Mission - Fall 2010 Edition

a ss o mh e Th ea d empea raTgme efNrT aeddi N gN

A year has gone by, and it seems like a few weeks. It really seems that way, and without the Blackberry, e-mail, a wristwatch and the occasional reminder, it is sometimes hard to notice the time of the day, the day of the week or even the month. Folks call this being “in the zone.”

At the Brody School of Medicine, I have the privilege of working with so many talented and passionate individuals on a daily basis that it’s hard not to be “in the zone.” I see the motivation and passion in the eyes of the medical students who hosted me for lunch this semester. Likewise, I observed this at the Brody Women Faculty Committee meeting and at the curriculum meeting. The desire is there at the ECU Physicians board meetings, the chair meetings and at meetings of the ECU board of trustees and the university leadership.

Sometimes I wish you could join me one day and experience this energy that’s all across our school. Short of that, I hope we can convey the energy in this issue of our alumni magazine.

On the following pages, you can read about some of our super-achieving faculty and students. Our physicians have started a new clinical division, neurosurgery; new services, such as a sleep disorders center; and have installed new technology, such as a cardiac CT scanner and a CyberKnife, to better care for our patients.

Our scientists are bringing in record numbers of grants and contracts and presenting their findings at prestigious gatherings around the world.

Greetings

Our students are working hard not only in the classroom but also in the community, where their spirit of service is helping make our region healthier.

And construction crews are working hard to finish our new outpatient building on Moye Boulevard and the Family Medicine Center.

Of course, there are challenges every day and uncertainties when complex changes occur. We have had an unusual and unpredictable year related to the state and local economies. Those financial constraints have temporarily sidelined our plans to expand to help meet our region’s doctor shortage. And while we’ve stabilized leadership on the department level, we’re facing a leadership change in academic affairs as our senior associate dean moves on to a prestigious new position within the university.

But the fact that the Brody School of Medicine exists shows we have a history of getting fired up and saying, “We will!” when others say, “You can’t!”

We still have much to allow us to remain excited about the future, to motivate us to solve problems and take on new challenges.

And so many of my colleagues here at Brody – faculty and students alike – are afire to work hard and further our mission of education, service and research.

Please enjoy our magazine and keep in touch.

Paul R.G. Cunningham, M.D. Dean and Senior Associate Vice Chancellor

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Dr. Paul R.G. Cunningham dean, Brody school of medicine senior associate vice Chancellor of medical affairs east Carolina University ediTor

Doug Boyd wriTers

Crystal Baity Marion Blackburn arT direCTor/desigNer

Mimosa Mallernee Hines phoTographers

Cliff Hollis Dawn Robinson

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F E AT U R E S service that sustains . . . . . . . . . .

Brody students teach others to help themselves

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Tears, fears and cheers First-year students settle in

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Students share their stresses

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The Drs. Knudson bring leadership and scholarship to East Carolina

D E PA R T M E N T S mission is published by the Brody school of medicine at east Carolina University. any written portion of this magazine may be reprinted with proper credit.

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CommeNTs or qUesTioNs doug Boyd east Carolina University greenville, NC 27858-6481 boydd@ecu.edu

alumni news

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Š 2009 by east Carolina University U.p. 10-125 printed on recycled paper.

3,500 copies of this public document were printed at a cost of $4,980.00 or $1.42 per copy.

Close up: a new diet plan .

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Inside back cover

ON THE COVER Medical student Tala Smith helps Shelia Hunt play kickball during a student-led summer program in Pembroke.

Read more about student service starting on page 12.

2009 mission 1

N Ne ew ws s f fr ro om m B Br ro od dy y

ECU Physicians adds clinical services East Carolina University has added neurosurgery to its list of clinical services following a merger with a local private practice, and existing services have added clinics and equipment.

Eastern Neurosurgical and Spine Associates joined the Brody School of Medicine and ECU Physicians in late 2008.

Its physicians are full-time clinical faculty of the new division of neurosurgery within the

neurosurgical emergencies at Pitt County Memorial Hospital.

Another new service is the East Carolina Endoscopy Center, a joint venture with Pitt County Memorial Hospital. The center is on the third floor of Moye Medical Center.

PCMH provides staffing and management oversight while ECU provides doctors for the center. The center opened in January 2009.

Endoscopies are procedures that allow physicians to look inside the body using a tiny camera housed in a small flexible tube and inserted through the mouth or rectum. At the center, physicians will perform procedures such as upper endoscopies, colonoscopies and flexible sigmoidoscopies on patients who have low risk factors.

Dr. Dennis Sinar, a gastroenterologist and professor at ECU, is the medical Tony Worthington is prepared for his sleep study by technologist director of the Michelle McLawhorn at ECU Physicians’ new sleep center.

11,000-square-foot center. It has three procedure rooms, a Department of Surgery at Brody. dozen preparatory/recovery rooms and space They see patients at their practice site at for a fourth procedure room. the corner of Arlington Boulevard and Also at Moye Medical Center is a new Stantonsburg Road, which is called the ECU sleep disorders center led by Dr. Sunil Neurosurgical & Spine Center.

Sharma of the division of pulmonary and Drs. K. Stuart Lee, Keith Tucci, Barbara critical care medicine. It received a five-year Lazio and Michael C. Sharts, along with the accreditation from the American Academy of late F. Douglas Jones, joined the medical Sleep Medicine in October. faculty, and ENSA staff members were Physicians at the center evaluate and offered positions at ECU. Jones died earlier manage sleep apnea, obesity hypoventilation this year. syndrome, insomnia, narcolepsy, parasomnias The practice treats patients with brain and (abnormal movements, behaviors, emotions, spinal tumors, pituitary tumors, spinal perceptions and dreams), restless leg disorders such as cervical, lumbar disc and syndrome and REM behavior disorders. The degenerative disease, certain strokes and more. center also treats sleep disorders in children.

It also treats children with neurosurgical The center treated more than 600 patients problems and provides 24-hour coverage for between its December 2008 opening and 2 mission 2009

mid-October.

Meanwhile, at the Leo W. Jenkins Cancer Center, radiation oncologists are treating tumors with a CyberKnife, unveiled last February.

With built-in X-ray imaging and computers that can make minute adjustments to compensate for tumor or patient movement, the CyberKnife delivers radiation with minimal damage to surrounding healthy tissue. It also eliminates the need for invasive head or body stabilization frames.

The CyberKnife can treat benign tumors, malignant cancers and other conditions anywhere in the body. It is also an advanced educational tool for physicians, medical students, radiation therapists and others.

ECU expects to perform about 500 treatments each year with the CyberKnife.

ECU Physicians has also begun treating cardiovascular patients with a new computed tomagraphy scanner in the East Carolina Heart Institute.

The scanner enables ECU to further its capabilities to diagnose and plan for appropriate management of cardiovascular disease in one location.

ECU’s machine is a Siemens SOMATOM Definition dual-source scanner with added features for heart diagnoses. ECU projects performing nearly 800 scans in fiscal year 2010 and increasing to more than 4,000 by fiscal year 2012.

Doctors and scientists will also use the device in research and clinical trials.

New Clinical Services ECU Neurosurgical & Spine Center East Carolina Endoscopy Center Sleep Disorders Center CyberKnife Cardiac CT scanner

N e w s f r o m B r o dy

ECU using new electronic medical record system East Carolina University doctors are using a new electronic medical record system that officials hope will bring more efficient, safer care to patients.

In March, ECU Physicians deployed the HealthSpan electronic medical record at its Firetower Medical Office, and in early July, all other clinic sites started using the patient registration, scheduling and billing aspects of HealthSpan. They will convert to the EMR function in 2010-2012.

HealthSpan has been developed largely by ECU’s health care partner, University Health Systems of Eastern Carolina. HealthSpan’s core is made by Epic Systems of Wisconsin, and the local health system customized HealthSpan to suit its needs. UHS has installed HealthSpan at Pitt County Memorial Hospital and its regional hospitals.

A local private pediatric practice has also installed the system.

Adopting UHS’ electronic medical record system improves doctors’ ability to treat and track their patients quickly and efficiently.

Roughly 140,000 patients get treatment at ECU Physicians clinics each year.

HealthSpan is valuable in myriad ways for ECU. It improves patient care by giving doctors instant access to information about any care patients have received at UHS

Student receives state award Brandon Yarns, a third-year medical student at the Brody School of Medicine, has received the Marc Amaya Award from the North Carolina Council of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.

The award recognizes a student who represents academic excellence, character, and who also has a strong interest and meaningful experience in child and adolescent psychiatry.

Yarns accepted the award at the September meeting of the N.C. Psychiatric Association in New Bern and attended the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry meeting Oct. 24-Nov. 1 in Honolulu.

hospitals. The system also makes registration and scheduling easier and more efficient, said Dr. Nicholas Benson, vice dean and medical director of ECU Physicians.

“If a patient comes in and has been in the hospital, we have direct access to that information right then,” said Dr. Tommy Ellis, lead physician at the Firetower Medical Office. “In the past, you had to track down their records.”

There’s also educational value in HealthSpan, said Dr. Nicholas Benson, vice dean of the Brody School of Medicine and medical director of ECU Physicians. The 300 medical students at Brody and 340 residents training at ECU and PCMH need exposure to the latest technology available to clinicians.

“We are responsible for teaching them not how medicine was practiced in the ’80s or the ’90s or even in many parts of the country today,” Benson said. “We’re responsible for teaching them how they should be and can be practicing medicine in the next decade.”

Ellis added that HealthSpan will help physicians access quality data more easily and completely.

“Tracking quality is going to be the way people are paid,” Ellis said.

Dr. Tommy Ellis uses the HealthSpan system at the Firetower Medical Office.

Benson credited The Duke Endowment, which awarded PCMH and ECU a $3 million grant in 2007 to fund HealthSpan implementation at the Brody School of Medicine. The total cost of implementing HealthSpan across UHS and ECU is estimated at $40 million.

State funds indigent care but not expansion East Carolina University received one of its legislative priorities this year when lawmakers in Raleigh approved $2 million in continuing funding for indigent care at the Brody School of Medicine, but major expansion plans went unfunded and are on hold.

The indigent care funding will help make up some of the approximately $10 million of free care the Brody School of Medicine provides annually to patients who cannot pay. That will help the bottom line for ECU Physicians, which officials project will generate $157.4 million in revenues and $157.1 million in expenses in the 2009-2010 fiscal year.

Work to expand the medical school to 120 students, and a concurrent expansion of the medical school at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, went unfunded in this year’s legislative session.

As a result, expansion plans are on hold indefinitely, and Brody will hold steady at 78 students per class.

Also unfunded was ECU’s request for $300,000 in operating funds for the East Carolina Heart Institute.

