42 minute read
VITAL LINES
UB MED VITAL LINES
By Dirk Hoffman
CO-DEVELOPER OF MRNA VACCINES FOR COVID DELIVERS HARRINGTON LECTURE
The scientist, who with a collaborator, invented and developed the messenger RNA (mRNA) technology that is the basis for PfizerBioNTech’s and Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccines, embodies the textbook definition of perseverance.
Drew Weissman, MD, PhD, Roberts Family Professor in Vaccine Research at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, spoke about his efforts to advance RNA technologies for use in vaccines on June 4 during Spring Clinical Day. The event brought to a close a yearlong celebration commemorating the 175th anniversary of the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences.
Studies Begun in Obscurity
Weissman was the keynote speaker for the Harrington Lecture and his talk, titled “Collaboration That Caught Fire: Decades of Research that Led to SARS-Cov-2 Vaccines,” detailed the arduous tasks he undertook in collaboration with Katalin Karikó, PhD, adjunct professor of neurosurgery at the University of Pennsylvania and a senior vice president at BioNTech.
Weissman and Karikó have been studying RNA for use in vaccines for more than 15 years and have dreamed about the seemingly endless possibilities for treating diseases with custommade mRNA, but for many of the early years they did so in complete obscurity and without any funding.
Weissman and Karikó are the recipients of the 2021 LaskerDeBakey Clinical Medical Research Award that often precedes a Nobel Prize; and the 2022 Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences, the world’s largest science prize, among many other inter- national awards.
“The story of how Dr. Weissman and his collaborators maintained their focus and determination against formidable trials and tribulations is truly inspirational,” said Allison Brashear, MD, MBA, UB’s vice president for health sciences and dean of the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences.
Weissman and Karikó found a way to modify mRNA and later developed a delivery technique to package the mRNA in fat droplets called lipid nanoparticles (LNPs), Brashear noted as she introduced Weissman.
Curious and Creative
Weissman said he was “highly honored” to be asked to deliver the Harrington Lecture and be a part of the school’s 175th anniversary celebration. “Medical schools are the foundation of basic science research in our country, so I am here to support all of basic science research,” he said.
Weissman said he is often asked what are the most important attributes of a researcher.
“My response is always that there is not a particular personality. You do not have to be an introvert. You do not have to be a particular type of person to be a researcher,” he said. “But I do believe that you have to be curious and you have to be creative. And you need a level of intelligence to be able to take the creativity and develop new things and figure out how to turn those into true therapeutics.”
Somewhat unexpectedly, Weissman also likened research to the arcade game of “whack-a-mole.”
“You’re bright enough and you are creative. What happens then is new ideas keep popping into your mind,” he said. “And the question is, ‘what do you do with these new ideas? How do you decide which ideas are good and deserve to be followed up on?’ Science is a game of whack-a-mole. It’s finding the right project and hitting it.”
Collaboration and Perseverance
Weissman went on to lay out the basic timeline on mRNA therapeutics.
“I always laugh because when I talk to lay audiences, I always hear comments like, ‘Oh, I am afraid of this vaccine because it was invented in 10 months.’ And I have to say, ‘Well, that is not exactly true’—mRNA was discovered in 1961. The first time it was injected into an animal was 1990.”
Weissman said what followed was a lot of collaborative research efforts, including those of his with Karikó, which he said started around 1998.
“It wasn’t a simple step. It wasn’t somebody found RNA, they stuck it into an animal, made a vaccine and they were done,” he said. “It was hundreds and hundreds of people and thousands of experiments that people did together to develop mRNA therapeutics.”
Weissman said he first started working with Karikó after they met at a copy machine.
“Back in those days, the only way you could read a journal article was to photocopy the journal,” he said. “And we both read a lot and we both fought over the copy machine so we started talking.”
He said they soon started collaborating on their research, but did not receive any grant funding until 2007— almost 10 years of work without any funding.
