CONTACT: Erin Brooks
(850) 645-1512
erin.brooks@med.fsu.edu

By Jennifer Schmidt
October 2004

TALLAHASSEE, Fla.- Florida State University is exploring the intersection of arts and medicine in a research symposium titled “Music, Medicine, & Culture: Medical Ethnomusicology and Global Perspectives on Health and Healing.”

Saturday, Oct. 9, 8:15 a.m. – 4:15 p.m.
Sunday, Oct. 10, 8:30 a.m. – 12:45 p.m.
at the
FSU School of Music

Registration and check-in will be Saturday, Oct. 9, 7:30 a.m., in the Beth Moore Lounge, Longmire Building. The opening and keychord presentations will be in Opperman Music Hall, Kuersteiner Music Building.

Attendees will learn about current and future research methodologies used to investigate interrelationships between culture, music, health/healing, spirituality/religiosity and aging. The symposium will also help create new interdisciplinary networks of scholars for future integrative research.

Presenters include medical and music experts from FSU faculty and from around the country. Medical and health professionals, ethnomusicologists, music therapists, and others with an interest in the intersection of arts and medicine are all welcome.

Select workshops will be interactive, with an opportunity to experience the healing aspect of music firsthand. One such workshop, entitled “Sonic Holograms and Aural Mandalas: Experiencing the Enlivening, Protective and Healing Dimensions of Balinese Gamelan Music,” will allow attendees to perform on hand-crafted gamelan instruments from Bali, India.

Oct. 20, 2004

Access to health care in Gadsden County has taken a great leap forward this fall, thanks to a unique partnership involving two universities, city and county officials, the county health department, a student group and a local nonprofit organization.

The new partnership will celebrate the grand opening of the Gretna Wellness Center on:

THURSDAY, OCT. 21
5 P.M. TO 6:30 P.M.
GRETNA WELLNESS CENTER, 14678 MAIN ST., GRETNA

The center seeks to reduce health disparities in rural, medically underserved communities like Gretna through culturally appropriate primary care, health education, and disease prevention activities that empower residents to take control of their own health.

In 1999, the Gretna Wellness Center began by offering adult primary care services provided by nursing and nurse practitioner students from Florida A & M University through a cooperative agreement with FAMU's School of Nursing, the Big Bend Area Health Education Center and the Gadsden County Health Department.

Now the center and its founders, joined by the City of Gretna and Gadsden County, will offer significantly expanded services through a partnership that includes FSU's College of Medicine and School of Social Work along with Community Medical Outreach Inc., an organization of FSU pre-med students sponsored by Thagard Student Health Center.

This fall, pediatric services will be offered at the clinic for the first time through the medical school's Pediatric Outreach Program.

Medical students and faculty will provide pediatric primary care, funded in part with nearly $70,000 raised by the 2003 FSU Dance Marathon to help local children. Meanwhile, students in Community Medical Outreach have developed a series of Saturday clinics offering health screenings, health assessments, limited primary care and referrals. Nursing and nurse practitioner students and faculty from FAMU will continue to serve the clinic's adult patient population.

Training nursing and medical students as well as those in social work and other health sciences is a key component of the partnership's overall mission to reduce health disparities. By exposing future health care providers from FSU and FAMU to the unique health care needs of rural and underserved communities like Gretna, the coalition helps them to develop culturally competent health care skills and

encourages them to consider future practice at similar sites.

Gretna Wellness Center services are available to all county residents and seasonal farm workers who temporarily reside in the area. The clinic will be open several days a week, and services will be coordinated by referral, when appropriate, to providers from the Gadsden County Health Department, Gadsden Medical Center, or private practitioners, depending upon patient preference, medical needs and availability of health insurance.

To learn more about Thursday's grand opening of the Gretna Wellness Center contact Mehran Heravi, founder and president of Community Medical Outreach: (850) 459-7376 or

mmh3999@fsu.edu

.