2009 mission 3

N e w s f r o m B r o dy

From left, Reema Padia, Negin Misaghian, Sarah Mian, Kasey Joyner and Crystal Bowe are 2009 Schweitzer Fellows. Not pictured is Emily Cullen.

Six Brody students receive Schweitzer Fellowships Six students from the Brody School of Medicine have received Schweitzer Fellowships for 2009.

The students, who have finished their first year of medical school, commit to a year of service with a community agency, devoting more than 800 hours to local communities lacking access to adequate health services.

Below are the students’ names and their service projects: ■■

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Emily Cullen is working with the organization Operation Sunshine to begin a program to increase self-esteem, positive coping skills and healthy body image and exercise behaviors in girls ages 10-13.

Kasey Joyner and Crystal Bowe are working with the Substance Abuse Coalition of Pitt

4 mission 2008

County to educate youth on the harmful efforts of second-hand smoke and equip them with resources and knowledge to reduce their exposure.

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Sarah Mian and Reema Padia are working at the James Bernstein Community Health Center in Greenville to promote the education and well-being of Spanishspeaking women by teaching English skills, providing mentoring and holding health education sessions.

Negin Misaghian is working at the ECU Pediatric Healthy Weight Research and Treatment Center to create a mentoring program that pairs at-risk and overweight children ages 9-13 with a medical student to encourage healthy lifestyles. Monthly

education sessions will be held for families involved.

Schweitzer Fellows continue their education while participating in the entry-year of the Schweitzer Fellows Program. At ECU, 77 Schweitzer Fellows have completed the program, which Pitt County Memorial Hospital has supported with $20,000 in annual gifts.

“Were it not for Pitt County Memorial Hospital, we could not have this program here,” said Dr. Thomas G. Irons, ECU associate vice chancellor for regional health services and the faculty member who oversees the Schweitzer program. “They have been generous and gracious in funding us for over 10 years.”

N e w s f r o m B r o dy

Cure for health care ills no easy fix, doctors say The U.S. health care system needs a lot of work, but no one bill before Congress has all the answers. That was the message from a pair of Brody School of Medicine faculty members who discussed federal health care reform measures Nov. 17.

Dr. Charles Willson, clinical professor of pediatrics and chair of the N.C. Health and Wellness Trust Fund Commission; and Dr. Stephen Powell, East Carolina University professor of cardiovascular sciences and a vascular surgeon, took opposing viewpoints on some topics but agreed on several others during a health care reform debate organized by medical students.

Dr. Paul Cunningham, dean of the Brody School of Medicine, was the moderator. The event was held in the Brody Medical Sciences Building.

“We don’t have a health care system. We have a sick care system,” Willson said. “We have a system perfectly designed to save your life at a cost of hundreds of thousands of dollars.”

He also described the health care system as one in which millions of Americans are “one pink slip away” from losing their insurance coverage. “We cannot be the country we can be and ought to be until all our people have access to health care and don’t have to worry about going broke,” Willson said.

Powell said the health care reform bill recently passed by the House of Representatives, H.R. 3962, or the Affordable Health Care for America Act, is hastily assembled, crowded with special interest provisions, does nothing to reduce costs and will add to the national debt. He said today’s medical students will pay the costs.

He also predicted rationing will occur when people who don’t have insurance are able to

Fischer

obtain insurance under the House plan, especially in a health care system that faces high costs and workforce shortages.

“Government health care programs would be forced to severely restrict services, ration care or deny care to save money,” Powell said.

“Adding more health care in a broken system will accelerate the breakdown of that system ... and lead to a rationing scenario. You can’t have something for nothing.”

The physicians also seemed to disagree on the question of whether health care is a right.

“Is food a right?” Powell asked. “Is it a right for people to have houses? Is it a right for people to have cars? You cannot have something for nothing.”

Willson responded by saying, “I’m not smart enough to know if health care is a right, but I know it’s good public policy if all Americans can be afforded the chance to be as healthy as they possibly can.”

Both, however, agreed on several points. A limit on non-economic damages in medical malpractice suits is needed, people with pre-existing conditions should be able to buy affordable health insurance, reduce fraud and abuse in Medicare, and promote primary care “medical homes” for patients.

“A place where everyone knows your name,” like at “Cheers,” the 1980s television tavern, Willson said in describing what a medical home is.

Both also said doctors should play a more active role in making sure lawmakers and the public know more about the health care system, its problems and potential solutions.

They also agreed that without change, severe challenges loom.

“We have a recipe for disaster with increasing costs, poor value delivered,” Willson said. “We are going to have more and more

rationing whether we want it or not.”

The debate was organized by Brody Scholars Josh McKinnon and Ying Zhang. The medical scholarship program encourages and supports students organizing seminars such as the debate.

Brody receives national accolades The Brody School of Medicine is one of the top 10 medical schools in the country for sending graduates into family medicine, according to the American Academy of Family Physicians.

According to the AAFP’s Society for Teachers of Family Medicine, 15.8 percent of the school’s graduates entered an accredited family medicine residency program for the three-year period ending October 2008.

In March, 21 percent of Brody’s graduating students matched with family medicine residency programs during the school’s annual Match Day. ECU also ranked among the top medical schools in the country that emphasize primary care, according to the annual listing of the top graduate schools by U.S. News & World Report magazine.

ECU was 28th overall among primary care schools this year. In the rural medicine subcategory, the school ranked seventh. ECU also sent the seventh-highest percentage of its graduates, 53.3 percent, into primary care residencies between 2006 and 2008. U.S. News defines primary care as family medicine, pediatrics and internal medicine.

Student recognized for leadership Third-year medical student Hayley Fischer was one of 30 recipients of the American Medical Association Foundation’s 2009 Leadership Award. This award provides medical students, residents, fellows and early career physicians from around the country with special training to develop their skills as future leaders in organized medicine and community affairs. Fischer and the other recipients were recognized March 9 in Washington, D.C. Locally, Fischer has served in several leadership roles such as Brody’s AMA chapter chair and has worked to improve health care access and education in Costa Rica and Bolivia.

2009 mission 5

D tr mo em ntB h Ne ep wasr f re oa dd yi n g

Display honors Brody Scholarship Called “A Legacy of Commitment,� a display in the lobby of the Brody Medical Sciences Building lists the students who have received scholarships through the Brody Medical Scholarship Program, which provides a full scholarship to medical school along with other benefits to top students, and honors the Brody family, which funded the program. It was unveiled at an April 3 ceremony.

6 mission 2009

N e w s f r o m B r o dy

ECU partners with agencies to deliver mental health services

From left, Ashley Mabina, Evan Lutz and Emily LeRoy recite a pledge at the annual white coat ceremony Aug. 14.

Brody welcomes Class of 2013 East Carolina University welcomed the largest medical class in school history Aug. 14 when 78 new students received their symbolic white coats.

The 39 men and 39 women in the class range in age from 21 to 43. As usual, they are all North Carolina residents with 31 counties of residence listed. They earned their undergraduate degrees from 25 different colleges and universities with the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill having the most graduates, 21. ECU has 15 alumni in the class and North Carolina State University has 10.

Dr. Harry Adams, professor of medicine and recipient of the Clinical Science Faculty Award from the Class of 2009, addressed the new medical students.

Students spent their first week in traditional college orientation sessions, took a basic life support class where they learned CPR and also tackled ECU’s ropes course, where challenges build

teamwork and confidence.

“I think we’re ready to get started, really,” said Hunter Mahaffey of Waynesville, who received his bachelor’s degree from ECU in May. Among the class of 2013 are the three newest Brody Scholars: Daniel James Goble of Marion, Diana Nicole Spell of Raleigh and Jordan Ray Preiss of Charlotte, who described her classmates as a little anxious but also eager to learn.

“Everyone was a little more worried about the first two years with classes and more excited about getting with patients in the third and fourth year,” said Preiss, who graduated from Duke University in May. The symbolic white coats are a gift to class members from the Brody School of Medicine Alumni Society, said Karen Cobb, director of development for the ECU Medical & Health Sciences Foundation.

Psychiatric services in 13 eastern North Carolina counties are getting a boost thanks to a new collaborative effort involving East Carolina University, two local mental health organizations and the state Division of Mental Health.

Working with East Carolina Behavioral Health in New Bern and the Beacon Center in Rocky Mount, ECU’s Department of Psychiatric Medicine at the Brody School of Medicine is staffing three full-time psychiatry positions through face-to-face and telemedicine interactions with patients.

The services, offered in Northampton, Gates, Hertford, Bertie, Edgecombe, Nash, Wilson, Pitt, Greene, Beaufort, Craven, Pamlico and Jones counties, started Aug. 1.

“We believe this project helps us get on the right track for increasing access and availability of quality psychiatric care to underserved and unserved populations while also enhancing regional and local mechanisms to address the pressing shortage of psychiatrists,” said Dr. Sy Saeed, professor and chair of psychiatric medicine at ECU. Saeed said the state’s population is growing faster than the state’s supply of psychiatrists, setting the stage for a shortage. In addition, he said, the lack of psychiatrists in certain counties means people might not have access to the mental health care services they need, the lack of child psychiatrists statewide has reached a critical stage, and in some counties a shortage of psychiatrists and primary care providers exists, leaving people with mental disorders undiagnosed or untreated.

“The partnership with ECU will create a walk-in crisis psychiatric network, which will increase the access and availability of quality psychiatric care to currently underserved areas of eastern North Carolina,” said Roy P. Wilson, chief executive officer of East Carolina Behavioral Health. “We believe the network is a step in right direction and will become the model program for addressing the shortage of psychiatrists in North Carolina.”

2009 mission 7

D Ine p ta hr e tLmaebnt h e a d i n g

Lemasson

Campbell hopes to help prostate cancer survivors cope with side effects Researchers at East Carolina University are looking at whether providing coping skills training or comprehensive disease education to African-American prostate cancer survivors and their partners will help them better manage side effects and improve their quality of life.

ECU’s Procare study will evaluate a telephone-based coping skills training program tailored to black prostate cancer survivors and their intimate partners. The study is funded by a four-year, $1.5 million grant from the National Institutes of Health.

Researchers at Duke University are also participating in the study.

Campbell

“The Procare study is an effort to address the needs of African-American prostate cancer survivors in a couples context,” said Dr. Lisa Campbell, a psychologist and associate director of the ECU Center for Health Disparities Research. Campbell described how prostate cancer affects couples by quoting a survivor: “‘If I’ve got it, she’s got it.’”

In North Carolina last year, an estimated 6,543 people were diagnosed with prostate cancer, and more than 800 died from the disease, Campbell said, citing data from the North Carolina State Center for Health Statistics. From 2001-2004, black men with prostate cancer in North Carolina died at nearly three times the rate of white men, 73 per 100,000 compared to 25 per 100,000, she said.

