June 2009

One advantage of having a world-class simulation center is being able to share it in ways that will lead to improved public health. In mid-June, the College of Medicine provided a training exercise in which public-health workers and others were introduced to the concept of managing and containing a threat to community health.

Though it involved scenarios including anthrax, smallpox and radiation from a dirty bomb, the exercise took place in a safe environment under controlled conditions. Dr. Steve Quintero, medical director of the Charlotte Edwards Maguire, M.D. and Tallahassee Memorial HealthCare Center for Clinical Simulation, said it’s one example of how the College of Medicine contributes to improving public health.

“To my knowledge, this is the first time that high-fidelity simulation has been included in a master’s-level public-health training, at least in the state of Florida,” Quintero said. “I think it has broader implications and ramifications for the future of health-care training in this state and perhaps nationally. The FSU College of Medicine is proud to have contributed its faculty, staff and high-tech facility.”

The training exercise took place as part of the Florida Public Health Institute (FPHI) master course in applied public health. Nine universities across the state, along with state and local health departments, participated.

Such an exercise requires a significant amount of behind-the-scenes preparation. Quintero said people had to be taught the medical histories of these simulated patients and actually speak for them through an offstage microphone. And the simulated patients, or manikins, had to look the part. Quintero said the special effects of radiation burns, trauma, smallpox and anthrax were achieved with putty, wax, makeup and a lot of creativity.

“The simulations were amazing,” said participant Chuck Wells, assistant director of public health research for the Florida Department of Health. “Those of us participating were in awe. For a brief moment we got the opportunity to walk in the shoes of the health-care providers. It awakened us to the seriousness of treating a fellow human being, and the challenge of unraveling a medical mystery to arrive at a diagnosis and plan of treatment.

“All this was complicated by the fact that our scenarios dealt with possible chemical and biological agent exposures, which helped us to recognize the additional responsibility of dealing with collateral issues, namely protecting fellow health-care providers already exposed before it was clear what the risks were, and mitigating actions to prevent further exposures and harm from occurring.”

FPHI’s mission is to “advance the knowledge and practice of public health to promote, protect and improve the health of all.” It promotes improvements in health through advocacy, community education, training of the health workforce, and basic and applied research.

CONTACT: Ron Hartung
(850) 645-9205
ronald.hartung@med.fsu.edu

By Ron Hartung
June 2009

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- The Florida State University College of Medicine is the new home of a think tank created to coordinate Florida’s efforts at curing diseases.

The Florida Department of Health entered into an agreement with the College of Medicine to operate the Florida Center for Universal Research to Eradicate Disease (FL CURED) for the next three years. The center previously operated out of the Florida Department of Health. Its new home is in the college’s Division of Research and Graduate Programs.

“The Florida Department of Health is demonstrating its confidence in FSU’s ability to champion collaboration among the public and private research enterprises of the state to prevent, treat and cure deadly and debilitating diseases,” said Michael Smith, director of the college’s Clinical Research Network and now also “principal investigator” in charge of FL CURED.

When it created FL CURED in 2004, the Legislature and, in particular, then-Senate President Jim King envisioned a center that would help Florida:

• Commit to finding cures for the deadliest and most widespread diseases.
• Become the U.S. leader in biomedical research.
• Coordinate efforts among the state’s universities and research institutes and the biomedical/biotechnology industry to discover cures.
• Attract related researchers and businesses to the state.

The College of Medicine is a perfect fit for that mission, said Myra Hurt, senior associate dean for research and graduate programs. It has six regional campuses spread across the state; more than 60 teaching hospitals, clinics and community health-care centers as partners in educating medical students; and a network of more than 1,500 physicians who serve as faculty for third- and fourth-year students.

“Those 1,500 faculty-clinicians are treating upwards of 3 million Floridians,” Smith said. “In our Clinical Research Network, we already are beginning to link them to the research enterprise of the university and College of Medicine to better translate basic research into medical care. Now, with FL CURED, we will continue to build on the innovative, community-based model of the college to encourage partnerships between researchers, treating physicians and community hospitals.”

For more information about FL CURED, visit

http://www.flcured.org

CONTACT: Doug Carlson
(850) 645-1255
doug.carlson@med.fsu.edu

By Doug Carlson
June 2009

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- Informing men that a new vaccine to prevent human papillomavirus (HPV) would also help protect their female partners against developing cervical cancer from the sexually transmitted infection did not increase their interest in getting the vaccine, according to a new Florida State University study.