CONTACT
Phone: (850) 645-1255

By Nancy Kinnally
October 27, 2004

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - Students, faculty and staff of the Florida State University College of Medicine are moving this week into the medical school's new $60 million building complex on the northwest corner of the FSU campus.

All administrative and faculty offices, research labs, classrooms, and student community rooms, as well as the Medical Library and the Clinical Learning Center, are being relocated from the college's transitional facilities in the former FSU Developmental Research School, also known as Florida High.

The move is expected to take a few weeks to complete. The Medical Library and the Clinical Learning Center begin operating in the new building this week. Classes will be held in the new buildings beginning the week of Nov. 8.

The three-story complex, which is designed to evoke the Jacobean architecture of the historic core of the FSU campus, includes an education and administration building and a research building, and will feature a 300-seat auditorium. The auditorium and a second section of the research building will be built over the next 15 months. When complete, the 300,000-square-foot building complex will enclose a central cloister.

The new medical school complex is designed to accommodate an anticipated full enrollment of 240 first- and second-year students, as well as 50 Ph.D. students.

Third- and fourth-year medical students study at the medical school's regional campuses in Orlando, Pensacola, Sarasota and Tallahassee. Students at all of the medical school's campuses participate in classes together via videoconferencing, and faculty and staff from across the campuses use videoconferencing to meet, plan curricula and conduct training. The new building complex features improved videoconferencing facilities with state-of-the-art equipment.

The medical school's classrooms also feature the latest instructional technology, including wireless Internet access, LCD projectors, digital recording equipment, and digital microscopy.

The FSU College of Medicine currently has 173 medical students in four classes, as well as five Ph.D. students and six post-baccalaureate students.

Tours of the new College of Medicine building complex will be offered to the public beginning in March.

CONTACT
Phone: (850) 645-1255

By Nancy Kinnally
February 4, 2005

 TALLAHASSEE, Fla.- The Florida State University College of Medicine was notified today that it has been granted full accreditation by the Liaison Committee on Medical Education, the nationally recognized accrediting authority for medical education programs leading to the M.D. degree.

Meeting in Washington, D.C., Feb. 2-3, the committee voted in favor of full accreditation after reviewing a report drafted by an ad hoc LCME survey team that visited the medical school in November.

Before full accreditation can be granted to a new medical school, LCME guidelines require such a survey be conducted when the inaugural class is in its fourth year of study. The inaugural class of the FSU College of Medicine is now its fourth year and will graduate May 21.

Accreditation means that national standards for structure, function and performance are met by a medical school's education program.

FSU’s medical school has been provisionally accredited since October 2002. Since that time, all of the rights and privileges that apply to fully accredited medical schools, their graduates and their students, have applied to the FSU College of Medicine.

The FSU College of Medicine is the first new allopathic medical school to be established in the United States in more than 20 years. The population of Florida has more than doubled since 1971, the last time an allopathic medical school opened in the state.

Based in Tallahassee, the FSU College of Medicine provides third- and fourth-year clinical education at regional medical school campuses in Orlando, Pensacola, Sarasota and Tallahassee.

The Florida Legislature created the medical school in 2000 and charged it with educating physicians to serve the state’s rural, geriatric and other medically underserved populations.

CONTACT
Phone: (850) 645-1255
Feb. 25, 2005

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - The Florida State University College of Medicine today dedicated the Charlotte Edwards Maguire Medical Library during the luncheon of the FSU Foundation winter board of trustees meeting. The dedication took place at the newly completed John Thrasher Building. Dr.
Charlotte Maguire is a long-time supporter of FSU and a trustee of the FSU Foundation.

The Charlotte Edwards Maguire Medical Library is the first new medical library created since the rise of the Internet, and 95 percent of its resources are available online, including 2.5 million electronic journal articles. In addition to naming the physical library for Dr. Maguire, the virtual library also has been named for her.