In the Procare study, 189 early stage African-American prostate cancer survivors 8 mission 2009

and their intimate partners are being randomized to one of three conditions: a six-session partner-assisted coping skills training intervention; a cancer education intervention of equal duration; or usual care.

The study will measure quality of life, depression and relationship quality pre- and post-treatment among survivors and partners.

Nine of the state’s top 10 counties for prostate cancer mortality are in the east, Campbell said: Hertford, Northampton, Tyrrell, Martin, Perquimans, Sampson, Robeson, Gates and Edgecombe, again citing data from the State Center for Health Statistics.

The prostate is a male reproductive system gland, slightly larger than a walnut, near the rectum that produces part of the fluid contained in semen. Sexual and urinary symptoms, such as impotence and incontinence, and bowel symptoms are common after surgeons remove a cancerous prostate and often persist well beyond the acute treatment and recovery period. Reducing symptom distress and increasing quality of life are important symptom-management goals.

Symptom-management efforts have traditionally focused on the patient. However, symptoms also affect partners and the relationship. Among African-American men and their partners, the burden may be even greater. Black men have a 60 percent higher incidence rate of prostate cancer, more advanced disease at diagnosis and higher mortality rates than white men. Research also indicates that African-American men recover more slowly after treatment for prostate cancer.

Campbell hopes that this tele-health approach will make the Procare study accessible to African-American prostate cancer survivors and their partners throughout the state and particularly in the eastern North Carolina region increasingly affected by prostate cancer.

The trial is actively recruiting couples. To date, participants from 12 counties have participated, most residing in eastern North Carolina.

Grants aid study of cancer-causing virus Dr. Isabelle Lemasson, an assistant professor of microbiology and immunology at the Brody School of Medicine, has received two grants worth more than $500,000 to study a virus that causes a rare form of cancer.

A two-year, $358,000 grant from the National Institutes of Health and a two-year, $154,000 grant from the American Heart Association will help Lemasson continue her study of human T-cell leukemia virus type 1, a retrovirus that causes adult T-cell leukemia, an untreatable and often fatal disease.

Transmission occurs through breastfeeding, exposure to contaminated blood and sexual contact. While the disease is rare in the United States, it occurs in people who have emigrated from HTLV-1-endemic regions such as parts of Japan, the Caribbean Basin, South America and Africa.

Lemasson’s research also benefited from approximately $210,000 in start-up funding from the ECU Division of Research and Graduate Studies after she arrived in 2005 and a $25,000 research development grant.

Lemasson was a co-author on articles on HTLV-1 published in the Journal of Virology and Blood earlier this year.

In T h e L a b

Researchers receive record number of grants Faculty members at the Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University brought in a record number of grants in fiscal year 2008-2009, totaling nearly $24 million, while stimulus-related grants have gotten the 2009-2010 year off to a strong start.

In 2008-2009, a total of 195 grants were funded, according to the Office for Research and Graduate Studies at the medical school.

That’s up from 182 grants the previous fiscal year.

State and federal government grants, pharmaceutical firms and other sources funded $23.8 million in research, service and clinical trials work at the medical school. That’s down $4.6 million from the previous fiscal year largely due to a change in the timing of the receipt of a recurring $4.2 million contract, officials said.

About 48 percent of the dollars went to service, such as patient care, while the reminder went to basic science investigations, clinical research and clinical trials of devices, medicines and procedures.

Campuswide, ECU totaled nearly $40.8 million in external research dollars from July 1,

2008-June 30 of this year, also down from the previous year, according to the university’s Division of Research and Graduate Studies.

Meanwhile, ECU researchers have received nearly $4 million this year in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds, also known as the stimulus bill, with Brody School of Medicine researchers accounting for nearly $1 million of that total.

Dr. C. Jeffrey Smith, professor and chairman of microbiology and immunology, received $334,000 to continue his study of the microbe Bacteroides fragilis and abdominal infection.

Dr. David Tulis, an associate professor of physiology, received two grants worth a total of $262,422. One grant will fund a two-year summer research experience for a high school science teacher, and the other is a two-year administrative supplement Tulis plans to use for hiring a post-doctoral trainee. Tulis’ primary research focus is molecular, cellular and functional mechanisms that underlie aberrant vascular smooth muscle growth.

Dr. Darrell Neufer, professor of physiology and exercise and sport science and director of

ECU researcher to study healthy lifestyle curriculum for youth An East Carolina University pediatrician is studying the effectiveness of a school-based approach to tackling obesity and encouraging healthy lifestyles, thanks to a three-year, $300,000 grant.

Dr. Suzanne Lazorick, an assistant professor of pediatrics and public health at the Brody School of Medicine at ECU, is leading a study of a youth wellness education program called MATCH, or Dr. Suzanne Lazorick Motivating Adolescents with Technology to Choose Health. Lazorick is evaluating the effectiveness and feasibility of this innovative middle school-based obesity intervention in eastern North Carolina.

MATCH was started in 2006 by Tim Hardison, a science teacher at Williamston Middle School. It incorporates wellness themes into the existing health and science curriculum and includes goal-setting, physical activity and motivational strategies to help students reach a healthy weight.

Lazorick will study the results of the program among seventh graders at schools in Ayden, Robersonville, Hertford County, Washington County and Williamston by assessing body mass index measurements, eating choices and other factors.

Lazorick’s project will last through June 2012 and is funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Physician Faculty Scholars program. She is one of 15 scholars nationwide to be funded by the program this year and is the first ECU researcher to receive this award.

The Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina Foundation has funded the development of Hardison’s curriculum.

the ECU Metabolic Institute, received $188,000 for the purchase of a clinical analyzer. Neufer’s research focus is deciphering the molecular mechanisms governing mitochondrial bioenergetics and function in the context of the etiology of metabolic disease.

Dr. Ann O. Sperry, associate professor of anatomy and cell biology, received $143,000 to study whether a protein recently discovered in her laboratory influences the activity of a key regulatory molecule in cells. Results from her work will provide important information about how the organization of the cytoskeleton is controlled during normal development and how disruption might cause pathogenesis and disease.

Dr. Barbara Muller-Borer, an assistant professor of cardiovascular sciences, received $44,000 as part of a larger grant to Duke University to study what drives a stem cell to become a cardiac myocyte, or muscle cell, that could repair damaged heart tissue.

The government turned down an application for $10 million in stimulus funds to finish the fourth floor of the East Carolina Heart Institute at ECU into research labs.

Scientist presents at Oxford Dr. Saame Raza Shaikh, assistant professor in the Department of Dr. Saame Raza Shaikh Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the Brody School of Medicine, was recognized last summer for his research on how omega-3 fatty acids modify lipid/protein plasma membrane organization of lymphocytes, the white blood cells that are important to the body’s immune system.

Shaikh presented a 30-minute lecture at the 2009 Fatty Acids in Cell Signaling meeting at Keble College, Oxford, United Kingdom.

Shaikh presented his recently published model, based on quantitative fluorescence microscopy data, on nanometer scale plasma membrane domain organization and lymphocyte function.

2009 mission 9

Dr F eo pa mr tt h mee nt F o un h ed aa dti n i ogn

Kathyrn and Dr. Paul Walker

F r o m t h e F o un d a t i o n

A commitment to cancer care

Dr. Paul and Kathryn Walker make unprecedented gift

By Doug Boyd

D

r. Paul Walker and his wife, Kathryn, are making a commitment to expand the strengths and raise awareness of the Leo W. Jenkins Cancer Center while also hoping to spark the community to give in support of the cancer center.

Walker, an associate professor at the Brody School of Medicine and director of the thoracic oncology clinic, and his wife have given $500,000 to the ECU Medical & Health Sciences Foundation to be used to fund an endowed professorship in oncology and support research by faculty members.

Of the amount, $333,000 will draw a state match of $167,000 to fund the professorship. The rest will serve as seed grants to jump-start promising research so scientists can collect data and subsequently apply for larger grants.

The faculty member who holds the professorship will be called the Paul R. and Kathryn M. Hettinger Walker Distinguished Professor of Clinical Oncology.

“I firmly think there are a lot of strengths here,” Paul Walker said. “I believe there’s a lot of growth that can be accomplished. I’m committed to building a program, and that’s very exciting.”

Dr. Paul Cunningham, dean of the Brody School of Medicine, praised the Walkers’ generosity and desire to advance cancer research.

“What makes this even more special is that this has been provided by one of our own faculty,” Cunningham said. “This physician has a unique perspective as to the value of this support. Being a professional who works with some of our most vulnerable patients adds to the level of compassion that this gift reflects.”

Carole Novick, associate vice chancellor for health sciences development and alumni and president of the foundation, said the donation is one that will benefit eastern North Carolina.

“Kathy and Paul Walker believe strongly in the importance of the Leo W. Jenkins Cancer Center to our community,” Novick said.

“They see its potential and know that a donation of this magnitude will help to build on the strengths of the center, making possible expanded research and patient care.

This $500,000 gift, the largest ever from an ECU faculty member, is a challenge to others to join in support for our local cancer center.

These dollars will stay in our community.”

Walker came to ECU about five years ago from Indiana in the prime of his career in private practice. As a young physician, he had begun in internal medicine, but felt a calling to care for cancer patients. Thus, he entered a fellowship in medical oncology.

About that time, his father was diagnosed with colon cancer, which took his life. A brother-in-law died of brain cancer. That helped him see what cancer patients and their families go through, and he responded to his calling.

“It has shaped my view of how I think cancer should be treated and cared for,” Walker said. “Every patient deserves to know that everything possible has been done, is being done and will always be done in the treatment of their cancer and care of them.”

The Walkers want the cancer center to be the first place eastern North Carolinians think of when they think of cancer care.

They also want to make sure the center stays at the forefront in technology, research and patient care.

“Paul and Kathy Walker’s gift is a signal to the region and to the state of the loyalty and the confidence that the Leo Jenkins Cancer Center inspires among those who know it best,” said Dr. Adam Asch, professor and chief of hematology/oncology at ECU. “I hope that their profound generosity inspires newfound interest in the community and across the state in our mission of bringing state-of-the-art cancer care to our region.”

Since Walker arrived at ECU, the number of patients being cared for in his thoracic oncology clinic has doubled. The clinic saw more than 200 new patients in fiscal year 2008-2009, and the number is rising. Among the new approaches to care he’s working on is one that involves radiation oncologists and changes the timing of chemotherapy and radiation to target tumors when they are most vulnerable.

“Dr. Walker has been a leader in establishing multidisciplinary care as a model that our center embraces and, in the region, is uniquely qualified to deliver,” Asch said.

“New, more successful therapies for cancer will require such collaborative approaches.”

Kathryn Walker was a director of diagnostic imaging when she and Paul, then a young physician, met “over patient care,” she said.

“Patient care is very important to both of us.”

She added that her husband wants to make sure ECU is known as a place where patients receive innovative care, feel they are in a “safe haven” and know they are receiving all the care that’s available.