Mary Gerend, assistant professor of medical humanities and social sciences at the FSU College of Medicine, and Jessica Barley, a 2008 Florida State psychology graduate who based her honors thesis on the study, found that men are no more likely to want the vaccination just because they can help protect their female sexual partners. An HPV vaccine for women has been available since 2006, and a vaccine for men is likely to be approved in the near future.

“You can probably interpret this finding in a number of ways,” Gerend said. “Thinking about the benefit to their own health -- protection again rare genital cancers and genital warts -- is all men really need to know; telling them all that extra stuff really isn’t going to push them one way or another.”

For maximum benefit to public health, both men and women should be vaccinated but little was known about men’s interest in the vaccine before Gerend’s study, which was published in the journal Sexually Transmitted Diseases. Gerend presented the findings recently at the annual meeting of the Society of Behavioral Medicine in Montreal.

HPV is the most common sexually transmitted infection, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which estimates that approximately 20 million Americans are currently infected with HPV and that another 6.2 million people become newly infected each year. HPV-related cancers are very rare in men, but last year the American Cancer Society estimated that nearly 20,000 women would be diagnosed with cervical and other cancers caused by HPV in 2008.

Gerend’s research team randomly divided 356 male college students into groups and gave one group a self-protection message that focused on the benefits of HPV vaccination for men and the other a partner-protection message that focused on the benefits of HPV vaccination for men and their female partners.

Men were asked to rate, on a scale of 1 to 6, the likelihood that they would get the vaccine, with 1 equaling “very unlikely” and 6 equaling “very likely.” There was little difference between the groups, with both expressing only moderate interest in getting the vaccine. Those who received the self-protection message had a mean response of 3.9 on the 6-point scale, while the mean response from the group who got the partner-protection message was 3.8.

Moreover, men who identified themselves as being in a committed relationship also did not indicate a higher degree of interest in the vaccination.

“Now, we have to remember that these were 18-, 19-, 20-year-old male college students, so we have to keep that in mind when considering their idea of a committed relationship,” Gerend said. “And if we did this study again, I’d really want to make sure we drilled home the message of the seriousness of HPV for women. I think they got that message, but it might not have been strong enough.”

The key point in encouraging women to receive the vaccine is the message about how it reduces their risk of developing cervical cancer. The results of Gerend’s study have important implications for how the vaccine for men will be marketed for public acceptance when it becomes available. Efficacy trials in men are ongoing, and the Food and Drug Administration is expected to approve it for use in men as early as this year.

In the meantime, Gerend is working on another study funded by the National Cancer Institute to gauge the best message for encouraging young women to receive the HPV vaccination. The most recent estimates from the CDC, based on 2007 data, suggest that acceptance rates for the HPV vaccine remain low -- about 1 in 4 for girls ages 13 to 17 and about 1 in 10 for women in the 18 to 26 age group.

June 19, 2009

By Meredith Fraser

Addressing disparities in Florida’s physician workforce requires starting early – long before the start of the medical-school admissions process.

The Florida State University College of Medicine, through its outreach programs, seeks first to tilt the odds in favor of finding more qualified medical students from underrepresented backgrounds. Studies show that such students, once they become physicians, are more likely to care for populations faced with the biggest doctor shortages.

The newest part of that effort is a summer “mini-med school” experience for high-school students.

The College of Medicine Summer Institute is a weeklong event for rising high-school juniors and seniors, providing an inside look at what it means to be both a doctor and a medical student. But more than that, it’s another way to encourage students from diverse backgrounds to imagine themselves in the role of physician.

Typically, children from medically underserved communities or backgrounds never get the encouragement to consider a career in medicine.

To introduce such an idea at an early age, the College of Medicine works with middle- and high-school ers through SSTRIDE (Science Students Together Reaching Instructional Diversity and Excellence). It’s an ongoing program aimed at inspiring an interest in the medical sciences among students who might otherwise never consider a future as a scientist or physician.

“Our goal for the Summer Institute is to recruit students from rural, underserved and minority backgrounds and, at the same time, recruit students from other parts of Florida who have a desire to work in medically underserved areas,” said Thesla Berne-Anderson, director of college and pre-college outreach at the College of Medicine.

