 2006.

Matthews is also a prolific researcher, author, editor and teacher who has published more than 150 original articles, chapters and reviews in high-impact national and international journals. His research endeavors have focused on the cell biology of epithelial transport and barrier functions, and his laboratory has been supported by the National Institutes of Health for nearly 20 years. He has delivered invited lectureships and served as visiting professor to departments of surgery around the globe.

He is a senior director of the American Board of Surgery and has served as President of the Society of University Surgeons and the Society for Surgery of the Alimentary Tract. He also is co-editor in chief of the Journal of Gastrointestinal Surgery and serves on the editorial boards of 12 scientific journals and textbooks.

Matthews completed his medical training at Harvard Medical School and surgical residency at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, including a fellowship in hepatobiliary surgery at the University of Bern in Switzerland. He began his academic and clinical career at Harvard and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. In 2001, he joined the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine as Christian R. Holmes Professor and Chairman of the Department of Surgery. He served in that capacity till 2006, when he joined the University of Chicago Medicine.

“Dr. Matthews is an outstanding surgeon-scientist who has had a broad impact as a clinician, teacher and researcher,” said Kenneth Polonsky, MD, executive vice president for medial affairs at the University of Chicago and dean of the Biological Sciences Division and Pritzker School of Medicine. “I cannot think of a more appropriate role model to lead the Chicago Surgical Society.”

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May 22, 2013

Joseph J. Ceithaml, PhD, dean of students emeritus for the Pritzker School of Medicine and the Biological Sciences Division and professor emeritus of biochemistry and molecular biology at the University of Chicago, died on Saturday afternoon, May 11. He was 96.

Ceithaml served as dean of students in medicine and the biological sciences from 1951 to 1986, shepherding the academic careers of 2,914 future physicians and 1,460 research biologists. He was a central figure in shaping the character of medical and biological education at the University, building the medical school’s national reputation and attracting many of the nation’s best and most well-rounded students to the program.

He also was influential at the national level in efforts to expand the pool of applicants for medical schools. He fought the idea that the standard biology-based “pre-med” curriculum was a prerequisite and sought students with diverse interests, origins and socio-economic backgrounds. When he became dean of students, half of all medical students came from families with incomes in the top fifth of the population. Changing that meant funding need-based scholarships.

“Dean Ceithaml made it possible for thousands of students to develop into outstanding doctors and scientists, and he was firmly committed to ensuring that students received financial aid, thus allowing more flexibility in their career decisions,” said Holly Humphrey, MD, current dean for medical education at the University of Chicago. “He was a kind and generous man who placed student well-being at the top of his priority list.”

Ceithaml was a tireless advocate for students, helping them progress through their medical education without amassing huge debts. He grew the medical school’s no-interest loan fund program from $25,000 in 1951 to more than $6 million in 1986. The Ceithaml Scholarship, named in his honor, funds the medical education of many students each year and continues to expand.

“Dr. Ceithaml was one of the most revered student deans in the country,” said Norma Wagoner, PhD, who became dean of students soon after Ceithaml stepped down. “He served as a mentor to many, and was the most important mentor in my own life. He was one of a kind.”

During his 35 years in the dean’s role, Ceithaml developed the Medical Scientist Training Program at the University, obtaining federal funding in 1967 for what would become one of the leading programs in the country. He implemented the medical school’s pass/fail system. He also helped develop the centralized American Medical College Application Service through the Association of American Medical Colleges.

“He was the kind of person you would want to have with you in tough times,” said his friend, cardiologist Louis Cohen, MD, professor emeritus of medicine at the University of Chicago and a former member of the admissions committee. “He was dependable, loyal, reliable and incorruptible. No one ever bought their way into this medical school.”

Ceithaml’s family can vouch for that. When his son, Eric, now chief of pediatric cardiovascular surgery at the University of Florida at Jacksonville, was looking at medical schools, his father told him: “Don’t even apply here. You won’t get in. Your grades are not good enough.”

“He did put in a good word for me at another medical school,” Eric said. “He was strict and he had high expectations, but he was always supportive, always there for us. If you had a problem or a challenge, he would help you sort it out. That’s why so many med students loved him unconditionally.”

His daughter, Lenore, who practices immigration law in San Diego, said the University and the medical students were like a second family to him. “He kept in touch with them after graduation and remembered all their names and details about their lives,” she said. “He left quite the legacy.”

Colleague Frank Fitch, MD, professor emeritus of pathology and a former member of the admissions committee, lauded Ceithaml for his ability to discern the quality of a student applicant.

“Joe had a fantastic talent for recruiting the really good students, a knack for spotting those with tremendous potential even if they had some questionable credentials, and the talent and inclination, almost paternal, to help those who got into difficulties,” Fitch said. “There are not many people around like him.”

Born May 23, 1916, into a family of Czechoslovakian immigrants on the Southwest Side of Chicago, Joseph James Ceithaml graduated from Lindblom High School as valedictorian of his class. He was the first of his parents’ six children to go to college. He entered the University of Chicago in 1933, where he discovered a passion for biochemistry. After graduating in 1937, he entered the biochemistry doctoral program and completed his PhD in 1941, just weeks before Pearl Harbor was bombed. In May 1942, he married Ann Bednarik, a high school friend.

During World War II, Ceithaml worked on a malaria-research project based at the University of Chicago and run by the Office of Scientific Research and Development of the U.S. War Manpower Commission. In 1946, he was named an assistant professor of biochemistry at the University of Chicago. He also worked part time as a pre-med adviser. In 1948, he and his wife left Chicago for a post-doctoral fellowship at California Institute of Technology, where he worked with geneticist George Beadle — who would win the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1958 and become president of the University of Chicago in 1961.

In 1949, after completing his fellowship, Ceithaml returned to the University of Chicago. In 1950, he won the University’s Quantrell Award, the highest honor bestowed upon undergraduate teachers. In 1951, he was named dean of students for medicine and biological sciences. He was promoted to professor in 1958. He retired in 1986 at age 70.

As dean of students, Ceithaml was revered for his in-depth knowledge about every student and for his efforts to help students with academic, financial or personal problems. He tackled similar issues at the national level, serving as chairman of the Association of American Medical Colleges’ committee on medical student financing, from 1961 to 1964, and as vice chairman and chairman of the Group on Student Affairs, 1965 to 1969. He also served on the board of directors of the National Resident Matching Program from 1967 to 1980, during the period when the computerized Match system was implemented.

“Joe and two other student deans founded the Group on Student Affairs at the AAMC,” Wagoner said. “When he spoke, everyone listened, and very few ever refuted anything he had to say. His brilliant, practical, down-to-earth solutions always seemed to be on target. As a result, many of the policies that govern the Group on Student Affairs today initially came from him.”

Among those students who was impacted by Ceithaml: Ted Steck, MD, professor emeritus of biochemistry and molecular biology.

“He was totally committed to the students, the University and his job,” recalled Steck, who was interviewed by Ceithaml when he applied to the medical school and later became Ceithaml’s department chairman. “I should add that he always had the same hair style – a crew cut, flat on top — for all the decades I knew him.”

Ceithaml received several career honors but was particularly proud of the 1982 Gold Key Award, which recognizes outstanding and loyal service to the Biological Sciences Division and to the University of Chicago, and for having the medical student and alumni center named for him, just before he retired.

“His hobbies kept him fit long after he retired,” said Ernest Mhoon, MD, professor of surgery at the University of Chicago. “He played squash, he loved fishing and he enjoyed hiking through the woods looking for mushrooms, which he often shared with my wife and me. We would not ordinarily eat wild mushrooms, but this was Joe Ceithaml. We trusted him.”

Ann, his wife of 43 years, died of cancer in 1985. Ceithaml is survived by his second wife, Mildred, whom he married in 1989, and her son Bob Husa; two children, Lenore and Eric; Eric’s wife Susan; three grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.

Services were private. A memorial service at the University is being planned. In lieu of flowers, donations should be made to the Pritzker School of Medicine: Joseph J. Ceithaml Scholarship Fund, designed to lessen the large debt burden medical students often face upon graduation.

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May 20, 2013

A clinical trial at the University of Chicago Medicine aims to find new ways of preventing type 2 diabetes or slow its progression by treating participants with medications normally used for people who have had full-blown diabetes for at least one year. The trial will enroll individuals who are prediabetic or have been recently diagnosed with diabetes but are not taking drugs to treat the condition.

The Restoring Insulin Secretion, or RISE, Study will examine the effects of three such medications: liraglutide, metformin and insulin. The expectation is that the use of these medications before diabetes has developed will preserve or enhance the body’s ability to produce insulin, the hormone that is crucial to maintain normal blood sugar levels.