“That’s one of Paul’s mantras, that everything that can be done will be done,” she said.

2009 mission 11

12 mission 2008

Service

sustains THAT

Brody students teach others to help themselves By doUg Boyd

2008 mission 13

J

Jasmine Oxendine and Sakyra Thompson like talking about food.

“I like vegetables a lot, and fruit – strawberries, blueberries,” said Sakyra, 6.

Looking up through her dark curls, 8-year-old Jasmine smiled and whispered, “I love watermelon.”

The two girls were learning about nutrition and health during a summer program organized by Bryan Howington, now a second-year student at the Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University. He put together the healthy lifestyle program in his hometown of Pembroke with the goal of helping young people learn to eat better, exercise and make healthful lifestyle choices.

His program is evidence the spirit of service is alive and well at Brody. Students volunteer at clinics at the Greenville Community Shelter, Grimesland and elsewhere. Schweitzer Fellows and Brody Scholars organize service projects and educational programs for patients and members of the community.

“Most of their activities have more volunteers than they can use,” Dr. Thomas G. Irons, associate vice chancellor for regional health services at ECU, said of Brody students. “They are a continual inspiration to me.”

Service is nothing new at Brody, a school founded with a mission to improve the health status of eastern North Carolina.

“I tell applicants I’m always amazed our students do so much extracurricular when the

14 mission 2009

Medical student Bryan Howington set up a youth wellness program in his hometown of Pembroke.

curricular they face is astounding,” said Dr. James Peden, associate dean for admissions at Brody. “I think it’s part of the university’s commitment to serve and being an active member of the community. They desire not only to learn medicine but to help them while they’re learning.”

Helping back home Howington, a recipient of ECU’s Brody Medical Scholarship, organized the youth wellness program through his scholarship.

The project was funded by a $2,500 grant from the Brody Foundation, which was used to purchase exercise equipment, supplies and to cover other expenses.

Working with Howington were Tala Smith and Medical Shaun Deese – student Shaun fellow medical Deese works with Cherokee students, Pembroke Christi in natives and Lumbee Pembroke.

Indians. Howington and Deese hope to become pediatricians after medical school, and Smith favors family medicine. All three are graduates

of the University of North Carolina at Pembroke.

“Being from Pembroke, we all recognize the health disparities and the need,” Howington said. “And we all want to go back home and practice.”

In the 2000 census, 38 percent of Robeson County’s 123,339 people listed themselves as Native American. Among Native Americans, heart disease is by far the leading killer in North Carolina, according to the N.C. Center for Health Statistics. Cancer is second and diabetes third. The death rate from diabetes is more than twice as high for Indians as for whites.

About 20 youth ages 6 to 15 participated in the two-week program this summer at the Olivia Maynor Revels Community Building in this rural, southeastern North Carolina town. One day in late June, they gathered around tables after lunch in groups of three to six. Howington, Deese, Smith or another young adult led discussions about carbohydrates and high blood pressure. Some kids eagerly announced their favorite foods while others shyly hid their faces and wouldn’t say how much they like fruits.

After the lessons, they headed outside for kickball and touch football under the summer sun.

“We’ve been telling them to go home and tell their parents what they’re learning here every day,” such as reducing consumption of sugared drinks, Deese said. “If you tell them

to eat fruits and vegetables, it’s up to the parent to buy the fruits and vegetables to have there to eat.”

Saying the program was going well would have been an understatement.

“Oh, gosh, the kids love Bryan,” said Lemark Harris, executive director of the Pembroke Housing Authority. “I think Bryan’s been a little surprised, too, at how the kids have taken to him and his classmates.”

Jasmine smiled and said, “I’ve had so much fun bowling, skating and swimming.”

The students’ work in Pembroke isn’t likely a one-time thing. Despite the chance of high-paying opportunities in certain specialties or offers to work for more money in a city, they want to make a difference in their hometown.

“We all want to come back to the community and work,” said Deese, who grew up in a mobile home and briefly dropped out of high school. “I’ve never really looked at it as money. I want to come back and help the community.”

He also wants to inspire youth who, like him, might not have the means but can still have the drive to succeed. His younger sisters were in the second group of children to participate in the program.

“You don’t have to be the most privileged person to go to medical school,” he said.

“You just have to work hard.”

worthy of applying for the fellowship.

“There are so many barriers that stand in the way of necessary health care,” said Padia, of Cary, who majored in Spanish at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill.

“This is one step we hope will make them feel more comfortable.”

Padia studied in Spain and was a health volunteer in Mexico. Mian, also a UNC-CH graduate, studied in Mexico and Ecuador.

Their goals were to bring women together to learn and share their experiences as well as network.

When they were beginning their program, they spoke about it at St. Gabriel Catholic

very hard to learn.”

Mian’s and Padia’s interest in helping people goes deeper than a service project.

Mian is looking at entering primary care, perhaps pediatrics, and teaching. Padia is also leaning toward pediatrics and wants to pursue a master’s of public health degree with a focus on Latino populations.

“Reema and Sarah have done a marvelous job of finding ways to recruit women for their classes,” said Irons, who oversees the Schweitzer Fellows program at ECU. “They have great attendance, more than I have ever seen at previous, similar programs. They are highly organized and both have strong service

Reema Padia, left, and Sarah Mian, are helping Spanishspeaking women learn English and more in their Schweitzer Fellowship project.

Learning language and more Working hard is no problem for another pair of students who organized another service project. They held a weekly session one October night at the James D. Bernstein Community Health Center in Greenville where 13 women, many from Mexico, learned about breast cancer from Liz Steele, a registered nurse with the Pitt County Health Department.

They were there because of the work of Sarah Mian and Reema Padia, second-year medical students at ECU who organized the classes through their Schweitzer Fellowship.

Their project promotes the education and well-being of Spanish-speaking women by teaching English skills, providing mentoring and holding health education sessions.

Both wanted to help the Spanish-speaking population in Pitt County, and by putting their ideas together, they could have a project

Church’s Spanish mass. “We had over 30 women sign up,” Padia said. “Once we started the program, our first class, we had four women show up, and we were disappointed.”

So they went to work contacting the women who had signed up.

“The very next week we had over 20 women come,” she said. “Some women seem to just like talking to somebody. Then there are other women who have certain goals.”

Many want to learn English so they can help their children with schoolwork and communicate with their children’s teachers.

“I thank God for the opportunity these women have provided for us because it’s been fun and very interesting to speak English,” Dora Lopez, who’s from Mexico and works at a florist, said as Steele interpreted. “It’s

commitments. They approach their work with humility and openness. They’re wonderful examples of Dr. Schweitzer’s credo, ‘I decided to make my life my argument.’”

Mian said hearing the personal stories of the women in the program, such as one who was able to find a job after learning how to create a resume and apply for positions.

“It’s rewarding to see there is need and they do appreciate the classes,” she said.

Elida Diaz, also from Mexico, said the program is one of several in the area aimed at helping immigrants advance themselves. “I came from Georgia, and they didn’t have a program where they helped people,” she said through Steele. “In Greenville, they help the immigrants more.”

2009 mission 15

16 mission 2009

A new home The Drs. Knudson bring leadership and scholarship to East Carolina BY

D OUG

BOY D

Up on the seventh floor of the Brody Medical Sciences Building, Drs. Cheryl and Warren Knudson have an enviable view of Greenville and the surrounding countryside.

The view is a big change from Chicago, the couple’s last home before coming to North Carolina.

After more than 20 years at Rush Medical College, where they mentored doctoral students, established educational programs for inner-city youth and raised a family, they decided to start over. An opening for a chair of anatomy at East Carolina University was the perfect opportunity.

“It was our opportunity to make something new here,” Cheryl Knudson said. New it is, as neither one of them had ever lived in the South. Plus, she added, “it’s nice having a short, easy commute.”

2009 mission 17

Dr. Cheryl Knudson talks with doctoral candidate Na Cuo.

Starting out Born near Los Angeles, Cheryl Knudson graduated with a bachelor’s degree from Pomona College and a doctorate from the University of Southern California. Warren Knudson is an Illinois native, with a bachelor’s degree from Elmhurst College in Illinois and a doctorate from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

It was at Tufts University in Boston, where both were pursuing fellowships, that they met. It wasn’t anything as storybook as love at first sight, they said. They even laughed a little at the thought. When they arrived at Tufts, Warren Knudson said, they were too busy starting their new research projects. But after a short while, he said, “we really saw each other and knew this was a forever relationship.”

They also had another common interest: how cells communicate with each other. In Boston, they met Dr. Elizabeth Hay, the renowned cell biologist at Harvard Medical School and one of the first to show that the extracellular matrix plays a vital role in determining cell behaviors. Cell communication is a field that developed in the 20th century. Along with Hay, the Knudsons met other pioneers, which furthered their interest.

18 mission 2009

“It’s like knowing your academic grandparents,” Warren Knudson said. That set them on their career path: the study of cell communication as it relates to connective tissue.

Time for a change After Tufts, they went to Rush, where they raised their children and built their careers.

Both held endowed chairs. But after their children left for college, they decided they wanted new surroundings and new challenges.

Their graduate students were finishing their studies, and the chair position opened at ECU, “so the timing was right,” Warren Knudson said.

The chance to lead an academic department didn’t necessarily fill a career goal for Cheryl Knudson, but it did fit her path and talents as someone who is a superb organizer.

“Bringing people together was an outstanding skill of my former department chair and that is one of my goals,” she said. “My Ph.D. advisor told me I would be a department chair one day. I wouldn’t say that 10 years ago my goal was to be a department chair.” But the opportunity was there.

“I like the idea it’s a growing school,” she said of ECU. “It has a mission to give opportunities to lots of different students

and to give them a chance to have their dreams come true.”

The Knudsons had participated in programs at Rush that brought low-income and inner-city youth to the school to study with faculty members. Brody has similar programs geared toward youth in eastern North Carolina.

“It’s the same kind of kids who don’t necessarily have the same opportunities,” Cheryl Knudson said. “You still have this reasonably bright kid who loves science, but they may not fit in well with their classmates in high school. It’s important for them to meet other kids who like science and have that peer support.”

Leadership and scholarship The Knudsons brought National Institutes of Health funding with them, and this summer Cheryl Knudson received a five-year, $1.6 million grant from the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases of the National Institutes of Health to study a protein that might hold the key to healing cartilage in people with degenerative osteoarthritis.