“Katie and I would work side-by-side in the lab. We did not have any technicians or postdocs helping us do this,” Weissman said. “Katie would make the RNA and I would add it to cells or give it to mice. We would sit and discuss the results.”
It was not until 2019 and 2020 that grants started to come a lot easier, he noted.
“What that brings up is perseverance and my favorite quote from Winston Churchill about perseverance: ‘If you’re going through hell, keep going.’”
Weissman said the duo’s “moment of success” occurred when the first Phase III clinical trials came out for mRNA vaccines and they showed nearly 95 percent efficacy and incredible safety.
“This was our shining moment, that Katie and I were suddenly recognized for what we had spent 25 years working on,” he said.
Potential of mRNA Therapeutics
Weissman said he wanted to focus on the future because that is what interests him the most.
“Talking about the past is great, but I don’t have a great memory, so I am always forgetting the past,” he said. “But I am interested in the future. What the mRNA therapeutic landscape is useful for is that it is a platform, which means that it has an enormous number of potential uses.
“We’re developing vaccines for some of the more critical diseases in the world, where previous vaccines have failed; things like malaria, hepatitis C, HIV and many others,” Weissman said.
“But that’s not all that you can do with an RNA vaccine. We are developing vaccines for food and environmental allergens —for things like peanuts, dust mites and tree pollen.”
Weissman said therapeutics are also being developed for autoimmune diseases and cancers.
He said he is especially interested in mRNA therapeutics, which is the delivering of a protein to a cell of interest.
“The big difference is that with RNA you can replace intracellular proteins, so these are proteins inside the cell—things like the CFTR gene, which is the defective gene in cystic fibrosis, and any other genetic deficiencies. We can deliver gene editing technology to fix broken genes,” Weissman said.
“I’ve talked about all the vaccines we are developing, but I think mRNA therapeutics in the future is going to be even wider and have many more diseases that it can treat.”
For the final slide in his presentation, Weissman said he needed to thank all of the people in his lab and all of the people in the labs he has collaborated with, so it included a list of the names of dozens of researchers who have worked on mRNA technologies.
“Katie and I get a lot of awards for this, but we’re not the only people involved. There were many more researchers both before and after us.”
Following Weissman’s talk, a panel of faculty experts joined him on stage for a Q&A session. They included Jennifer A. Surtees, PhD, moderator; Gabriela K. Popescu, PhD; Thomas A. Russo, MD; and Jonathan F. Lovell, PhD.
Drew Weissman, MD, PhD
Photo by Joe Casio
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Lackner
Jeffrey M. Lackner, PsyD, professor of medicine and chief of the Division of Behavioral Medicine, has been elected to the Academy of Behavioral Medicine Research (ABMR).
Election to the ABMR is reserved for those with national and international behavioral medicine research excellence.
Much of Lackner’s research has explored irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), a painful gastrointestinal disorder that is often poorly understood and treated unsatisfactorily with medications and diet changes.
Lackner has received funding for his research from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases of the National Institutes of Health for more than two decades. His research has been distinguished by creativity, impact and boundary-breaking scientific discovery.
“Our research has had a major impact on clinical practice across the world,” Lackner says. “Like many pain conditions, IBS used to be seen as a psychosomatic condition. If diagnostic testing like a colonoscopy did not reveal positive findings, patients’ physical symptoms were dismissed as a personal weakness or emotional problem.
“Focusing solely on purely biological drivers increases the personal and economic costs of pain conditions like IBS,” he adds.
“We have shown that IBS is no different than other chronic health conditions whose trajectory is influenced by lifestyle factors. This trajectory, however steep, can be reversed by adopting a broader, biopsychosocial approach and targeting the actionable behavioral factors that keep symptoms going, leading to very real and sustained pain relief. Our work has not only fleshed out this approach, but also the practical tools for how to reduce the cost and suffering that comes with refractory pain disorders like IBS.”