The RISE Study is a nationwide program looking at the effects of various treatments on insulin secretion. The University of Chicago is one of three sites recruiting adult patients for the medication trial, along with the VA Puget Sound Health Care System in Seattle and Indiana University.

“The goal is to identify people who are at high risk for diabetes and then treat them for one year with medications to prevent the development of diabetes. We also want to try to determine if people who have had diabetes for less than one year might benefit from treatment with these medications. In both cases, the idea is to see if we can prevent loss or even restore insulin secretion,” said David Ehrmann, MD, professor of medicine at the University of Chicago Medicine and principal investigator on the trial. Eve Van Cauter, PhD, professor of medicine at the University of Chicago Medicine, is a co-investigator on the study.

The trial, sponsored by the National Institutes of Health, is currently recruiting patients. To be eligible, patients must be between 20 and 65 years old, have prediabetes or self-reported type 2 diabetes for less than one year, and must not have taken any medications to treat diabetes in the past. Patients also must be considered overweight or obese.

The investigators have applied for additional funding to add a sleep study to the screening procedures of the RISE trial. They hope to determine whether the presence of a sleep disorder, such as sleep apnea, may reduce the efficacy of drug treatment. The investigators aim to enroll 85 patients who will participate in the trial for 21 months.

More details are available at the National Institute of Health’s ClinicalTrials.gov website, identifier: NCT01779362. The studies conducted are funded by the NIH, Grants # U01-DK094431 and UL1-TR000430.

To participate in the RISE Study or for more information, contact (773) 702-0011.

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May 15, 2013

The University of Chicago is launching the first secure cloud-based computing system that will enable researchers to access and analyze human genomic cancer information without the costly and cumbersome infrastructure normally needed to download and store massive amounts of data.

Until now, researchers authorized by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to analyze The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) had to set up a secure, compliant computing environment capable of managing and analyzing terabytes of data, download the data — which could take weeks — and then install the appropriate tools needed to perform the desired analysis.

The Bionimbus Protected Data Cloud, which is the only NIH-approved cloud-based system for TCGA data, will be equipped with the most commonly used query pipelines and will allow researchers to focus solely on the analysis of large-scale cancer genome sequencing, which experts believe can unlock paths to appropriate treatment, early detection and prevention of cancer.

“Our hope is that the Bionimbus environment will help democratize access to cancer genomics data so that more researchers can fruitfully work with large datasets to understand genomic variations that seem to be one of the keys to the precise diagnosis and treatment of cancer,” said Robert L. Grossman, PhD, principal investigator of the Bionimbus project and professor of medicine at the University of Chicago Medicine.

The Bionimbus Protected Data Cloud continues to add to its current stable of the most widely used sets of cancer DNA from TCGA, including breast, ovarian and prostate.

TCGA is a comprehensive project to improve the understanding of the molecular basis of cancer through the application of genome analysis technologies, including large-scale genome sequencing. TCGA contains data from more than 6,000 cancer patients, spanning 20 different types of cancer. The TCGA is a collaboration between the National Cancer Institute (NCI) and the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), both part of the NIH.

“The Bionimbus Protected Data Cloud provides cancer researchers a simple way to analyze TCGA data without having to become experts at managing big data,” said Kenna Shaw, PhD, director of the TCGA Program Office.

Megan McNerney, MD, PhD, instructor of pathology at University of Chicago, used Bionimbus to analyze data that led to her discovery that gene CUX1, which acts as a tumor suppressor, is frequently inactivated in acute myeloid leukemia.

“Bionimbus was critical for my work, as it was used it for all aspects of the project, including secure storage of protected data, quality control of next-generation sequencing results, alignments, expression analysis, and algorithm development,” she said. “The strength of Bionimbus, however, is the support that is provided for end users, which enabled both expert and non-expert team members to use the cloud.”

The cloud technology for the Bionimbus Protected Data Cloud was developed in part by the Open Science Data Cloud, a National Science Foundation-supported project that is developing cloud infrastructure to manage, analyze and share large scientific datasets.

About the Bionimbus Protected Data Cloud: The Bionimbus Protected Data Cloud is a collaboration between the Open Science Data Cloud and the Institute for Genomics and Systems Biology, the Center for Research Informatics, the Institute for Translational Medicine and the University of Chicago Medicine Comprehensive Cancer Center, all on the University of Chicago campus. The Protected Data Cloud allows users authorized by the National Institutes of Health to compute over human genomic data in a secure and compliant fashion. Currently, selected datasets from The Cancer Genome Atlas are available in the Protected Data Cloud. The Bionimbus project is supported in part by federal funds from the National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health through SAIC-Frederick Inc. and The Frederick National Laboratory for Cancer Research. The Protected Data Cloud also uses technology developed by the Open Science Data Cloud that was supported in part by the National Science Foundation (Grants OISE – 1129076 and CISE 1127316). Any opinions, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NIH, National Science Foundation, or other supporters of the project. For more information, visit bionimbus.opensciencedatacloud.org.

About the TCGA: The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) is a comprehensive and coordinated effort to accelerate the understanding of the molecular basis of cancer through the application of genome analysis technologies, including large-scale genome sequencing. The overarching goal of TCGA is to improve the ability to diagnose, treat and prevent cancer. To achieve this goal in a scientifically rigorous manner, the National Cancer Institute and the National Human Genome Research Institute used a phased-in strategy to launch TCGA. A pilot project developed and tested the research framework needed to systematically explore the entire spectrum of genomic changes involved in more than 20 types of human cancer. For more information, visit cancergenome.nih.gov.

About the Open Science Data Cloud: The Open Science Data Cloud is a petabyte scale cloud to manage, analyze and share large scientific datasets that is managed by the not for profit Open Cloud Consortium. For more information, visit opensciencedatacloud.org.

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May 15, 2013

The University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine is hosting its 67th Annual Senior Scientific Session from 1 to 6 p.m. Thursday, May 16, in the Biological Sciences Learning Center (BSLC 115).

Fourth-year students will present their research and be judged by a panel of 17 faculty members. Typically, nearly one-third of the graduating class participates.

Ten oral presentations will be followed by a poster session featuring an additional 28 student projects. Seven cash prizes for excellence in science and presentation will be awarded.

“This year, in recognition of the culmination of the four year Scholarship and Discovery Program, the range and breadth of what is presented at the annual Senior Scientific Session has been expanded to reflect the diversity of the research that students engage in, ranging from traditional scientific investigation to applied projects in medical education, quality and safety, and global and community health,” said Vineet Arora, MD, MAPP, assistant professor of medicine, leader of this year’s event.

“Due to a generous donation by Charles Pak, SB’58, MD’61, in honor of his mentor, John D. Arnold, MD’46, the first ever Arnold Faculty Awardees will be recognized for their exceptional and sustained contributions to mentoring and professional development of our medical students,” she said.

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May 9, 2013

The University of Chicago Medicine maintained its “A” grade in hospital safety, according to the latest survey of more than 2,500 U.S. hospitals.

The Hospital Safety Score, released Wednesday by non-profit The Leapfrog Group, is an update to last November’s rankings. The University of Chicago Medicine has had an “A” since Leapfrog began regular surveys in June 2012.

Of the 2,514 general hospitals surveyed, 780 earned an “A” while 638 received a “B” rating. Sixteen hospitals were given an “F.” About 74 percent of hospitals maintained the same score from the November 2012 survey.

Illinois ranked 5th in the nation for safety, with 42 percent of hospitals, or 48, receiving an “A.” Maine was the top state with 80% of its hospitals getting an “A” grade.

Leapfrog uses 26 measures of publicly available hospital safety data to produce a single score representing a hospital’s overall success in keeping patients safe from infections, injuries, and medical and medication errors. Data come from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, plus its own survey.

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May 8, 2013

A new, multinational randomized clinical trial has found that patients with severe and enduring anorexia nervosa will not only stick with treatments but also make significant improvements with just a slight modification of the standard goals and methods of treatment.

More than 85 percent of those who enrolled in the trial completed treatment–almost three times the usual retention rate. After eight months of outpatient treatment, patients in both treatment groups reported improved quality of life, reduced symptoms of mood disorders and enhanced social adjustment.

One crucial element of this trial was the decision to reprioritize how the goals of treatment were presented to those enrolled in this study. Treatment of newly diagnosed adolescents and young adults tends to focus on weight recovery. For this study, conducted at the University of Sydney, University of London and University of Chicago, treatment goals were set collaboratively, by the care team and the patient, with less emphasis on weight gain and more on quality of life, reduction of mood disorders, and enhanced social adjustment.