“It’s a validation,” Cheryl said of receiving the grant. “The basis of the grant proposal

was research work done in anatomy and cell in research and teaching, the Knudsons are biology here at ECU. It also confirms in active in committee work. another way that my decision to come here “There are also less tangible contributions was a good one.” that the Knudsons have made to this Figuring out how cartilage cells communidepartment,” Sperry added. “I believe their cate that they are under stress or discovering a collegiality and friendliness promotes a fun marker they send out as they begin cartilage place to work.” destruction could lead to more effective Longtime anatomy faculty member Dr. treatments for arthritis. “The issue of the Ronald Dudek, professor and director of role of the matrix in cell-to-cell communicagraduate studies, praised the Knudsons for tion is very interesting especially since the the energy they’ve brought to ECU. majority of cartilage tissue is extracellular “They certainly have brought a level of matrix. Arthritis is a disease process in which professionalism to the department we have cross-cellular communication is dysfuncnever had in the 30 years I’ve been in the tional,” she said. department,” Dudek said. He praised Cheryl Osteoarthritis occurs when cartilage lining Knudson’s administrative ability and Warren the ends of joints degenerates, most often Knudson’s work with students. occurring in the fingers, hip and knees of Dudek credits the Knudsons with aging adults or adults who have experienced improving the department’s seminar series. various joint injuries. Osteoarthritis is the Cheryl Knudson appointed a faculty most common arthritic condition in the committee to be responsible for bringing in country and is responsible in aggregate for top-notch speakers, and Warren Knudson vast economic costs in direct medical care and works with graduate students a few days lost workdays. before the speaker arrives to help them learn “By the time you feel the pain, it’s too late,” more about the speaker’s research. Seminar Warren Knudson said. “The damage is discussions are then included on students’ already done, and cartilage doesn’t repair exams. itself.”

Graduate student Liliana Mellor said Cheryl Knudson is also associate editor of Warren Knudson is enthusiastic and good at the journal Connective Tissue Research and explaining complex scientific information. vice president of the “He’s great at International Society expressing for Hyaluronan things,”she said.

Sciences.

He assigns the Faculty members students papers say the Knudsons related to the have sparked the speaker’s research, department’s which Mellor said missions: teaching, helps students be research and service. able to converse in “They actively more depth with the participate in speaker once he or teaching graduateshe arrives. “It makes level courses and the speaker feel courses to medical better, too,” she said. students as well as Mellor, who’s serve as research from Columbia, said mentors to graduate the Knudsons also —Cheryl Knudson students,” said Dr. encourage diversity.

Ann Sperry, an In their labs, they associate professor. also have graduate “Their active research program provides a students from India and China. ‘critical mass’ of individuals working on Another way the Knudsons have shown scientific problems that can act as resources their dedication to diversity is Cheryl for those in other laboratories. Their Knudson’s work with the Brody Women enthusiasm for science provides a stimulating Faculty Committee and a subgroup she environment for other faculty members, created that focuses on bringing women students and postdocs. Besides their activities scientists together from east and west campus.

“I like the idea it’s a growing school ... It has a mission to give opportunities to lots of different students and to give them a chance to have their dreams come true.”

Dr. Warren Knudson

Sperry said Cheryl Knudson is a role model, and not just for female students and young faculty members. “There are few female scientists at her level of achievement, and we are lucky to have someone here who demonstrates that this is possible and can provide direct guidance in the career development of faculty, both male and female.”

She also echoed Dudek’s praise of Knudson’s leadership skills. “Cheryl is an able and extremely energetic administrator,” Sperry said. “My impression is that she is an active advocate for her faculty and department with the administration, which is essential for our growth individually and as a department. What is particularly impressive to me is that she is able to attend to the numerous tasks required of her and still maintain an active research program.”

In addition to their work at ECU the move to eastern North Carolina brought other benefits for the Knudsons. As academics, they’re interested in history, and living in one of the original 13 Colonies is a plus, Cheryl Knudson said. They also enjoy the work of the state’s artisans. She keeps her business cards in a piece of pottery from Seagrove.

And there was another unexpected surprise for Cheryl Knudson, who grew up with scents of Southern California flora – pines and flowers.

“Here, it’s the same kind of smell in the morning,” she said with a smile.

2009 mission 19

Mission magazine writer marion Blackburn spent time with a group of m1s a few days before their second block of fall exams. over coffee and doughnuts, they shared their experiences. Mission plans to keep tabs on these students each year of their medical school career.

Tears, fears 20 mission 2007

and cheers The ďŹ rst-year workload means hours of studying, missed family events and overdue workouts, but these m1s say they wouldn’t have it any other way By Marion Blackburn

2009 mission 21

In a few short weeks after starting medical school, first-year students experience enough peaks and lows to last a lifetime. With less (or no) free time, they are isolated by distance and by obligations from their friends and family, their days shorn of familiar routines. Their homes, too, show the strain with dishes unwashed, clothes unfolded and beds unmade.

Still, they’ll tell you nothing compares to following a dream. That each night, falling asleep exhausted, they know they’ve lived to the fullest. That while the workload feels overwhelming, it pushes them to achievements they couldn’t have imagined.

The M1s who arrived at the Brody School of Medicine in August are no different. They’re facing the toughest times of their lives as they balance personal pursuits, family time and basic needs like eating and exercising with learning vast amounts of new material. They’re exhilarated by the pace and driven by their own natural curiosity to absorb all the information they can.

Medical school at midlife Michael Weeks is 43. A clinical social worker, addiction therapist and certified public accountant, he said he never felt right in any of his former professions.

For years, he envied his sister, Dr. Kathy Weeks ’91, who completed medical school and went on to an internship in Charlotte.

While managing a program for substance abusers, he realized his heart was in another place. “Med school always sounded exciting,” he said. “(But) I didn’t think I was med school material.”

S MIC H A EL W EE K Turns out he was medical school material, after all. In a major life turn, he enrolled in several prerequisite classes, and 22 mission 2009

in fall 2008 applied to medical school.

He was accepted at Brody and hasn’t looked back.

“This is nothing like I expected,” he said. “Everyone told me, ‘You won’t believe how hard it is.’ You just don’t have any time to do anything but study, get some sleep and do it again and again.”

The personal rewards, however, have been stunning.

“It’s exciting, even when you’re doing the same thing every day,” he said. “When you reflect, you realize you’ve learned so much in a short period of time.”

Does he still have anxieties? Absolutely – but not the kind one would expect. “The concerns I had – that I wouldn’t be able to keep up because I’m older – haven’t really materialized,” he said. “But you do have to work differently.” He learns less by rote and more by mnemonics and by putting information in context.

And in the end, he said, it’s lots of fun.

That is, “if you think it’s fun running for your life and being shot at. At the end of the day, you feel good about yourself,” he said.

“It’s a good feeling.”

DIA

NA

E SP

LL

Standout with a plan For Diana Spell, 23, attending medical school came as a natural transition from her outstanding college years. A recipient of the Brody Scholarship, she is a graduate of Spelman College for women in Atlanta, one of the nation’s top historically black universities that’s also known for sending a high number of graduates into medicine. She was drawn to medicine not only for the challenges but also to help others.

Only a few weeks into her first year, she faced a heart-breaking decision before realizing she couldn’t attend her brother’s

KE

Now that he’s here, he’s overwhelmed – in a good way, most of the time. “It’s not how much you study but the quality,” said Mehaffey, who’s originally from Clyde, near Asheville.

“You can never get caught up,” he said.

“You get used to being behind, and you trust it will all come together before the exam. You can’t allow yourself to panic.”

As an undergraduate, he logged EY more than 900 HA hours volunteering VE N with Project Heart as a math and science tutor.

As an ECU swimmer, he enjoyed early morning laps with the team, time he now uses to study before his first class at 8:30 a.m.

His rule of thumb for exam prep? “Just ‘MD in seven’ know everything,” he said.

He’s already halfway through his M1 year, He chalks up at least four hours of but Hunter Mehaffey, 21, doesn’t even have a studying every day but often calls his family bachelor’s degree yet. back home. “It’s important to That’s because this make time for personal exceptional student, a phone calls,” he said. former ECU “You have to, or swimmer and you can lose long-time touch with volunteer, people who entered are medical important school as to you.” an “MD Like his in seven” classmates, – students he who show experiences such ups and promise that downs. But they complete his best day? their under“Every day,” graduate degree he said. “You’re during medical Y living your dream. It’s FE F school.

A hard, but I wouldn’t want H E H UN TER M For years, he’s wanted to to be anywhere else.” become a doctor, applying for medical school after his sophomore year at ECU. LL

wedding. While remembering it still brings some tears, she accepts her choice to keep up with her courses by not attending.

“I see the bigger picture,” she said.

While she was already an excellent student at Spelman, medical school requires complete devotion. Gone are hours working out or exercising, and even phone calls seem an interruption at times. “The moment you realize you can’t take those hours for yourself is a low point,” she said.

There are high points, too. The best?

“When I found out I was awarded a Brody Scholarship,” she said. “I was bawling because I was so happy.”

Her personal goal is to not only learn the material, but also drill herself to recall it.

M3s and M4s often help during their “bomb sessions,” their name for these intense study groups. Studying so much means she must streamline household chores. She uses paper plates and cups to avoid having dirty dishes pile up.

“In college, you had a personal life,” she said. “Now, to make sure I’m prepared, I quiz myself. It takes time to feel confident going into a test. I have to study more.”

Healthy justice Growing up in a suburb of Greenville, Kelley Haven had what she considers a comfortable childhood. Both her parents were in medicine; her father was a doctor and her mother, a pediatric nurse.

So when she volunteered at 14 with a local soup kitchen, she felt deeply moved by the needs around her.

When she was asked to cut greens for cooking, “I had no idea what I was doing,” she said.

“I was hooked the day I went,” she remembers. By high school, she decided to work in a service profession. Today, she is still helping others, drawing inspiration from civil rights leaders who fought for justice together, living, eating and working side-by-side like a family.

Haven, 24, is an M1 again this year, completing classes she began before giving birth to her little girl, Minnie. She became pregnant before med school and attended most of the first semester before giving birth in November 2008.

Three days later, she took a biochemistry exam and sat out the spring before returning in fall 2009.

She laughs about it now, but she had a terrible scare the night before an anatomy exam when she experienced serious bronchospasms that nearly sent her to the E.D. Instead of fearing for her health, she worried more about missing the exam.

Breathing better with the aid of an inhaler, she took the exam and made a high B. Her days start at 6 a.m., and before class, she helps a disabled friend. During the day, her daughter stays with her father, from whom Haven is separated. She bikes to class when possible – her “clearing my head time.”

She maintains a light-hearted approach to the pressures. “Humor and respect are key to surviving,” she said.

2009 mission 23

Students listen to and learn from Dr. David Fairbrother, second from right, during a Personal Professional Leadership group meeting.

Free-speech

ZONE A group gives new medical students a chance to share feelings outside the high-pressure world of classroom and lab

By Marion Blackburn

24 mission 2009

In her first semester, Lisa Walters, 21, realized her classmates all felt moved in unexpected ways by anatomy class. For her, small details like hair and nails evoked a strikingly human connection with the cadavers.