“The philosophy of the Summer Institute is similar to how the College of Medicine’s admissions process works. Also, it helps in our effort to recruit students for our Medical Honors Scholars program, along with helping identify high-school students who might join our SSTRIDE program.”

The focus on minority recruitment stems from the college’s founding mission to help train doctors for Florida’s traditionally underserved populations. A 2007 study indicated that fewer than 5 percent of Florida’s practicing physicians are African-American and 15 percent are Hispanic. By contrast, the U.S. Census Bureau classifies nearly 16 percent of Florida’s overall population as African-American and more than 20 percent as Hispanic. As Florida’s population continues to grow and its number of practicing physicians declines, people who were underserved from the beginning suffer all the more.

The first week of the Summer Institute (June 13-20) brought in 15 participants, all of whom will enter 11th or 12th grade this fall. The students hail from Gadsden, Volusia, Madison, Orange and Leon counties. The second week boasts 17 participants who come from nine counties.

The students had the opportunity to shadow physicians and College of Medicine students, visit rural health centers and get college testing and application advice. They also attended faculty lectures on topics such as medical ethics, migrant health care and doctor-patient relations.

In one activity, they trained in the Charlotte Edwards Maguire, M.D. and Tallahassee Memorial HealthCare Center for Clinical Simulation. They could examine high-tech “manikins” programmed to display certain vital signs such as pulse, lung activity and blood pressure. Using real medical equipment, participants performed simulated medical examinations with med students as guides.

Participants Ysabel Ilagan of Orlando, Imanuel Gayle of Tallahassee and Persis Mistry of Daytona Beach inspected one manikin with guidance from second-year medical student Carolina Pereira.

“Blood pressure is definitely the trickiest [vital sign] to figure out,” said Ilagan as she completed a reading. While the students reported “healthy” results from several manikins, one case presented a challenge: The patient displayed elevated blood pressure, which Ilagan correctly identified as a symptom of hypertension.

When the manikin’s lung or heart function became the object of scrutiny, the students could simultaneously listen to the vital signs through small speakers projecting the same sounds a stethoscope would detect in a real-life situation. It’s the same technology used to promote discussion among medical students as they acquire the basic physical-examination skills required of a competent and compassionate physician.

With one Summer Institute participant in charge of the stethoscope’s placement, Pereira coached the students on how to best listen to each of the four chambers of the heart, leaving it up to them to determine whether the heart was healthy. Working together, the students diagnosed one manikin with a heart murmur, and they detected worrisome symptoms in another – which Pereira then explained as a condition called aortic stenosis.

Summer Institute participants come from communities throughout Florida. The College of Medicine’s six regional campuses – in Daytona Beach, Fort Pierce, Orlando, Pensacola, Sarasota and Tallahassee – invite students from their area high schools to apply.

Meredith Fraser
July 2009

Childhood obesity has become increasingly worrisome for many American families, and Latino children in particular are more likely to gain dangerous extra pounds. Curbing this trend in the Latino population has been the focus of many national studies, one soon to be based in the Florida State University College of Medicine.

With funding from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) – a first for the College of Medicine – Dr. Javier Rosado will run a two-year, $75,000 project studying the rural Latino population across Florida. Specifically, he plans to study how well rural clinics and school health programs inform Latino parents about their children’s weight.

The study will be based in Immokalee, about 30 miles southeast of Fort Myers in Collier County, and Quincy. Rosado works as a postdoctoral psychology fellow at the college’s clinical training site in Immokalee, which serves a large, predominantly Latino population of migrant workers.

RWJF created the “Salud America!” program in late 2007 to provide support for researchers studying the obesity epidemic in Latino children. Last month, the foundation notified Rosado that his proposed project had gotten the green light.

Latino kids’ heightened susceptibility to obesity has been increasingly noted and analyzed over the past decade. According to a 2006 study by the Mathematica Policy Research Group, 25 percent of Latino children end up obese by age 3, compared with 16 percent of black children and 14 percent of whites. The disparity among racial groups remained after researchers accounted for possible confounding socioeconomic factors.

Rosado and his colleagues will interview parents after children’s routine medical checkups.
“The long-term goal is to change the policies of these clinics,” he said. “We think BMI (body-mass index) will be the most helpful tool to explain children’s weight to families. Hopefully we’ll be able to show [the clinics] how they can use BMI information to improve their patients’ care.”