“Our goal was to peel back the negative impact of anorexia and to shift the traditional pressure to gain weight to an emphasis on improving quality of life and overall functioning,” said the study’s lead author Stephen Touyz, PhD, from the Centre for Eating and Dieting Disorders at the University of Sydney. “By refocusing the core of treatment, we were able to engage highly resistant individuals with severe and enduring anorexia nervosa in treatment, circumvent the notoriously high dropout rates and help them make their lives a little better.”

Patients with severe and enduring anorexia nervosa (SE-AN) are notoriously difficult to treat. Most of them develop anorexia as adolescents and do not respond to treatment. Participants in this study had suffered from severe anorexia for at least seven years, with an average duration of illness of more than 15 years.

Anorexia nervosa has the highest mortality rate of any psychiatric disorder. Most individuals with SE-AN have been through multiple unsuccessful treatment episodes. Repeated failure leaves them with low motivation and a self image dominated by illness.

After prolonged malnourishment, many of those with SE-AN are disabled and unable to hold a job. They often suffer from neurocognitive, cardiac or liver problems, as well as osteoporosis. Insurance companies frequently refuse to pay for treatment because so few individuals improve.

This study, published online by the journal Psychological Medicine on May 3, 2013, was the first randomized clinical trial for chronic anorexia nervosa. It compared two standard treatments but modified them in ways that made them more suitable for individuals with such a profound and persistent disorder. The treatments–cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and specialist supportive clinical management (SSCM)–were altered to focus on retention, improved quality of life and to avoid “further failure experiences.”

The researchers enrolled 63 patients, all female, at two clinical centers: at the University of Sydney and St George’s Hospital, University of London. The average body mass index of study participants was 16.2, with a range from 11.8 to 18.5. (Normal BMI ranges from 18.5 to 25.) The University of Chicago served as the data-coordinating center.

Thirty-one patients were assigned to CBT and 32 to SSCM. Both treatments involved 30 outpatient therapy sessions over eight months. Patients were assessed at the end of treatment, with follow-up assessments six and 12 months later.

Results from both treatments were comparable, with significant improvements ranging from “moderate” to “large” on many measures. CBT had a greater impact on eating-disorder symptoms and readiness to change. SSCM produced larger improvements in health-related quality of life and depression. Average BMI for both groups increased from 16.2 to 16.8, about 4 percent.

“The results were far better than most people in the field would have expected,” said Daniel Le Grange, PhD, professor of psychiatry and director of the eating disorders program at the University of Chicago and the principal investigator for the data-coordinating center. “Many of these patients were profoundly ill. The prevailing wisdom is that current treatments have not been effective and patients are best served by refeeding in the hospital setting. This study showed that specific modification of these behavioral approaches could overcome the high dropout rates and lead to meaningful positive change.”

Limitations of the study include a moderate sample size, 63 study participants, and a relatively short follow-up period, 12 months for a disorder that had been present for more than seven years. Despite the limitations, the high retention rate and the magnitude of improvement in most of the outcome measures were very encouraging, especially in the setting of a disorder with poor compliance and limited previous clinical success.

“This study clearly shows that SE-AN patients do respond to, and benefit from, two specialized treatments when done by clinicians with specialist knowledge,” the authors wrote. “This study should provide hope for those suffering from severe and enduring AN as well as stimulate interest in the development of new psychosocial treatment approaches.”

The Australian National Health and Medical Research Council, the NHS Trust (United Kingdom), the Butterfly Foundation (Australia) and the University of Western Sydney funded this study. Additional authors include H. Lacey of St George’s Hospital; P. Hay and B. Bamford of the University of Western Sydney; R. Smith and S Macguire of the University of Sydney; K.M. Pike of Columbia University in New York; and R.D. Crosby of the University of North Dakota. The paper, “Treating severe and enduring anorexia nervosa: a randomized clinical trial,” can be found at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0033291713000949.

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May 9, 2013

The National Cancer Institute (NCI) has renewed the University of Chicago Medicine’s designation as a comprehensive cancer center, a prestigious distinction that the federal agency grants to recognize an institution’s excellence in research.

The University of Chicago Medicine Comprehensive Cancer Center is one of only two NCI-designated comprehensive cancer centers in Illinois — and one of 41 nationwide — to have earned this distinction. This is the second consecutive time the Cancer Center has received a five-year “comprehensive” designation since 2008, when it was awarded its highest NCI review score up to that point. This year, that score was even higher.

In its review, the NCI praised several of the Cancer Center’s major strengths. These include innovative research on epidemiology and the genetic basis of cancer, the molecular mechanisms of transformation, tumor immunology, hematological malignant diseases, and imaging sciences, as well as the innovative clinical trials portfolio and exceptional pharmacogenomics research.

“Designation as a comprehensive cancer center is the highest mark of medical and scientific excellence,” said Kenneth Polonsky, MD, dean and executive vice president for medical affairs. “We are proud of our efforts to remain at the forefront of cancer care for children and adults.”

Comprehensive cancer centers must meet rigorous criteria for “world-class, state-of-the-art programs in multidisciplinary cancer research,” according to the NCI. All NCI cancer centers commit significant resources to research programs, faculty, staff and facilities. They must demonstrate depth and breadth in laboratory, clinical and population-based research, as well as transdisciplinary programs that bridge scientific areas. A comprehensive cancer center also must demonstrate “professional and public education and outreach capabilities, including the dissemination of clinical and public health advances in the communities it serves.”

Grant funding that accompanies the designation supports shared resources for research, provides developmental funds to advance scientific goals, and fosters cancer programs that draw investigators from different disciplines together.

“Our heartfelt thanks goes to the hundreds of faculty, staff, donors and volunteers who helped complete our application for re-designation as a comprehensive cancer center from the National Cancer Institute,” said Michelle LeBeau, PhD, Comprehensive Cancer Center director. “Our application, along with the onsite tour hosted for the NCI review committee, garnered an exceptional report.”

The University of Chicago has been home to an NCI-designated cancer center since 1973, when the federal government set up the cancer center network following the National Cancer Act in 1971. This program was created to recognize the leading clinical and research centers in the country and to help patients find the facilities that offered the most advanced research and treatment.

The University of Chicago has long played a leading role in understanding the basic biology of cancer and developing new treatments. More than 200 physicians and researchers perform groundbreaking research and translate their discoveries into personalized medicine to prevent and treat cancer. The University of Chicago’s Comprehensive Cancer Center offers 320 cancer therapeutic clinical trials, more than any other institution in Illinois.

Cancer Center faculty and staff also bring the latest information on prevention and treatment to community physicians. They educate patients at elevated risk for cancer about prevention and early detection and provide a series of programs for residents of underserved communities.

Patient care and treatment takes place at the University of Chicago Medical Center, where almost 4,000 cancer patients are diagnosed and/or treated annually, and at several off-site locations, including the University of Chicago Medicine Cancer Center at Silver Cross Hospital, which opened last summer.

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May 3, 2013

The University of Chicago Medicine’s Program on Medicine and Religion has selected its second round of faculty scholars whose focus will be on the relationship between a physician’s spirituality and their ability to deal with the pressures of practicing medicine.

“These scholars are poised to deepen and expand scholarship regarding religion and medicine,” said Farr Curlin, MD, associate professor of medicine and co-director of the Program on Medicine and Religion.

There is a growing list of factors contributing to feelings of burnout and dissatisfaction among doctors. Increasing technology, the fragmentation and bureaucratization of care, and the growing pressure to see more patients as remuneration declines are all taking a toll.

In fact, a study done last year, results of which were published in JAMA Internal Medicine, found that almost half of the nearly 7,300 physicians surveyed suffered from at least one symptom of burnout. And physicians on the frontlines, such as those in family, internal and emergency medicine, experienced the most difficulties.

“It’s a little dangerous to look at spirituality as a kind of vaccine against burnout, but it would be valuable to be able to show that physicians who have spiritual practices that help them to reflect on their programs of care are actually protected, to some extent, against the onslaught of what a lot of them are feeling,” said Daniel Sulmasy, MD, PhD, Kilbride-Clinton Professor of Medicine and Ethics in the Department of Medicine and Divinity School and co-director of the Program on Medicine and Religion.

The Program on Medicine and Religion was started last year with a $2.5 million grant from the Templeton Foundation to examine a variety of issues relating to how a doctor’s spirituality impacts their work, how it may affect medical decision-making, and the general role of spirituality in medical practice and education. 