She couldn’t help feeling touched by the donation that gave her an opportunity to learn. “You respect the individual,” she said.

“It was someone’s brother, or sister, or mother.”

Because their learning journey takes students so deeply into the human experience – and asks so much of them in return – the Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University offers the Personal Professional Leadership program. While they’re being asked about everything from amino acids to zygotes, first-year medical students rarely get asked to let their guard down and talk. Their PPL groups offer a warm setting and mutual acceptance to do so.

In August, along with their white coats, M1s from the Class of 2013 received their PPL group assignment, as others have before them since 1994. The PPLs are led by two faculty members – physicians, basic scientists and administrators. Together, they sort through the emotions and uncertainties that leave students reeling.

PPL meetings give first-year medical students a safe place to share their fears and joys. They also gain strategies for mastering the information that often comes at them like water from a hydrant.

“The amount of material we cover in a given day was the biggest shock,” said student Andrew Tee, 26. “I heard about it and everyone

said, ‘Get ready for it.’ But I didn’t understand what they meant by a lot of information.

That’s taken some getting used to.”

Eventually, students adjust, but not without some doubts. Their PPL conversations help them get used to the new normal.

“I remember the first set of exams,” said Dr. David Fairbrother ’97, a pediatric cardiologist at the medical school and PPL group leader for two years. “You’re used to doing well in high school and in college, and you expect to achieve and excel as you’ve always done. You end up failing or nearly failing, and it’s a humbling experience.

“Then you realize that others in the class are going through what you are,” he said.

“You also realize that with support, you’re going to get through it.”

Students meet during orientation and throughout their first year, usually around exam times. They generally gather at the Brody Building, but might visit someone’s home during holidays. After sharing so many trials, group members become trusted study partners and friends.

Test blocks, roughly every month, demand that students think through complex questions with only partial information to rely on. These exams test critical thinking and prepare them to sort through symptoms and problems with lots of unknowns.

“Students feel like they’re struggling and imagine they’re the only ones having to adapt to the academic rigors of medical school,” said Dr. Virginia Hardy, senior associate dean for academic affairs. “So we help them feel more comfortable sharing these feelings.

“If you’ve been a top-notch student and you get a C, it feels like it could ruin your life,” Hardy said. “In PPL, they can normalize their feelings and share with others.” For some students, the release of emotions is just what they need to get through the next exam block. Occasionally, students realize medical school is not where they belong after all.

In addition to the “personal” comes the “professional.” At a recent PPL gathering, the topic was social media. Facebook and other Web sites allow anyone to share photos from parties and vacations. Students mulled over the implications for their careers: that crazy family reunion photo may not be what one would like an employer or patient to see.

This year’s PPL groups agreed on several attributes of professionalism to guide them.

These included respect, excellence, altruism, accountability, honor, integrity and duty.

They adopted an additional goal of writing an ethical guide based on these traits.

“The first week, we went through what we consider professional behavior and what we want to see in other physicians,” Walters said.

“We all want a physician who will take time to understand – a caring and generous person who is ethical.”

Looking back, second-year student John Yoon, 26, said the PPL groups allowed his class to find their shared goals and principles.

Moreover, with a firm footing, he felt he was able to more fully develop as a student leader.

In November, he served as the Brody School of Medicine’s delegate to the student section of the American Medical Association meeting in Houston.

“The PPL was a great way to connect with students I may not have connected to,” Yoon said. “Now that we’re close, we discuss things that are a concern for us – curriculum, medical school life. We formed a small community that allowed us to help each other along the way.

“PPL helped me pursue leadership by connecting me with other people,” he said.

“The struggle with leadership in med school is that you have to do well in school. That’s your first responsibility. PPL helps you stay focused and grounded and support one another.”

In PPL groups, students realize they’re not competing with each other. That helps remove friction among classmates from the M1 emotional climate.

“Everybody seems to be really helpful, as compared to being competitive,” Tee said.

“We all want to do well, but not when it’s to the detriment of everyone else.” They talk without judging, and confessions stay confidential. That includes feeling wiped out by the first exams.

“There’s nothing you’ve done before that can prepare you for the first exams of med school,” Fairbrother said. “After that, you learn how to study, how to pay attention to the details you need to remember. Things begin to go up after that.”

For Tee, that message meant a lot.

“It was nice to hear him say he also struggled,” he said. “Hearing from someone who’s gone through it gives you perspective.”

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New Faculty Dr. Prashanti Atluri Assistant professor of internal medicine M.D.: Kasturba Medical College, India Residency: Gandhi Hospital, India, Jamaica Hospital Medical Center,

New York Fellowship: Winthrop University Hospital, New York (hematology/oncology) Dr. David A. Brown Assistant professor of physiology Ph.D.: University of Colorado at Boulder

Dr. John Cahill Assistant professor of cardiovascular sciences M.D.: University College Dublin Medical School, Ireland Residency: St. Joseph Exempla Hospital and the

University of Colorado Fellowships: University of Colorado (cardiac imaging); University of Michigan (nuclear medicine)

Dr. Qing Cao Clinical assistant professor of family medicine M.D.: Hubei Medical University, China Residency: ECU Fellowship: ECU (geriatrics) Dr. Stefan Clemons Assistant professor of physiology Ph.D.: UniversitĂŠ Bordeaux 1, France

Dr. Ramesh Daggubati Clinical associate professor of cardiovascular sciences M.D.: Kasturba Medical College, India Residency: Kasturba Medical College, Jamaica Hospital Medical Center, New York Fellowships: Winthrop University Hospital, New York (clinical cardiology); Yale University/ Bridgeport Hospital (interventional cardiology); Loma Linda University Medical Center, California (research cardiology)

26 mission 2009

Dr. Jennifer Defazio Assistant professor of medicine M.D.: West Virginia University Residency: WVU Fellowship: Dermatologic Surgery Specialists, Georgia (Mohs surgery) Dr. Tejas Desai Assistant professor of internal medicine M.D.: New York University School of Medicine Residency: New York University, Mount Sinai School of Medicine-Jersey

City Medical Center Fellowship: Emory University (nephrology)

Dr. Maureen Depres Clinical assistant professor of pediatrics M.D.: University of Massachusetts Residency: ECU

Dr. Christopher Duffrin Assistant professor of family medicine Ph.D.: Ohio University Dr. Teresa Edenfield Assistant professor of psychiatric medicine Ph.D.: University of Maine

Dr. Justin Edwards Clinical assistant professor of family medicine M.D.: ECU Residency: ECU

Dr. Larisa Gavrilova-Jordan Assistant professor of OB/GYN M.D.: Kubanskaya State Medical Academy, Russia Residency: Mayo Clinic, Minnesota Fellowship: Duke University (reproductive endocrinology and infertility)

Dr. Enamul Haque Clinical assistant professor of surgery M.D.: University of Texas Health Science Center-San Antonio Residency: State University of New York-Syracuse Fellowships: Kleinert Institute for Hand and Microsurgery, Kentucky; Saint Louis University Hospital, Missouri (plastic and reconstructive surgery) Dr. Andrea Hernandez Clinical assistant professor of psychiatric medicine M.D.: Universidad de Ciencias Medicas de Centro America Residency: ECU Dr. Isham Huizar Assistant professor of medicine M.D.: Universidad Anahuac, Mexico Residency: Hospital of St. Raphael, Connecticut Fellowship: University of Washington (lung biology) Dr. Dawn Kendrick Assistant professor of emergency medicine M.D.: ECU Residency: Maine Medical Center Fellowship: Children’s Hospital of Alabama (pediatric emergency medicine) Dr. Jeffrey Livingston Associate professor of OB/GYN M.D.: Medical College of Virginia Residency: ECU Fellowship: University of Tennessee Health Science Center (maternal-fetal medicine) Dr. Cynthia Lynch Assistant professor of medicine M.D.: MCP Hahnemann School of Medicine, Philadelphia Residency: Cleveland Clinic Florida Fellowship: ECU (hematology/oncology)

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New Faculty Dr. Sheran Mahatme Assistant professor of medicine D.O.: Kirksville College of Osteopathic Medicine, Missouri Residency: Henry Ford Hospital, Michigan Fellowship: University of Pittsburgh (infectious diseases) Dr. Angie Mathai Clinical assistant professor of medicine M.D.: Ross University School of Medicine, West Indies Residency: ECU Dr. Carol Moore Clinical assistant professor of emergency medicine M.D.: ECU Residency: Mayo Clinic, Minnesota; ECU Fellowship: Mayo Clinic (plastic surgery) Dr. Martha Naylor Clinical assistant professor of pediatrics M.D.: Eastern Virginia Medical School Residency: EVMS Fellowship: University of Virginia (neonatology)

Dr. Melissa Rayburg Assistant professor of pediatrics M.D.: Michigan State University Residency: University of Texas Health Science Center-San Antonio Fellowship: Cincinnati Children’s Hospital (pediatric hematology/ oncology) Dr. Cynthia D. Rolston Clinical assistant professor of psychiatric medicine Ph.D.: Ohio University

Dr. Matthew Rosenbaum Assistant professor of comparative medicine DVM: University of Tennessee Dr. Robert Shaw Clinical associate professor of medicine M.D.: Duke University Residency: Ohio State University Fellowship: Ohio State University (pulmonary medicine) Dr. Coral Steffey Clinical assistant professor of pediatrics M.D.: University of Texas Health Sciences Center-San Antonio Residency: Children’s Medical Center, Texas

Dr. Danthai Thongphiew Clinical assistant professor of radiation oncology Ph.D.: Case Western Reserve University, Ohio Dr. Leanna Thorn Assistant professor of emergency medicine M.D.: ECU Residency: ECU Dr. Diane Walters Assistant professor of physiology Ph.D.: Johns Hopkins University

Dr. Yilmaz Yildirim Clinical assistant professor of psychiatric medicine M.D.: Hacettepe University, Turkey Residency: ECU Fellowship: ECU (child and adolescent psychiatry) Dr. Robert Ziegelmann Clinical assistant professor of family medicine M.D.: University of Michigan Residency: ECU

ECU physicians named to annual Best Doctors list Forty physicians from the Brody School of Medicine have been chosen by their peers for inclusion in the 2009-2010 “Best Doctors” list.

The annual list is compiled by Best Doctors Inc., a Boston-based group that surveys more than 30,000 physicians across the United States who previously have been included in the list asking whom they would choose to treat themselves or their families.

Approximately 5 percent of the physicians who practice in North Carolina make the annual list.