Rosado says the interviewers plan to gather Latino parents’ opinions on:

• Ideal body size and weight differences between males and females.
• The way the clinic or schools delivered weight-related information.
• Whether the parents fully understand their child’s health situation.
• And what parents think they need to combat issues related to obesity.

In addition to the interviews in Immokalee, Rosado’s study will gather information from parents of Latino children in Quincy, where a separate obesity study is under way. After those children receive BMI screenings at school, their parents receive a letter detailing the results. Rosado and his colleagues will interview those parents on the letter’s content and learn what change, if any, they made in response to the letter’s BMI report. Rosado hopes to shed light on how parents react to a BMI report and how such information could be presented most effectively.

Said Myra Hurt, the college’s senior associate dean for research and graduate programs, “Dr. Rosado’s findings will directly translate to helping other communities throughout our country.”

CONTACT: John Fraser
(850) 644-8637
jfraser@techtransfer.fsu.edu

By Barry Ray
July 2009

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- For the past four years, the Florida State University Research Foundation has funded a highly competitive grant program designed to support Florida State researchers as they seek to transfer their technology out of the laboratory and into the commercial marketplace.

The winners of these Grant Assistance Program (GAP) awards are those researchers who can most clearly identify the commercial viability of a product, process or license that they believe will come from their efforts with a corporate partner.

“We started this program to encourage faculty to become engaged with the private sector to solve real problems. This is happening,” said Kirby Kemper, Florida State’s vice president for Research. “We have been fortunate to have a review committee of Tallahassee technology business people led by Kay Stephenson of Datamaxx.

“I also want to thank the committee members who, as local volunteers, generously donate their time,” Kemper said. “They not only make award decisions but also meet with faculty every three months to talk about the next commercialization steps.”

(See http://tr.im/qwd3 for more information on the review committee members and on prior GAP award winners.)

In two rounds of awards, the Research Foundation has granted $250,000 in GAP awards for fiscal year 2009 to a total of seven research projects currently under way at Florida State. The four projects to receive GAP funding during this spring’s competition, and the award amounts, are as follows:

• Treating Cancer-Drug Side Effects: “Drug Delivery for Treatment of Spinal Muscular Atrophy and Peripheral Neuropathy” -- $40,000 award to Kate Calvin, postdoctoral associate, Department of Biomedical Sciences (in the laboratory of Professor Charles Ouimet), and researcher, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry. This is a drug delivery method for treatment of spinal muscular atrophy and peripheral neuropathy -- essentially a treatment for areas of the body that have been adversely affected by cancer treatment drugs such as Taxol. The treatment uses a protein, SMN, to target nerve terminals, and employs a neurotoxic protein, botulinum, as the carrier of SMN. Botulinum is used in this way because of the way its structure allows it to attach to nerve terminals.
   
• The Potential to Delay Premature Labor: “Novel Application of Melatonin Antagonists in Obstetrical Practice” -- $40,000 award to James Olcese, associate professor, Department of Biomedical Sciences. This is a method for the prevention of pre-term labor. Olcese proposes to introduce, intravenously, a melatonin antagonist to women who are predisposed to premature birth. Melatonin antagonists are drugs that do not provoke a biological response themselves, but bind to melatonin receptors and therefore prevent melatonin itself from binding to the receptor. Olcese suspects that this inhibition of the uptake of melatonin will prevent women from beginning labor.
   
• ‘Buckypaper’ as a Non-Toxic Fire Retardant: “Fire Retardant Polymer Composites” -- $25,000 award to Chuck Zhang, professor, Department of Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering, and deputy director, High-Performance Materials Institute. This process is designed to use buckypaper, a thin sheet made from an aggregate of carbon nanotubes, as a fire- and smoke-shielding layer for sensitive devices. The buckypaper skin will be applied to polymer surfaces either during the production process or applied after production as a film.
   
• A Better Solar Energy Device: “Inflatable Solar Energy Collector” -- $15,000 award to Ian Winger, associate, Department of Physics. The Inflatable Solar Energy Collector is a device designed to maximize the amount of sunlight that is focused on an energy collector. The energy collector is typically filled with water or oil, which in a full operating system would ultimately power a steam generator to make electricity.