The Faculty Scholars Program is designed to create a growing collection of professionals who will expand scholarship and education of the spiritual and religious dimensions of medicine.

“Is there meaning in healing beyond the outcome and the income?” said Sulmasy, pondering whether there is something transcendental about the doctor-patient relationship that can help physicians find meaning in their work and better deal with the many contradictions in practicing medicine.

“Medicine is inherently paradoxical: a finite craft addressing an infinite need; a universal science dealing with individuals one at a time; and an objective practice addressing subjective experiences. Religions are good at helping us deal with paradoxes,” he said.

The following are the faculty scholars for 2013-15:

Amy Michelle DeBaets, PhD, ThM, MDiv, MA, is an assistant professor of bioethics at Kansas City University of Medicine and Biosciences and is the first osteopath in the program.

Curlin said “DeBaets’ project focuses on the rich history of attention to spirituality within schools of osteopathic medicine, which train a growing proportion of tomorrow’s primary care physicians.”

The hope is that by understanding the roots of the profession, such spiritually can be retrieved and used to help enhance and inform the education of future osteopaths.

“I look forward to contributing to a broader understanding of the place of spirituality in medicine, particularly through studying the history of osteopathic medicine and the unique perspective that tradition provides to the field,” DeBaets said.
 
Warren Kinghorn, MD, ThD, is assistant professor of psychiatry and pastoral and moral theology at Duke University Medical Center and Duke Divinity School.

“Dr. Kinghorn’s project rather adventurously puts Thomas Aquinas into conversation with contemporary psychology in order to better understand the practical challenges faced by physicians, patients, and religious communities as they respond to mental health concerns,” Curlin said.

Kinghorn is seeking to develop a theologically structured program of study that can help clergy administer to the physicians in their congregations.

“The program is for me an unprecedented opportunity to develop more deeply as a theological scholar within medicine, and also to allow my training and identity as a psychiatrist to more deeply inform my theological work,” Kinghorn said.

Elena Salmoirago-Blotcher, PhD, MD, is an assistant professor of medicine in the division of cardiovascular medicine at the University of Massachusetts Medical School.

“Dr. Salmoirago-Blotcher will focus on physicians who are at high risk for burnout, to examine how their religious faith and spiritual practices might help to sustain a sense of meaning and purpose in one’s work,” Curlin said.

Lydia Dugdale, MD, is an assistant professor in the section of general internal medicine at the Yale School of Medicine.

She will focus on the inherent difficulties in end-of-life care and examine a range of theological virtues physicians use in treating terminal patients.

“I aim to produce a foundation of published work that draws on theology and philosophy, and to further scholarly conversations about the care of the dying in a manner that supports physicians and patients,” Dugdale said.

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April 25, 2013

Jerome Lowenstein, MD, founder and director of the Program for Humanistic Aspects of Medical Education at New York University, will be the keynote speaker at the Bucksbaum Institute of Clinical Excellence’s second annual symposium on Friday, April 26.

Lowenstein’s address, titled “Shifting Paradigms: The Oldest Art Became the Youngest Science,” will discuss the importance of maintaining humanistic thinking in an increasingly complex science-based medicine. The symposium also will highlight work by the institute’s scholars and underscore its ongoing commitment to strengthen the doctor-patient relationship and enhance communication and decision-making through research and education.

A distinguished physician-scientist as well as an accomplished medical humanist and prolific author, Lowenstein started New York University’s program in 1979. His goal was to encourage medical students to examine their clinical experiences at a time when education was increasingly focused on the extraordinary achievements of the past 50 years.

“Our keynote speakers are distinguished physicians who have made major contributions in the areas of doctor-patient relationship, improving patient care and bringing humanism to medical practice,” said Mark Siegler, MD, the Lindy Bergman Distinguished Service Professor of Medicine and executive director of the Bucksbaum Institute.

Following Lowenstein will be Arnold Gold, MD, professor of clinical pediatrics and neurology at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons and founder of the Arnold P. Gold Foundation, which seeks to place people and relationships at the center of every health care interaction and to improve patient care and outcomes by training doctors in the “habit of humanism.”

The afternoon event also includes research presentations from the Bucksbaum Institute’s faculty and students scholars, including Ross Milner, MD, Bucksbaum’s inaugural Master Clinician. Bucksbaum announced earlier this month that Michael Bishop, MD, professor of medicine and director of the Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation Program, will be the institute’s second Master Clinician, joining Milner.

The winners and runners-up in the 2012/2013 Pritzker Poetry Contest — Lindsay Poston (MS1), Gini Fleming, MD, Julia Mosqueda and Sandra Shi (MS3) — will read their poems during the program.

Presentations by the Bucksbaum’s scholars include:

• “Potential Roles for the Master Clinicians and Senior Faculty Scholars in the Bucksbaum Institute,” Ross Milner, MD (Department of Surgery)
• “Engineering Patient-Oriented Clinic Handoffs (EPOCH),” Amber Pincavage, MD (Department of Medicine)
• “Endometrial Cancer Survivorship: A qualitative approach to understanding healthy lifestyle change in African American endometrial cancer survivors and their support network,” Nita Lee, MD (Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology)
• “Operationalizing the Virtues for Good Doctor-Patient Relationships,” John Yoon, MD (Department of Medicine)
• “Psychiatric Disorders, High-Risk Behaviors, and Chronicity of Homelessness in Chicago Youth,” Anne Lauer, MS2 (Pritzker School of Medicine)
• “Prognostication in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit,” Elizabeth Rhinesmith, MS2 (Pritzker School of Medicine)
• “Shared Decision-Making Preferences and Behaviors Among Hispanic and Non-Hispanic White Patients with Diabetes,” Robert Sanchez, MS2 (Pritzker School of Medicine)

The program wraps up with an advisory board panel discussion featuring:

• Jordan Cohen, MD, professor of medicine and public health, George Washington University, and president emeritus of the American Association of Medical Colleges
• Laura Roberts, MD, chairman of the department of psychiatry and behavioral sciences, Stanford University
• Arthur Rubenstein, professor of medicine, former dean and EVP for the Health System (2001-11), Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania

The symposium will be held 12:30 to 5 p.m. in Room 115, Biological Sciences Learning Center, 924 E 57th St. For questions or to RSVP, please call (773) 702-3247.

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WHAT: Free webinar titled “From ‘Pathological Gambling’ to ‘Gambling Disorder’: Changes to the DSM-5,” held by the National Center for Responsible Gaming (NCRG)

WHO: Jon E. Grant, MD, JD, MPH, professor, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience, University of Chicago Medicine

WHEN: 1 to 2 p.m. (CDT) Wednesday, April 24, 2013

HOW: To register, go to the NCRG website at ncrg.org and click on “Webinars” under the “Public Education and Outreach” tab then follow to “Upcoming Sessions”. Or, click here to go directly to the registration page.

In one of the most anticipated events in the mental health field, the American Psychiatric Association will release the latest version of its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) next month, involving changes to a number of categories and diagnoses.

One of the bigger changes will be the reclassification of gambling as a disorder and its shift into a new category called “Addictions and Related Disorders,” putting it together with more commonly known substance-related addictions.

Jon E. Grant, MD, JD, MPH, professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience, will explain the changes in classification, the new name of the disorder, and the number of symptoms required for a diagnosis during a free webinar offered by the National Center for Responsible Gaming (NCRG) on Wednesday.

He also will explore a key question: Will insurance companies have to cover treatments once gambling is classified as an addiction? Currently, there is a patchwork of differing policies and coverage.

“The significant change in the classification of gambling recognizes the severity of the problem, and will force important discussions about how effective treatments will be funded now that gambling is recognized as an addiction,” said Grant, one of the country’s preeminent researchers into gambling and other impulse-related disorders. Grant is the principal investigator at the NCRG Center of Excellence in Gambling Research at the University of Chicago, one of only two in the country, which was opened earlier this year through a three-year grant from the NCRG.

Gambling has become a major issue in Illinois as the state seeks ways to plug its gaping budget hole with new sources of revenue. But proposals to expand gaming in the state have been met with resistance from a variety of critics who question the impact on the health and welfare of the state and its citizens.

“These changes in DSM-5 toward gambling give us hope that people suffering from this affliction, and other impulse-related disorders, may now begin to get the type of treatment they need,” Grant said.

The webinar will be moderated by Christine Reilly, senior research director at the NCRG.

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Wednesday, April 17, 2013

A new study looking at the genomes of more than 1,500 patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, a rare and devastating lung disease, found multiple genetic associations with the disease, including one gene variant that was linked to an increase in the risk of death.