The ECU physicians on the list are Drs. Diana J. Antonacci, John M. Diamond and

Kaye L. McGinty, psychiatric medicine; Drs. Joseph D. Babb, W. Randolph Chitwood Jr. and Charles S. Powell, cardiovascular sciences; Drs. Mary Jane Barchman and Paul Bolin, nephrology; Dr. William A. Burke, dermatology; Drs. Paul P. Cook and Keith M. Ramsey, infectious diseases; Dr. James J. Cummings, pediatric neonatal-perinatal medicine; Dr. Paul R. G. Cunningham, surgery; Drs. Raymond Dombroski and Edward R. Newton, obstetrics and gynecology; Drs. David N. Collier, Irma Fiordalisi, Glenn Harris, Karin Marie Hillenbrand, Thomas G. Irons, Dale A. Newton, William E. Novotny, Kathleen V. Previll, Michael Reichel, Debra A.

Tristram, Charles F. Willson and Judy Wheat Wood, pediatrics; Dr. David A. Goff, internal medicine/pediatrics; Drs. David Hannon and Charlie J. Sang Jr., pediatric cardiology; Drs. Yash P. Kataria and Mani S. Kavuru, pulmonary, critical care and sleep medicine; Drs. Lars C. Larsen, Robert J. Newman, Kenneth K. Steinweg and Ricky Lee Watson, family medicine; Dr. Daniel P. Moore, physical medicine and rehabilitation; Dr. Ronald M. Perkin, pediatric critical care and sleep medicine; Dr. Eric A. Toschlog, surgery and critical care medicine; and Dr. Emmanuel Zervos, surgical oncology.

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Hardy

Hardy named vice provost for student affairs

Dr. Virginia Hardy, a veteran leader in academic and student affairs at East Carolina University, is moving to east campus to become vice provost for student affairs. Her new job begins Jan. 1.

Hardy will oversee campus housing and dining; the student recreation center; student health services and the counseling center; the dean of students’ office; Greek life; and Mendenhall Student Center.

Hardy joined the university in 1993 as a student counselor in the Brody School of Medicine and since 2005 had served as senior associate dean for academic affairs. She was the university’s interim chief diversity officer from 2006 to 2008, and she has taught in the medical school since 2000.

Chitwood receives award Dr. W. Randolph Chitwood Jr., director of the East Carolina Heart Institute, Chitwood has received the Ellis Island Medal of Honor.

The award recognizes people who have made enduring contributions to the nation and world, according to the National Ethnic Coalition of Organizations, which presents it.

Chitwood received the award for his national and international contributions in the field of cardiac surgery and minimally invasive mitral valve surgery. He is professor of cardiovascular sciences at the Brody School of Medicine and senior associate vice chancellor for health sciences at ECU.

28 mission 2009

Frelix receives service award Dr. Gloria Frelix, an assistant clinical professor Frelix of radiation oncology at the Brody School of Medicine, has received the National Medical Association’s James P. Whittico award for outstanding service.

Frelix was recognized for her leadership in cleaning up a toxic waste dump in her hometown of Columbia, Miss., where people were dying of cancer and other diseases due to toxic waste.

Frelix also recently served on a consensus panel on cancer disparities conjointly with the American Cancer Society and the National Medical Society. The panel published a 57-page report on disparities.

Frelix has also been selected for the 2010 class of the North Carolina Medical Society Foundation Leadership College.

Rotondo to chair national trauma committee Dr. Michael F. Rotondo, profesRotondo sor and chair of surgery at the Brody School of Medicine, has been appointed chair of the Committee on Trauma of the American College of Surgeons.

Rotondo will serve as the 18th chair of the committee, founded in 1922. His term will be from March 2010 until 2012, and he can be reappointed to another two-year term.

Rotondo is a former president of the Eastern Association for the Surgery of Trauma and has served in leadership roles in the American Association for the Surgery of Trauma.

Willson to chair Health and Wellness Trust Fund Dr. Charles Willson, a clinical Willson professor of pediatrics at the Brody School of Medicine, is the new chair of the North Carolina Health and Wellness Trust Fund Commission.

Willson was unanimously elected at the commission’s July 16 meeting.

Willson has served on the commission since its inception in 2001, has chaired the Research, Education and Prevention Task Force and remains a member of the Obesity and Wellness Task Force.

Created by the General Assembly in 2000 to allocate a portion of North Carolina’s share of the national tobacco settlement, the HWTF has invested $199 million to support preventive health initiatives and $102 million to fund prescription drug assistance programs.

Liles named ‘Woman of the Year’ Dr. Darla Liles, a cancer specialist at the Brody School Liles of Medicine, is the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society’s Eastern North Carolina 2009 Woman of the Year.

Liles, an associate professor of medicine, raised more than $23,000 during a 10-week fundraising campaign for the society, more than any other woman in the campaign. Liles raised the money through letters to patients, friends and other physicians and events such as dinners, a silent auction, a Pampered Chef party and others.

Liles serves as the program director for the hematology/oncology fellowship program.

She also treats patients at an outreach clinic operated by Heritage Hospital in Tarboro.

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Four named master educators at Brody for 2009 Drs. Irene Hamrick, Ronald Johnson, John Olsson and Walter Robey have been named master educators for 2009 at the Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University.

Hamrick is an associate professor of family medicine and an ECU medical Hamrick graduate. She leads the geriatric division and directs the geriatric fellowship at Brody. She joined the medical faculty in 1997. Hamrick was recognized for educational leadership, administration, and outstanding teaching or mentoring.

Johnson is a professor of biochemistry and molecular biology. He has a doctorate from Northwestern University and completed a fellowship at the University of California. At Brody, he is studying how to fight bacterial

infections by disabling bacterial RNA, funded by a $175,000 grant from the National Institutes of Health. He has been on the ECU faculty since Johnson 1991. Johnson was recognized for outstanding teaching or mentoring.

A professor of pediatrics, Olsson has a medical degree from Pennsylvania State University and completed residency and fellowship training at Emory University. Olsson is associate director of the ECU Pediatric Healthy Weight Research and Treatment Center.

He has been on the ECU faculty since 1998.

Olsson was recognized for outstanding teaching or mentoring.

Robey is an associate professor of emergency medicine. He has a medical degree from the Universite de Bordeaux and completed residency training at Morristown Memorial Hospital in New Jersey. Robey joined the faculty in 1994 and is director of the Robey Medical Simulation & Patient Safety Lab. Robey was recognized for leadership and administration, teaching contribution or mentorship, innovation and curriculum development.

Since the program began in 2002, 34 Brody faculty members have been recognized.

Olsson

Faculty deaths Three current and former faculty members of the Brody School of Medicine died in 2009.

Dr. F. Douglas Jones, a neurosurgeon, died July 15 of cancer. He was 58.

A native of WilkesBarre, Pa., Jones was a graduate of the University of Jones Pennsylvania and Eastern Virginia Medical School. He completed his neurosurgical residency at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

In 1985, he moved to Greenville, where he joined Eastern Neurosurgical and Spine Associates and served as an adjunct faculty member at the medical school. In 2008, his practice merged with ECU, and Jones became a full-time faculty member.

Jones is survived by his wife, Brenda; two children, a sister and other relatives.

Lawrence

Dr. Irvin E. Lawrence, for whom the anatomy and cell biology conference room at the Brody School of Medicine is named, died May 28 of complications due to a fall. He

was 83.

Originally a member of the ECU Department of Biology, Lawrence was the first faculty member hired for the new ECU School of Medicine. He retired as professor emeritus in 1998. Lawrence trained numerous master’s students, including future faculty members Jack Brinn and Hubert Burden. Lawrence is believed to be the first ECU faculty member whose research was funded by the National Institutes of Health.

A native of Wake County, Lawrence had moved back to Raleigh. He was a veteran of World War II, having served in the Army Air Corps.

He is survived by two sisters and several nieces and nephews.

Edward Hollowell, 75, of Cary, died Nov. 9 of Parkinson’s disease. A native of Beaufort County, Hollowell was a veteran of the U.S. Army and a law school Hollowell graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

A noted attorney and expert in medical-legal matters, Hollowell held the title of professor of medical jurisprudence at the Brody School of Medicine and was a founder of the annual Edward E. Hollowell Health Law Forum, held for 30 years.

He is survived by his wife, Loretta “Sunshine” Hollowell, five children, 10 grandchildren, one great-grandchild and two brothers.

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Researcher takes science to heart Dr. Barbara Muller-Borer isn’t afraid to admit she just likes science.

“Someone referred to me as a science geek,” Muller-Borer said. “I told that to my husband, and he said, ‘Tell me something I don’t know.’”

Muller-Borer added that the person said she was more of a “science diva.”

“I like that better,” she said.

Since coming to East Carolina University in 2004, Muller-Borer has put her expertise to work studying how adult stem cells communicate with each other and heart cells to better understand how the cells might be used to repair damaged heart tissue. She’s an assistant professor of cardiovascular sciences at the Brody School of Medicine and director of the Cell-Based Therapy and Tissue Engineering Laboratory.

Her research is supported by a National Institutes of Health grant funded through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. A biomedical engineer, she’s also teaching in ECU’s new biomedical engineering concentration with plans to expand that into a graduate program in biomedical engineering. Having engineering expertise at ECU will be valuable, Muller-Borer said.

Also valuable will be gaining funds to complete the fourth floor of the East Carolina Heart Institute at ECU. That space is intended for research and training.

“The vision for the fourth floor is to bring people together who are doing similar research in cardiovascular health,” said Muller-Borer, who works out of offices and labs in the Brody Building, Warren Life Sciences Building and the heart institute. “That would be a huge advance.”

This fall, Muller-Borer participated in the Bridges Academic Leadership Program for Women through the University of North Carolina’s Friday Center for Continuing Education. The program gave her the chance to network with other women faculty and administrators in the university system and learn about leadership opportunities for women in higher education.

But her first love is science. When she was a girl, her father let her rummage around in his workshop and put things together. Her first engineering course in college set her on her path.

“I took one class and was hooked after that,” she said.

Muller-Borer

‘Gap year’ an adventure for ECU physician It’s commonly known as a “gap year,” the term normally reserved for teenagers who spend the year between high school and college working, traveling, volunteering or all three, but Dr. Dennis Sinar called it his “year of adventure.”

From July 2007 through June 2008, Sinar traveled to Alaska, Nepal, Romania and New Jersey, learning and practicing skills he wants to use at work and away from work.

A gastroenterologist and professor of medicine at the Brody School of Medicine, Sinar learned stonework in Alaska, eastern medicine in Nepal, furniture refinishing in New Jersey and archeology in Romania.

“Everyone I’ve talked to who’s 50 or older says, ‘I wish I could do that.’ Well, you can,” Sinar said. “It’s rejuvenating to do it.”

Sinar, 61, chose the four trips to complement his vocation – medicine – and one of his favorite avocations – restoring old houses.

He returned home between each leg of his travels. He kept costs low with no-frills 30 mission 2009 Sinar

accommodations, often sharing quarters with others. That also gave more local flavor to his travels, such as in Nepal, where he stayed with a Tibetan family and a pair of Buddhist trainee volunteers.