Sarah Augustynek has been named assistant vice president/ chief of staff to the vice president for health sciences and dean of the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences. In this role she assists in developing and shaping policy, strategies for collaborations and overall operating principles.
Augustynek is an attorney with more than 15 years of experience at the University at Buffalo, where she has focused on labor relations and health care compliance. Prior to joining the Jacobs School in February, she served as compliance officer for the School of Dental Medicine, where she successfully led quality assurance and risk management programs, while ensuring compliance with federal and state regulations and UB and SUNY policies and procedures. During her tenure at the dental school, Augustynek also served an interim role as assistant dean for administration, overseeing facilities, human resources, marketing and administrative operations.
Augustynek also served as assistant director in UB’s Office of Employee Relations, providing expertise and legal guidance to UB administration and department heads on matters related to collective bargaining agreements, HR policies and practices and federal and state employment and civil service law.
She earned a JD with a concentration in health law from UB’s School of Law in 2006, and an MPH from UB’s School of Public Health and Health Professions in 2007. She is the recipient of the 2006 American Bar Association Health Law Award and the 2006 University at Buffalo Activist Gavel Award. Augustynek is admitted to practice law in New York State and holds certifications in health care compliance and health care privacy compliance from the Health Care Compliance Association.
Augustynek
A LEADER IN BIOMEDICAL INFORMATICS
Elkin
The Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences has received a highly competitive National Institutes of Health (NIH)National Library of Medicine (NLM) T15 Biomedical Informatics and Data Science Training Grant renewal, increasing the school’s capacity to prepare the next generation of biomedical informatics and data scientists.
Only a handful of U.S. organizations were selected for this prestigious award, which will provide approximately $2.5 million for an additional five years of full-time support for four doctoral students and four postdoctoral fellows in the school’s Biomedical Informatics program.
This renewal marks the second consecutive five-year cycle of funding for this award since 2017.
Many of the trainees are recipients of the 42 degrees and certificates that the Jacobs School’s pioneering Biomedical Informatics Graduate program has awarded since its inception in 2013.
“We are thankful to have received another round of funding for this award that continues to support our program,” says Peter L. Elkin, MD, professor and chair of the Department of Biomedical Informatics and primary investigator of the grant. “Our training program has been improving the nation’s ability to share interoperable data and to perform cutting-edge translational research for the last five years.”
The Jacobs School was selected to host the 2022 NLM training grant meeting, which took place in June. More than 225 participants attended the two-day, in-person meeting, including NLM extramural programs director Richard Palmer, DrPH.
“Under Dr. Elkin’s leadership, our Department of Biomedical Informatics has grown to be one of the top such programs in the nation,” says Allison Brashear, MD, MBA, vice president for health sciences and dean of the Jacobs School.
DUNN LEADS BUSINESS OPERATIONS
Alfred Dunn has been named associate vice president for business operations at the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences.
Dunn is a senior health care leader with more than 25 years of experience in academic medical centers. He joined UB in May from Virginia Commonwealth University’s School of Medicine, where he served as senior department administrator for the Department of Internal Medicine, the school’s largest department. In this role, he successfully managed clinical operations, budget and finance, human resources and multi-million dollar funding streams, consistently increasing revenues and containing operation costs. During his tenure, the department doubled in size.
Dunn has also served in senior administration roles at the University of South Carolina’s School of Medicine, Scott & White Health, Emory Children’s Center and UB’s Department of Psychiatry.
He earned a master’s of public administration and a master’s of business administration from Canisius College and is an alumnus of UB, where he earned a bachelor of arts in political science. He is also a certified medical practice executive and a graduate of Leadership Buffalo.
Dunn
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WOLFE AND SCHWAITZBERG NAMED SUNY DISTINGUISHED PROFESSORS
Two faculty members in the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences have been appointed to the rank of SUNY Distinguished Professor—the highest faculty achievement in the SUNY system: Gil I. Wolfe, MD, UB Distinguished Professor and Irvin and Rosemary Smith Chair of the Department of Neurology; and Steven D. Schwaitzberg, MD, professor and chair of the Department of Surgery.