The study, released early online in The Lancet Respiratory Medicine, showed that a variant in a gene called TOLLIP was associated with an increased mortality risk. That variant resulted in decreased expression of TOLLIP in the lungs of patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF).

Because TOLLIP, also known as toll interacting protein, plays a role in regulating immunity to certain stimuli, this novel finding suggests that an abnormal immune response, possibly to infectious agents or even environmental injury, may be central to the disease.

Curiously, the version of TOLLIP that appears to prevent onset of the disease was also the variant that increased the risk of death in patients who did develop IPF.

“Our initial genome-wide study revealed 20 genetic loci that may be associated with this disease,” said lead author Imre Noth, MD, professor of medicine and director of the Interstitial Lung Disease Program at the University of Chicago. “A more focused investigation showed that four of these play a crucial role.”

The researchers confirmed one previously implicated gene tied to disease onset and, more important, found the new genetic locus that appears to play a role in both onset and mortality.

The results “change our perception of the importance of genetics in IPF,” Noth said. “Preliminary work, looking at multiple variants of different genes, may allow us to predict the risk of death in IPF patients, which can vary according to their genetics up to 6.5 fold. This would be a powerful prognostic test.”

Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis affects about 150,000 people in the United States, usually after age 50. It causes progressive scarring of the lungs, which leads to increasing difficulty with breathing. For most patients, this leads to death, usually within three to five years. The only effective therapy is a lung transplant.

“The finding that one of the TOLLIP gene variants is reproducibly linked to higher mortality in IPF patients has significant implications for patient management,” noted co-senior author Naftali Kaminski, MD, professor of medicine, Division of Pulmonary, Allergy and Critical Care Medicine, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, and director of UPMC’s Dorothy P. and Richard P. Simmons Center for Interstitial Lung Disease.

“If an IPF patient has this variant, we might want to consider lung transplantation early in the course of the disease,” he said. “It’s not an ideal treatment, but it saves lives. We might be able to use the genetic markers to reveal who might need a transplant quickly, and to stratify patients for research.”

One way to learn more about a complex disease such as IPF is through large-scale studies to search for genetic variations that are more common in those with the disorder. In many cases, the results of a single study are not replicated.

To address this concern, the multi-institution research team looked for links between genetic markers and IPF in three separate cohorts of patients. The results were consistent in all three groups, highlighting the reproducibility of the results that could now provide investigators with a better understanding of what causes IPF.

“The findings of this study open new avenues for IPF research” noted co-senior author Joe G.N. Garcia, MD, professor and director of the Institute for Personalized Respiratory Medicine at the University of Illinois at Chicago and vice president for health affairs at the University of Illinois Hospital & Health Sciences System. “Researchers can now focus on understanding the role of the variants found in humans, and drug companies can assess whether they already have drugs that affect these pathways, thus shortening the lag to new therapeutics.”

“IPF is a relentless disease for which we have no effective therapies to control or reverse the progressive scarring that leads to the untimely deaths,” added James Kiley, PhD, Director of the Division of Lung Diseases at the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, part of the National Institutes of Health, which partially funded this study. “Insights from basic research like this are what we need to develop therapies that target the underlying disease process.”

The paper, “A Genome-wide Association Study Identifies Novel Genetic Variants in Association with Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis Susceptibility and Mortality,” will be published in the May issue of The Lancet Respiratory Medicine. Funding for the study was provided by the National Institutes of Health as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the Pulmonary Fibrosis Foundation, the Coalition for Pulmonary Fibrosis grants, the Dorothy P. and Richard P. Simmons Endowment for Pulmonary Research, the Balbach Fund, the Spanish National Health Institute and the European Regional Development Funds.

Additional authors include Shwu-Fan Ma, Mathew Barber, Yong Huang, Steven Broderick, Rekha Vij and Dan Nicolae from the University of Chicago; Yingze Zhang, Joseph Scuirba, Thomas Richards and Brenda Juan-Guardela from the University of Pittsburgh; Meilan Han and Fernando Martinez from the University of Michigan; Michael Wade from the University of Illinois at Chicago; Carlos Flores from the Instituto de Salud Carlos III, Madrid; Karl Kossen and Scott D. Seiwert from InterMune, Inc., Brisbane, Calif.; Pirro Hysi from Kings College, London; and Jason Christie from the University of Pennsylvania.

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April 15, 2013

Janet Davison Rowley, MD, the Blum-Riese Distinguished Service Professor of Medicine, Molecular Genetics & Cell Biology and Human Genetics at the University of Chicago, is one of three physician-scientists who will receive the Albany Medical Center Prize in Medicine and Biomedical Research for 2013.

The prize, one of the largest for medicine and science discoveries in the United States, honors those “whose landmark research helped transform the treatment of cancer,” according to a release from the Albany Medical Center. The prize will be awarded during a celebration on May 17 in Albany, N.Y.

Rowley will share the prize with Peter C. Nowell, MD, Harnwell Professor Emeritus, Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania; and Brian J. Druker, MD, Director of the Knight Cancer Institute and Associate Dean for Oncology, Oregon Health and Science University. The three recipients will divide the $500,000 award.

They were chosen for their groundbreaking research that led to the development of a new generation of highly focused cancer drugs, beginning with imatinib (Gleevec) for chronic leukemia.

“These individuals exemplify the extraordinary impact that painstaking research can have on the lives of countless individuals,” said James J. Barba, president and chief executive officer of Albany Medical Center and chairman of the National Selection Committee. “These visionary scientists have advanced our understanding of cancer, vastly improved our ability to treat this devastating disease and given hope to so many around the world.”

Most conventional treatments for cancer have been based on the ability to kill rapidly dividing cells. A series of discoveries by the prize winners led to a more precisely targeted medication, designed to interfere with the specific proteins that cause rapid multiplication of the cells seen in chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML), but without damaging healthy cells.

The four-decade sequence of breakthroughs that led to imatinib began in the 1960s when two Philadelphia researchers, Peter Nowell and David Hungerford, found that patients with CML had an abnormally small chromosome 22 in their tumor cells. They called this the “Philadelphia chromosome.”

In 1973, using newly developed methods for visualizing distinct segments of chromosomes, Rowley showed that chromosomes from CML cells did not lose genetic material. Instead, one end of chromosome 22 had been exchanged for a piece of chromosome 9. Because of this transfer from one chromosome to another, important genes that regulate cell growth and division were no longer located in their normal position, a phenomenon she labeled a translocation. The result was the uncontrolled cell growth of cancer. Rowley has described similar exchanges in several types of leukemia.

“Janet Rowley is a visionary,” said her colleague, Michelle LeBeau, PhD, professor of medicine and director of the University of Chicago Medicine Comprehensive Cancer Center. “Her pioneering work led to the recognition that cancer is caused by genetic changes that confer new properties to cells, such as uncontrolled growth, and forms the basis for the development of today’s most promising targeted therapies.”

Scientists used Rowley’s 9;22 translocation discovery as a roadmap to narrow the search for specific genes that were disrupted by this process. In the 1990s, Druker and colleague Nicholas Lydon, PhD, began a collaboration that produced a drug, initially known as STI-571, later named imatinib. They showed that it exerted powerful effects against CML cells.

During the clinical trials, nearly all CML patients saw their white blood counts return to normal in a matter of weeks with little or no side effects. The trials were so successful that they resulted in the fastest approval by the Food and Drug Administration in the U.S. agency’s history.

Since Gleevec was approved by the FDA in 2001 to treat CML, it has proved effective against other forms of cancer, including pediatric CML and gastrointestinal stromal tumor. Gleevec’s success has led to the development of dozens of other FDA-approved targeted therapies. More are in clinical trials.

The Albany Medical Center Prize was established in 2000 to honor scientists whose work has demonstrated medical value of national or international importance. A $50 million gift commitment from the Marty and Dorothy Silverman Foundation provides for the prize to be awarded annually for 100 years. Five Albany Prize recipients have gone on to win the Nobel Prize.

In 2012, Rowley, who has received many honors, shared the 2012 Japan Prize for Healthcare and Medical Technology with Druker and Lydon.

For more detailed biographies and downloadable photos of this year’s recipients and more information on the Albany Medical Center Prize in Medicine and Biomedical Research, go to: www.amc.edu/Academic/AlbanyPrize.

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April 13, 2013

Pictured from left to right: Karen and Jim Frank, president and CEO of Wheels Inc., and Carole and Gordon Segal, the founders of Crate & Barrel

Two major gifts will build momentum behind the University of Chicago’s leadership in biomedical computation by assembling experts in the field and furnishing them with the tools to use “big data” to understand disease and solve today’s health-related challenges.