Maguire was the only woman in the 1944 graduating class of the University of Arkansas' medical school, as well as Orlando's first female doctor.
She has been involved with several health organizations as the first female president of the Florida Pediatric Society, a delegate of the World Health Conference in London and the Assistant Secretary of Health and Scientific Affairs for the United States Department of Health, Education and Welfare. Maguire also earned the Distinguished Achievement Commendation Award from London's Two Thousand Women of Distinction.

In an effort to give back to others who are currently studying at the fully accredited FSU College of Medicine, Maguire set up a $1 million endowed scholarship fund that provided 23 medical school scholarships. A recent additional gift of $130,000 from Maguire granted two full-tuition scholarships to the college.

At the dedication, FSU president T.K. Wetherell thanked Dr. Maguire for her support and effort in helping the medical school reach full accreditation. Dr. J. Ocie Harris, dean of the College of Medicine, spoke of the importance of the medical school to the community and recognized students who have received scholarships.

"We are honored to have such a notable individual take such a personal interest in the medical school and its students," Harris said. "Her generous support during the planning stages of the college, and her overall encouragement, was vital to our success."

The FSU College of Medicine, created by the Florida Legislature in 2000, aims to educate physicians who will practice patient-centered medicine and be sensitive to community needs, especially those of the underprivileged. The college has established regional campuses in Orlando, Pensacola, Sarasota and Tallahassee, and plans to develop campuses in Ft. Myers and Jacksonville as well.

The FSU Foundation Inc. is a private, non-profit 501( c ) 3 organization dedicated to raising private gifts to support FSU. The foundation is raising $600 million in the FSU CONNECT campaign to fund programs, facilities, professorships and scholarships for the university. For more information, visit www.FSUCONNECT.com.

CONTACT
Phone: (850) 645-1255
(941) 316-8120

By Tiffany Koenigkramer
March 1, 2005

SARASOTA, Fla.- The Florida State University College of Medicine is opening a regional campus in Sarasota that will be the school's fourth site for third- and fourth-year clinical training.

The public is invited to attend an open house of the FSU Regional Medical School Campus - Sarasota at:

201 Cocoanut Avenue
Thursday, March 3, 2005
12 - 6 p.m.

(The media is invited to come at 11 a.m., when faculty and staff will be available for interviews)

A community-based medical school, the FSU College of Medicine provides clinical training at regional medical school campuses around the state through affiliations with local physicians, ambulatory care facilities and hospitals. In the Sarasota area, the medical school is affiliated with Doctor's Hospital of Sarasota and Sarasota Memorial Hospital.

Beginning in July, nine third-year medical students will begin their clinical training in Sarasota. Four of the nine students are from Southwest Florida, including one from Sarasota, and the rest are from Southeast Florida.

Over the next few years, enrollment in Sarasota is expected to increase to 40 medical students, including 20 third-year students and 20 fourth-year students.

Under the direction of local physicians, these students will do clinical rotations in family medicine, internal medicine, pediatrics, surgery, obstetrics-gynecology and psychiatry. During their fourth-year, students will complete rotations in advanced family medicine, advanced internal medicine, geriatrics and emergency medicine, as well as a variety of electives.

At FSU's other regional medical school campuses, between 150 and 200 local physicians participate in FSU's educational program. As the Sarasota campus grows, it will likely involve a similar number of physicians from the area.
The Sarasota regional campus will be housed in the historic Weissgerber/ Famiglio house. The historic house was moved to its current site and renovated.

The Florida Legislature created the medical school in 2000 and charged it with educating physicians to serve the state's rural, geriatric, minority and other medically underserved populations. The medical school's other regional campuses are in Tallahassee, Orlando and Pensacola.