“They had heard that I was an astrologer – apparently the local translation for ‘gastroenterologist’ – and were disappointed I could not map their star charts,” he said.

Sinar has put his stonework skills to use at his home in Washington. He also said the travels reaffirmed why he went into medicine – the patient contact. In Nepal, all of the patients he saw spoke either Tibetan or Nepali.

“I relearned that a lot of information can be gained in the medical interview by nonverbal clues,” he said. “The language difference made me focus more on those nonverbal clues of body language, vocal tone, facial expressions to assess the patient’s complaint. I do more of that form of listening with my patients now, and think I gain more information than I did before.”

D e pa g Alu mr nti mNeent w sh e a d i nhttp://www.ecu.edu/cs-dhs/mhsfoundation/alumni.cfm D e p a r t m e nt h e a d i n g

Fixing problems, fulfilling needs Brody School of Medicine alumni Drs. Brian and Mary Dawson sketched out the idea for their small non-profit on a napkin three years ago while on a mission trip to Uganda.

“But the seeds were planted a long time ago,” said Brian, who with his wife, Mary, has been on several college, medicine or missionrelated trips to Zambia, Zimbabwe, Honduras and Uganda.

Each trip opened their eyes to vast differences in the way people live in developing countries compared to the United States.

Each time, they felt they could help but wanted to make an impact beyond just handing out money. They also believed that others back home would want to help, too, if they knew how.

The inspiration for their organization, ChooseANeed, came from the African community where the Dawsons were doing mission work. Residents there had worked more than two years to develop a community cow project. They held grassroots meetings, identified needs and responsibilities, created a budget and a 12-page plan for how the cattle would be used and the project sustained.

The only thing missing was funding to empower the local community to make it happen.

“Here was the answer to our desire to give responsibly and in a way that did not make us the rich Americans and them the poor beggars,” Brian Dawson said on their Web site, http://www.chooseaneed.org. “They knew about cattle, and they knew how to use them to better their community, and they had a plan in place. We simply provided the capital to make the project a reality.”

The project is successful. The herd has more than doubled in size, and it fulfills the mission of ChooseANeed: identifying, defining, publicizing and meeting the lifesaving needs of others, one need at a time.

The Web site links donors with more than 20 worthwhile projects – from digging a well for clean drinking water to building a classroom – complete with updates and photos.

“The cows you helped buy, you get to see the cows,” said Brian, who is chairman of the

non-profit’s 11-member board, which reviews applications and selects projects for assistance.

“You don’t have to go to Uganda to help.”

Youth groups, church groups, East Carolina University student groups, individuals and families can adopt and raise funds for projects, even creating challenges among groups. Donations can be made securely online. All funds go to the project, Brian said.

On one mission trip, the Dawsons saw a tractor being used as a chicken coop. The tractor had been donated to help in farming.

But what might be considered a simple fix in America – repairing a flat tire or filling up an empty fuel tank – is often impossible in a developing nation.

The story illustrated the importance of creating a network like ChooseANeed to identify and help match funders to projects that originate in the communities, not just ideas from outsiders.

“We didn’t want to give just money. You may have made them rich but you haven’t really helped them at all,” Brian said.

Mary and Brian met as undergraduates at Mars Hill College. Mary graduated in 2001 and Brian in 2002. Both graduated from the Brody School of Medicine in 2006. Mary, who is from Greenville, was one of six medical students selected as a North Carolina Schweitzer Fellow in 2003-04. She and another Schweitzer Fellow, Nathan Meltzer, helped coordinate breast, colorectal and prostate cancer screenings and conducted cancer education workshops at HealthAssist centers in Pitt County.

Dr. Thomas G. Irons, ECU associate vice chancellor for regional health services, was Mary’s mentor for the Schweitzer project.

“Mary and Brian have generous hearts and an absolute determination to serve,” Irons said. “What I have always been impressed with about Mary is her compassion. She is

Brian and Mary Dawson Cutline please.

focused and determined and does her work with remarkable gentleness and good humor.

She and Brian make a marvelous team.”

Dr. Todd Savitt, ECU professor of medical humanities, remembered Brian as an involved and inquisitive student, asking probing questions or making thoughtful comments that went beyond usual discussion.

“He’s earnest and caring, and that shows in the Web site they’ve set up,” Savitt said.

Mary will finish her residency in family medicine this summer. She also is expecting the couple’s second son in March. They have a 3-year-old, Evan. Mary’s father is retired ECU business professor Rick Hebert, who serves on the board of ChooseANeed.

Brian finished his residency in emergency medicine in June. He works for Emergency Medicine Physicians at Lenoir Memorial Hospital in Kinston.

He also applies his emergency medicine training to his work with ChooseANeed.

“See a problem, fix a problem, move on,” he said. “It is very satisfying.”

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Brody Class of 2009 graduates Christopher Kragel, center, was joined by family members, from left, grandmother Yolanda Kragel, sister Emily Kragel, brother James Kragel, his father and ECU faculty member Dr. Peter Kragel, and his grandfather George Kragel at the Brody School of Medicine’s convocation May 9. East Carolina University conferred medical degrees on 65 graduates on a sunny spring day.

For the third time in his 28 years on the faculty, Dr. Tom Irons, professor of pediatrics, director of ECU’s Generalist Physician Program and associate vice chancellor for regional health services, was the featured speaker. He turned the lectern nearly 90 degrees so he could better see the graduates as he spoke to them and reminded them to

More than half enter primary care residencies Toni Oxendine, left, holds her daughter, Elora, after learning she will be staying in Greenville for a residency in internal medicine-pediatrics. On the right is Adrian Jacobs, who is going to St. Joseph’s Hospital in Phoenix for a residency in pediatrics.

They were among the 56 percent of this year’s East Carolina University medical graduates who were accepted into primary care residencies.

Of the 62 students who participated in this year’s residency match, 13, or 21 percent, entered family medicine residencies. Eight entered some type of internal medicine residency. Six students entered pediatric residency programs, and seven entered obstetrics and gynecology.

The class of 2009 was accepted into institutions in 19 states in 20 specialties. The

32 mission 2009

be, in the words of the old restaurant paper placemat of prayers, “ever mindful of the needs of others.”

Irons brought up some issues facing medicine, such as malpractice concerns, quality and indigent care, and encouraged the graduates to stay true to the desire to help others.

He illustrated that with a story from his past, when he cleaned the dry, crusty mouth of a near-comatose boy while an Army doctor in Germany a quarter-century ago, then ran into the patient in 2008 in an unexpected but joyful reunion.

“Whatever the problems, it’s still the best job in the world,” Irons said.

Alumna death

Brody School of Medicine and Pitt County Memorial Hospital will be home to 12 class members. Thirty will stay in North Carolina.

Medical student Lindsay Roofe of Laurinburg went to Vanderbilt Medical Center for pediatrics. “It was my first choice,” Roofe said on Match Day. “I’m looking forward to getting to take care of patients finally and to learn more.”

Shannon Baird Jenkins, 37, of Vale died March 16. She was a 1999 graduate of the Brody School of Medicine, completed residency training in family medicine at East Carolina University in 2001 and served on the Brody faculty until 2005.

She joined the faculty at the University of Massachusetts, where she led the family medicine hospitalists and was associate chief of hospital medicine at UMass Memorial Hospital in Worcester.

She was recognized as teacher of the year and had a scholarship named for her.

Baird is survived by her husband, Nelson Lee Jenkins, two sons, two siblings and other relatives.

Photo by Forrest Croce

CLOSE UP: A NEW DIET PLAN

Professor’s diet plans aims at carbohydrates According to a new diet book by an East Carolina University scientist, carbohydrates are the target in the fight to lose weight, but simply eating fewer carbs isn’t the secret.

“The Dudek Diet Plan” (Outskirts Press, $24.95) is based on how the body processes carbohydrates, said Dr. Ronald W. Dudek, a professor of anatomy and cell biology at the Brody School of Medicine at ECU. In it, Dudek explains that while people should eat fewer carbohydrates to lose weight, the body needs – even craves – varying amounts of carbohydrates to carry out its metabolic needs.

“Years ago, the idea of how you got fat was you ate too much sugar or fat,” Dudek said. “In other words, public enemy No. 1 was fat.” As a result, he said, in the 1970s, federal diet guidelines promoted carbohydrates and pilloried fat.

“That’s when obesity skyrocketed,” Dudek said, adding that typical approaches to losing weight don’t have lasting effects. “‘I eat too much or I don’t exercise enough.’ That is wrong. That fails 99.9 percent of the time,” he said.

Instead of fat, Dudek said the main factor controlling weight gain is the amount of insulin in the bloodstream.

Carbohydrates, he said, trigger insulin production, which causes fat to be stored in body tissue. But simply cutting them out of one’s diet won’t work, he added.

“I’m not trying to make carbohydrates the bad guy,” Dudek said. “You have to get control of them, and the control is 40 to 60 grams a day.”

That’s a couple of ounces of potatoes, a handful of nuts, half an orange or a couple of slices of pizza, he said. However,

he added, the main source of carbohydrates for many people is refined sugars in soft drinks.

Reducing carbohydrates while varying the amount each day is the key, he said.

“What your body likes is fluctuation,” Dudek said. “We have a 20-gram day of carbs. Then we go up to 40 grams, 60 grams.

Your body likes this.”

His diet plan provides people with plenty of calories – one woman who sent him an e-mail after starting it said she had rarely eaten so much for breakfast – and a variety that keeps the body’s metabolism happy.

The diet includes omelets, fish, steak, vegetables, salads with carbohydrate-free dressing and no-carb protein shakes. When hungry between meals, Dudek recommends meat or cheese snacks.

“It turns out to be very balanced,” Dudek said. “After eight weeks, you have a sustainable meal plan where your metabolism won’t make it fail.”

Dudek, 59 and a regular exerciser, lost 22 pounds after eight weeks on the diet.

“It’s not the number of calories. It’s the number of carbohydrates. Most of the people, especially women, tell me it’s too much food,” he said.

A video of an interview Dudek conducted with a local radio and TV show is posted on YouTube. Information is also available on MySpace at http://www.myspace.com/ronnyld.

The book is Dudek’s first consumer publication. He has also written 12 medical textbooks.

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Family Medicine Center under construction Steel is going up at the site of the new East Carolina University Family Medicine Center. The 117,000-square-foot facility will have more than 60 exam rooms, a pharmacy, laboratory, a geriatric center, better parking and other amenities. It’s projected to open in late 2010. The $45 million project includes $35 million from the state, $2.5 million from the estate of Frances Joyner Monk of Farmville to fund the geriatric portion and $1 million from the Golden Leaf Foundation. Officials expect patient visits to climb 8 percent in the new facility compared to the old Family Medicine Center.