These two gifts will fund related projects that are central to a much larger plan at the University that includes multiple data-driven discovery programs to improve health and medical care.

The gifts were announced at an April 8 gathering of local corporate leaders hosted by Margot and Tom Pritzker, chairman and CEO of The Pritzker Organization, at the Park Hyatt Chicago. Pritzker, a University board trustee, organized the dinner meeting to boost corporate awareness of big-data biomedical research and to discuss how this work could become a regional economic engine.

The Gifts
Karen and Jim Frank, president and CEO of Wheels Inc., pledged $10 million. This includes $9 million to provide start-up funds and recruit a director for a proposed Institute for Computational Biology and Medicine and $1 million to support growth in orthopedics. This institute will serve as a hub for the collection, analysis and distribution of biomedical and health care information, ranging from genomic data to de-identified electronic medical records.

Carole and Gordon Segal, the founders of Crate & Barrel, made a substantial pledge to support the Pancreatic Cancer Genomic Medicine Initiative, which will use genetic information to improve assessment, decision-making and treatment for pancreatic cancer patients. The goal of the program is to discover gene-based biomarkers that can predict outcomes, estimate treatment toxicities, speed discovery of new drugs and create a model that could be reproduced at academic medical centers across the nation.

“These generous gifts enable us to take a major step forward in realizing the promise of data collection and analysis on a massive scale, and bringing the discoveries it yields into the day-to-day practice of medicine,” said Robert Zimmer, president of the University of Chicago, who spoke about the institution’s strategic vision as a place for translational discovery.

Kenneth Polonsky, MD, executive vice president for medical affairs at the University of Chicago and dean of the Biological Sciences Division and Pritzker School of Medicine, who also spoke at the event, believes the medicine community needs to understand complex data in order to identify opportunities for new advances.

“Our vision is to define disease at the genetic and molecular level with much greater specificity than is currently available,” Polonsky said. “This will improve our ability to predict, prevent, diagnose and treat different subsets of disease that, in many cases, we currently lump together. It will require access to gigantic data sets, innovative manipulation of those data, and vast computing power.”

The Projects
The Institute for Computational Biology and Medicine will bring together experts from many aspects of biology who are devoted to data-intensive biomedical discovery. Researchers in the institute will strive to invent new methods of extracting biomedical information from large, varied data sets. These data sources will allow them to generate fresh hypotheses about health and disease, the evolution of biological form and function, and the intricate relationship of organisms to each other and their environment.

By enabling researchers to test these ideas through statistical analysis, computer modeling and simulation — which are faster and more cost-effective than experimental testing — the institute will accelerate the development of biomedical knowledge and, in the long run, transform the practice of medicine.

“We are delighted to support the initiative that Dean Polonsky has identified as one that is core to the direction of many of our research initiatives and one that has the potential to revolutionize the direction of medical research” said Jim Frank, a trustee of the University of Chicago Medical Center since 1992.

“This is a bold and inspiring approach to uncovering new knowledge,” he added. “The outstanding experts on computational biology who already work at the University of Chicago will be able, with support of the new institute, to leverage their knowledge and take us to the next level of discovery.”

The pancreatic cancer initiative is more tightly focused, using genomic and physiological data to improve care for patients with this disease. The Segals’ motivation to fund this effort was personal. Last winter, within about three weeks, two of their good friends were diagnosed with advanced pancreatic cancer.

“We were surprised that this happened so suddenly to two of our closest friends,” said Gordon Segal, a University of Chicago Medical Center board trustee. “But we were astonished to discover how little is known about this kind of cancer.”

What came as an added shock, Segal said, was finding out that treatment for patients with advanced disease has not significantly improved in 20 years. About 80 percent of pancreatic cancers spread beyond the organ by the time of diagnosis; life expectancy for such patients is measured in months.

So, the Segals turned to a friend, Kevin White, PhD, the James and Karen Frank Family Professor of Human Genetics and director of the Institute for Genomics and Systems Biology (IGSB) at the University of Chicago and Argonne National Laboratory.

White already was working with collaborators Kevin Roggin, MD, associate professor of surgery, and William Dale, MD, professor and chief of geriatrics and palliative medicine, to use the genetics of pancreatic cancer to guide clinical practice. Thanks to the Segals’ gift, the pancreatic-cancer effort will sequence the genomes of tumors from up to 225 patients from the University of Chicago Medicine-NorthShore University HealthSystem pancreatic cancer program over the next three years. The team has so far sequenced genomes from more than 30 pancreatic cancer patients.

That data will be compared with genetic sequences of thousands of tumors already collected by the National Cancer Institute (NCI), including more than 500 pancreatic cancers. It will be cross-referenced with physical and functional, as well as cognitive and psychological, information collected from patients during their care.

That information, offering a panoramic view of pancreatic cancer, will be subjected to intensive computation using the Bionimbus Cloud, developed by White and IGSB colleague Robert L. Grossman, PhD, professor of medicine and Computation Institute Senior Fellow.

“The goal is to generate actionable clinical information that can inform the care of patients and fuel advances,” White said. “This is an opportunity to jumpstart a genome-guided approach to treatment.”

Working with Argonne National Laboratory, the University of Chicago has the assets to become a biomedical big-data hub. Together, they have experts in human, statistical and evolutionary genetics. The Computation Institute has extensive experience with huge data sets and is moving into biomedical issues. Campus-based efforts such as the IGSB and the Conte Center use computational data-mining to understand genetic networks. Argonne is home to the Beagle, one of the world’s most powerful computers devoted to biomedical research.

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April 11, 2013

Doriane Miller, MD, has been appointed to serve a one-year term on the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) Advisory Panel on Addressing Disparities. Miller is an associate professor of medicine at the University of Chicago and specializes in general internal medicine. She is widely known for her expertise in community-engaged research.

Researchers at PCORI, a non-profit organization authorized by Congress in 2010, work to provide the best available information to help patients and their health care providers make more informed decisions. PCORI’s research is intended to give patients a better understanding of the prevention, treatment and care options available, and the science that supports those options.

Miller will represent patients, caregivers and patient advocates on the Advisory Panel on Addressing Disparities. She was selected from among more than 1,000 applicants for one of PCORI’s four advisory panels, which correspond to the organization’s priorities: addressing disparities; assessing prevention, diagnosis and treatment options; improving health care systems; and advancing patient engagement. Each panel has 21 members representing different health care sectors.

“I am honored to be elected to the PCORI health disparities panel,” Miller said. “The University of Chicago has a strong tradition of community-based scholarship and patient-centered care.”

In addition to her clinical duties at the University of Chicago Medicine, Miller serves as the director of the Center for Community Health and Vitality, as well as a co-leader for the Institute for Translational Medicine’s Community Engagement Cluster. In these roles, she has conducted groundbreaking community outreach on the topic of neighborhood violence. One of her more high-profile projects, a theatrical production titled, “It Shoudda Been Me,” uses actors to communicate the effects of neighborhood violence on today’s youth.

“As a member of the PCORI Advisory Panel on Addressing Disparities, I will have the opportunity to share best practices and lessons learned from 25 years of experience in working in under-resourced communities of color,” Miller said. “My participation on the advisory panel will allow me to help inform a national conversation on research funding priorities to address health disparities.”

By Shanna Williams

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April 9, 2013

The Bucksbaum Institute for Clinical Excellence has named stem cell transplant specialist Michael Bishop, MD, as its second master clinician.

The three-year appointment is designed to mentor faculty and student scholars in ways to improve crucial doctor-patient communication skills and clinical care — hallmarks of the Bucksbaum Institute.

“I’m significantly humbled by even being considered for this position,” said Bishop, professor of medicine and director of the Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation Program.

The criteria for selection include being an active clinician, demonstrating superb clinical judgment and outstanding patient care skills, taking a compassionate and humanistic approach to medicine, and being a physician who puts patients and their families first.

The Bucksbaum Institute began in 2011 with a $42 million endowment gift from the Matthew and Carolyn Bucksbaum Family Foundation. The goals of the institute are to improve patient care, strengthen the doctor-patient relationship and enhance communication and decision-making between patients and physicians.

“We thought that Dr. Bishop represented all of those mission goals,” said Mark Siegler, MD, the Lindy Bergman Distinguished Service Professor of Medicine and Surgery and executive director of the Bucksbaum Institute. “His commitment to patients and his field of work were such that he is a wonderful choice.”