Initial community board members for the FSU Regional Medical School Campus - Sarasota are: Dr. Adam Bright, Sarasota County Medical Society; Dr. G. Duncan Finlay, Jr., chief executive officer, Sarasota Memorial Health Care System; Douglas R. Luckett, chief operating officer, Doctor's Hospital of Sarasota; Dr. Sandra K. MacLeod, medical director, Sarasota County Health Department; and FSU College of Medicine administrators Dr. Alma Littles and Mollie Hill.

CONTACT
Phone: (850) 645-1255

Contact: Elena Reyes

March 3, 2005
By Jennifer Schmidt

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - Florida State University medical students and faculty have expanded their annual FSUCares spring break medical outreach program to include Immokalee, Fla., where they will work with medically underserved populations March 5-12.

They also will revisit sites in Panama and along the U.S.-Mexico border during the organization’s fourth annual spring break mission.

In addition to providing health services to communities with limited access to health care, these trips serve to educate medical students about cross cultural medicine including the health issues of uninsured and culturally diverse groups. Thirty-five students and 11 faculty members will participate this year.

Migrant farm workers, whose labor contributes to the agricultural harvest of our country, often have unmet health-care needs. In Immokalee, first- and second-year students will work with faculty to treat patients at Collier Health Services and will offer local health fairs for the migrant community.

First-year students will visit McAllen, Texas, where they will serve the population on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border in cooperation with the Lower Rio Grande Border Health Council and the Mexican consulate.

First- and second-year students will travel with faculty members to revisit two sites in Panama, Central America, in cooperation with FSU-Panama. The medical students expect to see some of the patients first visited by FSUCares in 2002 in the remote Panamanian villages of Filipinas and Portobelo.

With the funds raised for the trip, including a $103,000, three-year gift from the Pfizer Foundation, and more than $10,000 in proceeds from November’s FSUCares 5K race, students will provide health services, medical supplies and books for medical students and children in the areas they serve.

While making final preparations for the trip, students will be available for interviews in Tallahassee:

Friday, March 4
12:30 p.m.
FSU College of Medicine Clinical Learning Center
(enter from parking lot on Stadium Drive)

In Texas the students can be reached beginning March 7 through Dr. Angel Braña of the Office of Border Health at (956) 367-0557.

In Immokalee, contact Prof. Elena Reyes, (850) 509-5938.

CONTACT
Phone: (850) 645-1255

March 17, 2005
by Nancy Kinnally

TALLAHASSEE, Fla.- All 29 senior students in the inaugural class of the FSU College of Medicine received notification today of where they will enter residency training this summer after graduation.

Twelve of the 29 graduating students, or 41 percent, are entering residency in primary care specialties, including family medicine, pediatrics, internal medicine and obstetrics/gynecology.

Other students matched in emergency medicine, psychiatry, general surgery, orthopedic surgery, urology and otolaryngology.

The 30th member of the inaugural class has been participating in the prestigious Clinical Research Training Program at the National Institutes of Health this year and will complete his fourth year of medical school during the coming academic year.

Fourteen of the students, or 48 percent, will remain in Florida for their graduate medical education. On average about 40 percent of students graduating from allopathic medical schools in Florida remain in the state for residency training, due in part to a limited number of available residency positions in state.

Of those matching outside of Florida, most will remain in the Southeast, although students also matched in California, New Mexico, New York and Texas.

“We couldn’t be more pleased with our first match results,” said College of Medicine Dean J. Ocie Harris, M.D. “The fact that every student had a successful match, and the high quality of the programs at which our students have been accepted, is a very strong indicator that we have developed a first-rate medical education program here at Florida State.”

The residency match, conducted annually by the National Residency Matching Program, is the primary system that matches applicants to residency programs with available positions at U.S. teaching hospitals. Graduating medical students across the country receive their match information at the same time on the same day.

CONTACT: Frank Stephenson
(850) 644-8634; frankstp@mailer.fsu.edu
By Frank Stephenson
March 30, 2005 

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - National Public Radio's popular weekly science program, Talk of the Nation - Science Friday, will be broadcast live from the Florida State University campus on April 8.