Florida State researchers who received GAP funding for fiscal year 2009 in the award competition’s earlier round (fall 2008) are as follows:

• Detecting Biomarkers of Disease on Cell Surfaces: “Quantification of Cellular Sphingolipids” -- $40,000 award to Alan Marshall, the Robert O. Lawton Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry at Florida State and director of the Ion Cyclotron Resonance Program at the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory; and scholar/scientist Mark Emmett and postdoctoral associate Huan He, both of the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory. This research group has invented a novel method for labeling and quantifying sphingolipids in cell cultures. GAP funding will be used to develop a test kit for possible commercial use as an adjunct to treatment of diseases such as cancer.
   
• A New Way to Produce Drugs: “Automated Syntheses of Pharmaceutical Agents” -- $40,000 award to Tyler McQuade, associate professor, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry. The McQuade Lab has developed novel chemistry and process technologies for continuous, as opposed to batch, synthesis of several pharmaceuticals. The group will use GAP funding to further develop their techniques to manufacture one commercially important drug. The goal of the process is to drastically reduce the cost of drug manufacture while increasing the yield of the process.
   
• A New Cancer Fighter: “Development of Enzyme Inhibitors” -- $40,000 award to Amy Sang, professor, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry. The Sang Lab has developed and synthesized matrix metalloprotease inhibitors, proteins that may allow for major breakthroughs in the prevention of stroke and in the ability to control growth in certain cancer cells.

Once researchers or a research group receive a GAP award, they are assigned a team of local business leaders who act as mentors. This group then meets on a quarterly basis to provide insight and assistance to the GAP winners in the area of product development.

For more information on the Grant Assistance Program at The Florida State University, visit

http://tr.im/qwk9

CONTACT: Doug Carlson
(850) 645-1255 or (850) 694-3735
doug.carlson@med.fsu.edu 

By Jeff McKenzie
Jeff@CoachingCharities.com

July 16, 2009 (Exuma, Bahamas) – Rhodes Scholar and College Football All-American Myron L. Rolle and his family today announced plans to build the Myron L. Rolle Medical Clinic and Sports Complex, in Steventon, Exuma in the Bahamas, where the Rolle family originates. The Complex will provide free health services to residents of Exuma, as well as a state-of-the-art wellness and training facilities for athletes and visitors to Exuma, Bahamas.

The project will be executed in conjunction with the Bahamas Ministry of Health and the Florida State University College of Medicine, based in the United States. Rolle graduated from Florida State in December 2008 with a pre-med degree and this coming school year, as a Rhodes Scholar, will earn a Masters Degree in Medical Anthropology from Oxford University in England. He plans to enter the National Football League Draft in 2010 to pursue a professional football career, and following football pursue a career as a medical surgeon.

“My family and I are extremely proud to announce the construction of this Medical Clinic and Sports Complex, which will provide much needed medical resources to an area of the world that is near and dear to our hearts,” said Myron Rolle. “While I was born in the U.S., Bahamas is where my parents, Whitney and Beverly Rolle, and three of my brothers, were born and raised. I have always thought of the Bahamas as my second home.”

A capital campaign is now underway to fund construction of the Myron L. Rolle Medical Clinic and Sports Complex, coordinated through the Myron L. Rolle Foundation, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization incorporated in the United States. The clinic will be built in multiple phases, with the first being the main health center facility.

In conjunction with that initial phase, a project will begin immediately to build a new Memorial Park adjacent to the clinic site, featuring the statue of Pompey and restoration of an historic jailhouse as a museum.

The Florida State University College of Medicine, based in Tallahassee, Florida, is partnering with the Foundation to advise on the project, as well as launch a new initiative through its FSU Cares Program to bring a medical mission to Exuma each year. During the program, Florida State medical students and doctors will travel to the Bahamas and provide free medical care and supplies to Exumians. The program will be funded through the Myron L. Rolle Foundation.

About the Myron L. Rolle Foundation

The Myron L. Rolle Foundation is a tax-exempt, non-profit organization dedicated to the support of health, wellness, educational and other charitable initiatives throughout the world that benefit children and families in need. The Foundation was established in 2009 by Rhodes Scholar and College Football All-American Myron L. Rolle and his family.

For information on the Myron L. Rolle Foundation visit

http://www.MyronRolle.com

Meredith Fraser
August 2009

The College of Medicine’s mission – which includes training physicians to practice culturally relevant and sensitive primary care – doesn’t stop in Florida, or even at U.S. borders.

For more than two years, the college has worked with Kazakhstan to help improve the republic’s medical education and research systems. In June, three faculty members journeyed more than 7,000 miles to work with 25 associate deans and deputy directors for research from Kazakhstan’s six medical schools and several national research centers. Through intensive, all-day tutorials, these professionals learned the ins and outs of writing internationally competitive research grant proposals and articles.