Bishop came to the University of Chicago in November 2012 from Medical College of Wisconsin/Froedtert Hospital in Milwaukee, where he was a professor of medicine and head of the adult hematologic malignancies section. Prior to that, he spent more than a decade at the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, Md., where he served as clinical head of the experimental transplantation and immunology branch of the NCI’s Center for Cancer Research.

Bishop is nationally known for his commitment to patients with difficult-to-treat diseases, those with advanced lymphoma, and patients who have not responded to first-line treatments or have relapsed.

Bishop and his team are also working to address the unique social, economic and physiological issues of patients facing stem-cell transplantation, including the elderly, who often lack an effective support system and can have differing outcomes.

“I believe physician-patient communication is an imperative,” said Bishop, adding he has been focused on building a strong relationship with his patients his whole career. “I have always involved my patients in the decision-making process.”

Bishop noted the nature and duration of cancer treatment produces enduring and strong bonds between doctor and patient.

“Once you go through a bone marrow transplant, you are with that patient for life,” he said, adding he recently received a personal letter and photo from a patient celebrating her 10th wedding anniversary on a skiing trip with her husband.

While he has been lauded for his teaching skills and commitment to patient care, Bishop also will bring a new dimension to the Bucksbaum’s core mission.

“It’s very important for physicians to be able to communicate effectively with other physicians,” he said. “That’s important to improving patient outcomes.”

In oncology, Bishop said there are often many doctors involved in a patient’s care, and they need to communicate with each other in order to assess if specific treatment options would work given the nature of the patient and the illness.

He looks at what he does as “personalized medicine,” a description usually used to refer to tailoring treatments based on a patient’s genetic makeup.

“Every patient is unique, and you can’t lump them in together,” he said, emphasizing that oncologists must work effectively with family doctors and other health care professionals to maximize the patient’s chances for recovery.

Bishop joins vascular surgeon Ross Milner, MD, an authority on aortic aneurysms and co-director of the Center for Aortic Diseases, as one of the first two Bucksbaum Institute Master Clinicians. Milner was appointed last autumn.

The Bucksbaum Institute also named its second set of 12 senior faculty scholar appointees for 2013-14. They are:

• Halina Brukner, MD, Department of Medicine
• Linda Druelinger, MD, Department of Medicine
• Scott Eggener, MD, Department of Surgery
• Savitri Fedson, MD, Department of Medicine
• H. Barrett Fromme, MD, Department of Pediatrics
• Melissa Gilliam, MD, MPH, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology
• Nora Jaskowiak, MD, Department of Surgery
• William McDade, MD, PhD, Department of Anesthesia and Critical Care
• Sonali Smith, MD, Department of Medicine
• David Song, MD, Department of Surgery
• Christopher Straus, MD, Department of Radiology
• Monica Vela, MD, Department of Medicine

The senior faculty scholars are outstanding clinicians, teachers and mentors and personify the mission of the Bucksbaum Institute. They will work with and help train and advise Bucksbaum Institute student, junior faculty and associate junior faculty scholars.

In a separate announcement, the Bucksbaum Institute will host its second annual symposium from 12:30 to 5 p.m. Friday, April 26, at the Biological Sciences Learning Center, at 924 E. 57th St.

The keynote lecture will be given by Jerome Lowenstein, MD, professor of medicine and the founder and director of the Program for Humanistic Aspects of Medical Education at New York University. His talk is titled, “Shifting Paradigms: The Oldest Art Became the Youngest Science.”

Also speaking will be Arnold P. Gold, MD, professor of clinical neurology and pediatrics at Columbia University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons and the chairman and founder of the Arnold P. Gold Foundation, established to “promote humanism in medicine.”

The current cohort of Bucksbaum student and faculty scholars will deliver research presentations, plus there will be an advisory board panel discussion. Also, winners of the 2013 Pritzker Poetry Contest will read their work.

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April 10, 2013

University of Chicago Medical Center President Sharon O’Keefe was named one of Modern Healthcare’s Top 25 Women in Healthcare in the magazine’s prestigious biennial awards.

The successful completion of the $700 million Center for Care and Discovery, which opened in February 2013, and her transition from critical care nurse to the upper echelons of hospital administration were among the factors behind her selection, according to Modern Healthcare. She became the medical center’s president in 2011.

“It is gratifying that her talents, which we all know so well, have gained wider recognition,” said Kenneth Polonsky, MD, executive vice president for medical affairs at the University of Chicago and dean of the Biological Sciences Division and Pritzker School of Medicine.

O’Keefe is joined on the list by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius; U.S. Surgeon General Regina Benjamin, MD; Irene Thompson, CEO of University HealthSystem Consortium; Ardis Hoven, MD, president-elect of the American Medical Association; and Risa Lavizzo-Mourey, MD, CEO of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, among others.

“I’m very honored to be considered among such a class of successful women in health care,” said O’Keefe, a nationally recognized authority on hospital operations, health care quality and patient satisfaction. “I feel this recognition reflects the dedication and commitment of the entire University of Chicago Medicine family who work hard every day to ensure the most advanced patient-centric care in the country.”

The Top 25 honor, which was announced Monday, will be presented on Aug. 6 at the Modern Healthcare’s Women Leaders in Healthcare Conference in Nashville, Tenn.

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April 10, 2013

The Center for Interdisciplinary Inquiry & Innovation in Sexual & Reproductive Health (Ci3) at the University of Chicago has received a $500,000 grant from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation to advance its work identifying novel solutions to complex problems affecting health and well-being in vulnerable communities.

The grant will help support the creation of the Design Lab for Game Changer Chicago (GCC), Ci3′s signature initiative to investigate how playing and designing games can promote the social and emotional well-being of youth and improve sexual and reproductive health outcomes.

Officially launched in November 2012, Ci3 unites University of Chicago researchers across multiple disciplines to examine issues surrounding reproductive health, sexuality, and the underlying systems and disparities in access that affect physical, emotional, social and economic well-being over the course of life. Those disciplines include medicine, English, sociology, economics, law, public policy, human development, gender studies, epidemiology, demography, business, neuroscience and psychology. Ci3′s focus lies in five areas: global sexual and reproductive health, which includes family planning; the intersection of child and youth health, development and connected learning; sexual and reproductive decision-making; adolescent and unintended pregnancy; and obesity and its impact on reproductive health.

Game Changer Chicago is among the dawning Ci3 endeavors, predating its formal inception. The initiative’s use of gaming concepts, critical inquiry and storytelling techniques to engage youth in matters of sexual and emotional health has already garnered interest and praise locally and nationally.

During the spring and summer of 2012, students from ChicagoQuest — a charter school on the Near North Side that uses digital technology and gaming as part of its problem-solving culture — play tested a new card game as part of a non-traditional wellness class curriculum. “InFection Four” features four superheroes with social and emotional characteristics that allow players to discuss tools and behaviors that can prove effective against sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and emotional villains such as shame, stigma, and fear.

In another GCC project, other high school participants helped craft the transmedia game “Stork,” a scavenger hunt spanning the physical and virtual world using traditional media, social media, text messaging and the Web to uncover direct or subtle messages around sexual health. That project’s success set the stage for collaboration with ChicagoQuest along with other progressive youth-centered initiatives and groups such as Hive Chicago, the Museum of Science and Industry science clubs, and music icon Lady Gaga’s Born This Way Foundation.

This year GCC will collaborate with Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s office, the Mozilla Foundation and others as part of Chicago Summer of Learning. The group will design a game to be played by youth across the city over a one-month period. As the initiative continues to take shape and expand its reach, the new Design Lab will provide space, support and expertise for research, prototyping and iterative design.

The inspiration for Ci3 came from Melissa Gilliam, MD, MPH, professor of obstetrics and gynecology and pediatrics, chief of the section of family planning and contraceptive research, and associate dean for diversity and inclusion at the University of Chicago Medicine and Biological Sciences Division. Gilliam recognized that many of the problems related to sexual and reproductive health transcend one academic or medical discipline. Game Changer Chicago, she said, is a perfect example of an opportunity to drive social change that wouldn’t have been possible without talent and insight tapped from across campus.

“Games have the power to shape reality,” said Gilliam, Ci3′s director. “We’ve created an incubator for innovation around that notion, and we’re thrilled to have this significant vote of confidence from the MacArthur Foundation.”

She said GCC explores how theoretical questions central to games and digital humanities offer new opportunities to study social systems and structural inequalities in urban communities: “How do we employ these theories to examine behaviors and attitudes around sexual behavior, pregnancy, relationships and contraception? How will these new intersections bring forth fresh insights? How can these insights be best deployed in practice? Will altering the context of creative expression create new approaches toward unconventional strategies for education in a digital age?”