Ira Flatow, known as "the man who brings science to the masses," will host the two-hour program that begins at 2 p.m. in the Fichter Dance Theatre in Montgomery Hall near the center of campus.

Picking up on the Terry Schiavo case that has galvanized public attention around the globe, for the first half of the show Flatow and his guests will discuss end-of-life care issues with specialists in the field. For the final hour, panelists will discuss the sociological aspects of aging and how technology can be used to assist an aging population. This event will mark the first time that the Washington, D.C.-based program, launched in 1991, will have broadcast from the campus of a Florida university.

Sponsored by FSU's Office of Research, the program will be broadcast before a live audience. Flatow's guests for the show will include Lois L. Shepherd, a professor of bioethics and health law at the FSU College of Law; Jeffrey Spike, an associate professor of clinical ethics at the FSU College of Medicine; Dr. Charles G. Maitland, a neurologist and clinical professor at the College of Medicine; Dr. Ken Brummel-Smith, chair of the geriatrics department, College of Medicine; Neil Charness, a cognitive psychologist at FSU; and sociologist Jill Quadagno of the Pepper Institute on Aging.

The public is invited to attend the broadcast and also to participate in the program. Whenever his show travels, Flatow routinely fields questions from his studio audience and also takes questions from callers as well as e-mailed questions from listeners to the show on the World Wide Web. The show's average weekly listenership in the United States is 2.6 million, a figure that complements an unknown number of listeners tuning in worldwide to more than 140 foreign stations that carry the program.

Tickets to the show are free, but are required for a seat in the theater that has a capacity of 380. Tickets are available on a first-come, first-served basis from the FSU Fine Arts Ticket Office, 644-6500.

Flatow, a native of New York City, began broadcasting for NPR 34 years ago. He joined NPR in 1971 just as the non-profit corporation was forming after being authorized by Congress. Trained as an engineer in college, Flatow began working in radio at WBFO in Buffalo, New York. His first science stories aired during his coverage of the first Earth Day in 1970.

Aside from his anchorship of Science Friday, Flatow is perhaps best known for his work on Newton's Apple for the Public Broadcastinzg System. This TV science show, aimed at children and young adults, ran from 1982 to 1987. Flatow won an Emmy for his work on the show. Since then, his TV credits have included serving as a science writer for CBS's This Morning and cable's CNBC.

Flatow's work with Science Friday has carried him from Antarctica and the South Pole to every region in the United States in a quest to bring to his broadcast audience the latest news and information about science in an informative, engaging style. An ardent advocate for educating young people about science, he devotes much of his time to programs and writing aimed for youth. His award-winning Science Friday Kid's Connections Web site is perennially one of the 500 most popular Web sites in the country.

Flatow also is a frequent contributor to newspapers and magazines. His latest book is They All LaughedŠFrom Light Bulbs to Lasers: The Fascinating Stories Behind the Great Inventions That Have Changed Our Lives (HarperCollins, New York).

Science Friday is supported in part by The National Science Foundation.

CONTACT
Phone: (850) 645-1255

May 2005
by Nancy Kinnally

TALLAHASSEE, Fla.- Just under five years after the legislation creating the Florida State University College of Medicine was signed into law, the medical school will hold a commencement ceremony for its first class:

Saturday, May 21, 2005
10 a.m.
College of Medicine Courtyard
Stadium Drive & Call Street
Tallahassee

The students in the inaugural class of the FSU College of Medicine began their studies in May 2001 on the FSU campus, where they spent their first two years of medical school. They then completed their third and fourth years of study at the medical school’s regional campuses in Orlando, Pensacola and Tallahassee. The graduating students have all passed the national licensing exam (USMLE Step 2) and matched with residency programs, where they will begin their graduate medical education in July.

The fully accredited FSU College of Medicine is the first new M.D. program to be established in the United States since 1982.