The partnership officially began in May 2007 when assistant professor Askar Chukmaitov, who’s a Kazakhstani native and director of the College of Medicine’s new Center on Global Health, and Robert Brooks, then the associate dean for health affairs, established a formal working relationship with the country. Before he joined the College of Medicine, Chukmaitov had co-written Kazakhstan’s official strategy to modernize its medical education system, which had been based on the former Soviet Union’s organizational model, so he knew what needed to be done.

On that first official trip, Chukmaitov and Brooks met with Kazakhstan’s vice minister of health, deans of the country’s medical and public health schools, and hospital administrators to discuss possible projects.

In early 2008, funded by Kazakhstan’s Ministry of Health, four Kazakh health specialists came to Tallahassee for a month of intensive programs at the college, designed to familiarize them with the U.S. health system, education system and research methods. According to Chukmaitov, these specialists enjoyed the training and were able to implement what they had learned. For example, an e-mail he received from a participant indicated they’ve put together a computer lab, with an e-library that has access to major international medical journals, for the faculty and staff of their National Research Center of Urology and have had the first meeting of their Internal Review Board from the center, among other steps. As a result, the Ministry of Health requested another training in Kazakhstan.

“This way,” Brooks explained, “they were able to bring more people from all over their country.”

This summer, for two weeks Brooks, Chukmaitov and Les Beitsch, director of the college’s Center on Medicine and Public Health, lectured and held workshops for the prestigious group of 25. Chukmaitov taught research methods, research design and academic writing. Beitsch went over various public health topics, as well as how to apply for funding from major international grant organizations. Brooks provided a thorough overview of the U.S. health-care and medical-education systems, as well as how universities are relevant to scientific research.

“We have the sophisticated National Institutes of Health and other agencies that have very educated, carefully instructed people who review grants and know how to grade and rank them,” Brooks said. “The simple infrastructure needed to set up a grants system – things we take for granted as being fair or organized or orderly – just didn’t exist.”

Chukmaitov mentioned that a previous Soviet health research model was based on a planned and noncompetitive allocation of limited resources among universities and research centers. Currently, Kazakhstan’s Ministry of Health is developing a new system that will award grants to those researchers whose work is likely to get recognized and published in international peer-reviewed journals.

Brooks and Chukmaitov noted that the participants were motivated and have the talent necessary for Kazakhstan to succeed in building their new research system and be competitive on the international stage in certain biomedical and applied research areas.

“It was a very hands-on experience for them,” Chukmaitov said. “We had two big projects for them to work on in groups. During the first week they had to come up with a grant proposal that would be interesting, and on an area of research that can be generalizable, something not only relevant in Kazakhstan but that would also interest the broader international research community.

“The second week’s project was to write a paper. They had to come up with a good research question, write an introduction, then come up with a detailed outline of the methods section, of the results section, of the discussion section, of the conclusion section. The idea was to give them something they can work on after the seminar is done.”
Brooks explained why Kazakhstan’s medical community is relevant here: “The College of Medicine has a unique mission that includes not only developing a special educational model focused on primary care but, in addition, primary care that’s culturally relevant and sensitive. Even though here in Florida we don’t deal with a lot of people from the former Soviet Union, such as Kazakhs or Russians, by dealing with them as students or faculty you learn to be more culturally sensitive in caring for other peoples.”

In addition, the college shares with Kazakhstan a focus on rural health. The country boasts a total area equal to all U.S. land east of the Mississippi River – yet has a population only the size of Florida’s. Developing a primary care system for those vast underpopulated areas is difficult.

More training is planned. This fall, the college and the Center on Global Health plan to host several Kazakh medical experts, who will study the processes that major grant organizations use to score proposals and decide which applicants receive funding.

Contact: Jennifer Rine
Phone: 850.494.5939
Fax: 850.494.5962
Email: jennifer.rine@med.fsu.edu 

August 27, 2009

PENSACOLA – Two local physicians who teach third- and fourth- year medical students at the Florida State University College of Medicine Pensacola regional campus received awards for their dedication to teaching and commitment to upholding the college’s mission.