Patrick Jagoda, PhD, assistant professor in the Department of English and co-founder of GCC, is seeing evidence that the game prototypes under way could fill a gap left by traditional sexual education, an approach he feels is failing the nation’s youth.

“Often sex education programs just offer youth information about STIs and contraception,” said Jagoda, a leading scholar on digital storytelling and game theory and design. “We’re going beyond that to think about sexuality in a more networked way — as a system with emotional and social components. Game Changer encourages our youth to shape their learning opportunities around their experiences with sexuality. We give them the tools to engage in world-generating collaborative projects that are based in their own realities.”

The GCC Design Lab builds on previous workshop models and will allow Gilliam, Jagoda and Ci3 staff to house these creative processes in an environment where high school students are joined by graduate and undergraduate fellows who sign on for a year to co-create game prototypes. The youth are quickly introduced to a world with few rules — a relaxed forum for creativity and open, fluid dialogue. One of the main objectives for the program is to make sure the conversation doesn’t end with the workshop. The organizers look to harness principles of “connected learning,” or opportunities to link messages across an adolescent’s learning environments that include home, school, community, popular culture and technology, as well as the influence of peers.

“A lot of this is about relationship building,” said Angela Heimburger, Ci3′s executive director. “We’re looking closely at the ways kids interact with information across sectors and technologies. We’re investigating game play and game design as effective tools to empower kids to think more critically and maybe understand information differently while building other real-life skills. The participants in our workshops have shared powerful stories and posed very thoughtful questions. They’re demonstrating an interest in learning in a different way.”

A beta of GCC’s latest completed project, “Lucidity,” can be found at http://luciditygame.com. The game offers challenging puzzles, videos and engaging narrative. Heimburger said there’s more to come.

“Our goal is for these game prototypes to serve as a model,” she said, “to put something out there that can be used by different people in many different ways, whether it’s in classroom setting, as part of community program or even as a museum exhibit. We don’t want to force any of these concepts into a mold. That would take us back to where we started. Our vision is about breaking molds.”

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March 27, 2013

About 90 percent of children with two copies of a common genetic variation and who wheezed when they caught a cold early in life went on to develop asthma by age 6, according to a study published by the New England Journal of Medicine.

These children, all from families with a history of asthma or allergies, were nearly four times as likely to develop the disease as those who lacked the genetic variation and did not wheeze. The effects of each–the genetic variation and wheezing illness caused by a human rhinovirus infection–are not merely additive but also interactive, the authors say.

The genetic marker studied, a variation on chromosome 17, is common. Half of the children in the study had one copy and 25 percent had two. Colds caused by human rhinoviruses also are extremely common, affecting almost all infants. But the combination of genetic risk plus the wheezing response to rhinovirus infection by children under age 3 was tightly linked to the development of asthma by age 6.

“We found that the interaction between this specific wheezing illness and a gene or genes on a region of chromosome 17 determines childhood asthma risk,” said study author Carole Ober, PhD, Blum-Riese Professor of Human Genetics at the University of Chicago. “The combination of genetic predisposition and the child’s response to this infection has a huge effect.”

Wheezing caused by respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), a more serious but less common childhood infection, did not show this same interaction.

Several genome-wide association studies have linked asthma to genetic variation on a region of chromosome 17, referred to as 17q21. Although this variation applies primarily to early-onset asthma, it still “dwarfs every other asthma-related genetic risk factor,” Ober said.

Exactly how the genes and viral infection interact to cause asthma is unclear. Two genes in the 17q21 region may play a role. One of them, known as ORMDL3, is the “most likely candidate,” Ober said. The protein produced by ORMDL3 is found in the endoplasmic reticulum membrane, the same component of airway cells that rhinovirus uses to makes more copies of itself. Less is known about the function of the second gene, GSDMB.

The researchers studied two carefully monitored cohorts of children from families at high risk for asthma. All of the 200 children in the COAST cohort, based at the University of Wisconsin under the leadership of Robert Lemanske, MD, principal investigator of the project, had at least one parent with asthma, respiratory allergies, or both. They were followed from birth and evaluated for asthma at age 6. The 297 Danish children in the COPSAC cohort were born to mothers with asthma and evaluated for asthma at age 7.

The researchers first investigated the links between genes, wheezing with viral infection, and asthma in the COAST group, in which they found significant interactions. Less than 30 percent of children in this group who lacked the asthma-related genetic marker were subsequently diagnosed with the disease, compared to 40 percent of children with one at-risk allele and 50 percent with two. Children who had two copies of the asthma-related genetic variation also had far more HRV-related wheezing illnesses.

When the researchers combined both factors, the difference was striking. Only about 25 percent of children who had no wheezing illness from HRV developed asthma. About 40 percent of those who wheezed in the first three years of life but lacked the risk-related genes got asthma. That increased to nearly 60 percent for those with one copy of the asthma-related allele and to 90 percent for those with two copies.

Next they sought to replicate that finding in a similar group, but from a different continent. Although the overall asthma prevalence, based on slightly different criteria in the Danish cohort, was lower, the more-than-additive association between the at-risk genotype, wheezing illness in early life and asthma diagnosis persisted.

To see how exposure to HRV altered expression of genes associated with the 17q21 marker, the University of Chicago researchers recruited 100 normal adult volunteers, collected blood from them and exposed immune-system cells from the blood to HRV. The leading suspect, ORMDL3, had the most robust response, more than doubling its presence in exposed cells.

This result suggests that “higher expression of ORMDL3 may increase the efficiency of the infection or viral replication in respiratory epithelial cells,” according to the study’s first author, Minal Çalışkan, a graduate student in Ober’s laboratory.

“This is the site where rhinovirus infection and replication occur,” she explained. “Upregulation of this gene may lessen these cells’ ability to repair the airway after an HRV infection, a feature associated with asthma. Our next project is to look more closely at this process in airway epithelial cells.”

What can parents do to prevent early onset asthma? At this point, “nothing that we know of,” Ober said. Parents can’t prevent their children from catching colds, but “perhaps they could work with their pediatricians to find proactive ways to prevent wheezing in young children with the asthma genotype.”

The National Institutes of Health supported this study, including funding for the COAST cohort. The Lundbeck Foundation, the Danish Council for Strategic Research and the Danish Pediatric Asthma Centre funded the COPSAC research unit. Additional authors include Michelle Stein, Gaixin Du and Dan Nicolae from the University of Chicago; Yury Bochkov, Daniel Jackson, James Gern and Robert Lemanske from the University of Wisconsin; and Eskil Kreiner-Møller, Klaus Bønnelykke and Hans Bisgaard from the University of Copenhagen.

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March 25, 2013

Cancer specialists Janet D. Rowley, MD, and Olufunmilayo I. Olopade, MD, of the University of Chicago have been named to the first class of Fellows of the American Association for Cancer Research Academy.

Rowley, the Blum-Riese Distinguished Service Professor of Medicine, Molecular Genetics & Cell Biology and Human Genetics, was selected for her discovery of recurring chromosomal abnormalities in leukemias and lymphomas — findings that have revolutionized how cancer is understood and treated.

Olopade, the Walter L. Palmer Distinguished Service Professor of Medicine and Human Genetics, associate dean for global health, and director of the Center for Clinical Cancer Genetics, was chosen for her work on the interactions between genetics and environment in the onset of breast cancer in young women of African ancestry and research on the prevention and early detection of breast and ovarian cancer in women at high risk.

The American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) created the Academy to recognize and honor distinguished scientists whose “major scientific contributions have propelled significant innovation and progress against cancer.” They selected the first fellows through a “rigorous peer review process that evaluates individuals on the basis of their stellar scientific achievements” in cancer research. Only individuals who have made exceptional contributions to cancer and/or cancer-related biomedical science are eligible for election.

“Our Board of Directors made the decision to establish the AACR Academy as a mechanism for recognizing scientists whose contributions to the cancer field have had an extraordinary impact. Membership in the Fellows of the AACR Academy will be the most prestigious honor bestowed by the American Association for Cancer Research,” said Margaret Foti, PhD, MD, chief executive officer of the AACR.

The inaugural class of Fellows will be inducted into the AACR Academy on Friday, April 5, in Washington, D.C., prior to the annual meeting of the Academy. It includes 106 individuals, symbolizing the age of the organization upon establishment of the Academy. Future classes of Fellows shall consist of no more than 11 individuals, in honor of the 11 founding members of the American Association for Cancer Research. These Fellows will be elected by vote of all the Fellows of the AACR Academy.

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