Dr. John Gage, clerkship faculty member in surgery, received the Outstanding Community Faculty Educator award. This awards honors one faculty member who “demonstrates consistent dedication to the six College of Medicine principles of the curriculum, consistent dedication to identifying and meeting the educational needs of students; enthusiasm for teaching; participation in faculty development; and, willingness to work collaboratively with clerkship directors/clerkship faculty/regional campus staff to deliver the College of Medicine’s clinical curriculum to students.”

In announcing the selection for Outstanding Community Faculty Educator, Dr. Paul McLeod, dean of the FSU College of Medicine’s Pensacola campus, noted that “Dr. John Gage is our “go to guy” for surgery. As a member of our outstanding surgery faculty, he lectures to all of the students as a part of the Doctoring 3 course, teaches third year students on the general surgery rotation and offers one our most popular electives to 4th year students. He is so popular that we keep asking for more and he keeps saying yes. Even at the last minute, he is willing to accept a student who needs his mentoring. Dr. Gage is a great example of our mission in action. We are very lucky to have him on our team.”

Dr. Marian Stewart, clerkship faculty for third-year required rotations in pediatrics, received the “Guardian of the Mission” Community Faculty Award. A clinical faculty member who had distinguished himself/herself by participating in activities that model the FSU College of Medicine mission to “educate and develop exemplary physicians who practice patient-centered health care, discover and advance knowledge and are responsive to community needs, especially through service to elder, rural, minority and underserved populations.”

Dr. Stewart was nominated by Dr. Robert Wilson, clerkship director in pediatrics. He noted Stewart’s contributions the Pensacola regional campus. “No student ever leaves the Jay pediatric experience who is not a better physician-in-training and person and who hasn’t been exposed on a continuous basis to patient-centered health care.” wrote Wilson.

“These physicians are illustrative of our entire faculty. They are just the type of models we want for our students and truly represent the mission of the FSU College of Medicine,” said Dr. Paul McLeod. “We are proud to have them as a part of our faculty.”

The FSU College of Medicine is the first fully accredited allopathic medical school (M.D. program) to open in the United States since 1982. First- and second-year basic sciences and clinical skills are taught in a new state-of-the-art facility in Tallahassee. Third- and fourth-year clinical clerkships are taught at one of six regional campuses by board certified physicians in local hospitals, ambulatory care facilities, and physician offices.

CONTACT: Ron Hartung
(850) 645-9205
ronald.hartung@med.fsu.edu

By Ron Hartung
September 2009

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- If you don’t know how a human cell is supposed to work, it’s hard to offer a good explanation when the cell goes haywire -- as it does in cancer. That’s why a Florida State University College of Medicine researcher has been awarded a $1.2 million grant to explore the role of centrosomes and cilia in cell division and development and their connections to human disease.

Tim Megraw, a veteran researcher who joined the College of Medicine as an associate professor in August, received the four-year grant from the National Institutes of Health this month. The grant continues through August 2013.

The focus of Megraw’s work is cell division. Cancer occurs when renegade cells start dividing uncontrollably. Anti-cancer drugs such as Taxol, Megraw noted, target the microtubule, a key molecule that regulates cell division. Along with other areas of focus, he’s looking into microtubule regulation and its relationship to another component of the cell called the centrosome.

“We’re studying how microtubules are regulated in cells normally,” Megraw said, “and the key roles that the centrosomin family of proteins play in this process. Centrosomes are the main centers for organizing microtubules. So we’re interested in how centrosomes are assembled and regulated. Both of those goals are outlined in this new grant.”

Remarkably, centrosomins regulate not only centrosome assembly and their functions in cytoskeleton assembly, but also the replication of centrosomes in the cell cycle.

This is a continuation of work Megraw and his wife, Ling-Rong Kao, now an assistant in research at the medical school, began in 2003 at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas. They have explored cells in the brain of the fruit fly and, more recently, the mouse.

Based on their work, researchers better understand the nature of centrosome-based diseases.

“Most of the diseases affect these little hair-like structures that stick out of our cells -- cilia,” said Megraw, noting that interest in cilia has experienced a renaissance in recent years. “It’s funny because, if you read a review article from 15 or 20 years ago, people wrote statements like ‘These appear to be useless vestiges.’ And now they appear to be key signaling centers. I have trouble keeping up with the list of diseases that are now associated with defective cilia.”

Among those diseases are polycystic kidney disease, as well as other syndromes that lead to deafness, visual degeneration, obesity and primary microcephaly, a condition in which brain development is impaired.