The honor recognizes innovative research and teaching, as well as extraordinary community service. It also spotlights the international prominence of the faculty members in their respective fields. The rank is an order above full professorship and has three co-equal designations: distinguished professor, distinguished service professor and distinguished teaching professor. Wolfe was named a distinguished professor and Schwaitzberg a distinguished service professor.
Steven Schwaitzberg’s interests focus on sophisticated device development and simulation with novel, minimally invasive surgical technology. He is a leader in video/computer technology in the operating room and has a broad influence on the global surgical community as well as at UB, where he has led development of surgical skills and robotic surgery laboratories in the Jacobs School.
A prolific researcher, Schwaitzberg has been the site principal investigator for numerous industry-sponsored clinical trials and co-PI on NIH and Department of Defense grants. Recently, he served as a co-investigator on an NIH grant to explore the use of virtual simulators in laparoscopy surgery training and credentialing. He also shares his expertise in endoscopic surgery as a collaborator on numerous grants. He holds four patents for his technical device development.
Schwaitzberg’s numerous awards include a Distinguished Service Award from the Society of American Gastrointestinal and Endoscopic Surgeons, a Health Policy Scholar Award from the American College of Surgeons (ACS), and being named a Master Educator in Surgery by the ACS; a teaching video he created for surgeons was awarded a Computerworld/National Smithsonian 21st Century Laureate Award for use of technology to produce beneficial changes for society.
Gil Wolfe, an international leader in neuromuscular neurology, has made numerous seminal discoveries impacting the study and clinical care of neuromuscular disorders, particularly myasthenia gravis, the most common disorder of neuromuscular transmission, the mechanism by which motor nerve signals are transmitted to muscle to create movement.
Wolfe’s work has been funded by the National Institutes of Health, the Muscular Dystrophy Association, the Myasthenia Gravis Foundation of America and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. He served as clinical chair on a $8 million multicenter international study, funded by the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, that confirmed the benefits of surgically removing the thymus gland over medical intervention alone in patients with generalized myasthenia gravis.
Throughout his career, Wolfe has served as a principal investigator or co-investigator on more than 45 clinical trials. Currently, he is conducting clinical trials funded by NeuroNEXT— a multicenter consortium supported by the NIH—and the PatientCentered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI), in addition to four industry-sponsored trials evaluating new pharmaceutical treatments for myasthenia gravis.
Earlier this year, he was appointed to a four-year term on the Food and Drug Administration’s Cellular, Tissue and Gene Therapies Advisory Committee.
In 2015, Wolfe was honored as the Myasthenia Gravis Foundation’s Doctor of the Year, and in 2018, he received the SUNY Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Scholarship and Creative Activities.
Wolfe Schwaitzberg
LEDDY RECEIVES STOCKTON KIMBALL AWARD
John J. Leddy, MD ’85, clinical professor of orthopaedics and one of the foremost world leaders in the diagnosis and treatment of concussion, received the 2022 Stockton Kimball Award for outstanding scientific achievement and service.
Leddy is medical director of the UB Concussion Management Clinic and director of outcomes research in the Department of Orthopaedics. He serves as concussion consultant to the Buffalo Bills football team and Buffalo Sabres hockey team. In addition, he is a clinical professor of rehabilitation sciences in UB’s School of Public Health and Health Professions.
Leddy’s early research resulted in a paradigm shift from what then was the standard approach for managing post-concussive symptoms (PCS)—strict, and sometimes prolonged, physical and brain rest until all symptoms resolve. His work is noteworthy in its emphasis on understanding the metabolic and neurophysiological changes that drive post-concussive symptoms and how aerobic exercise may reverse those effects.
In 2006, Leddy’s work on concussion injury began to gain notice after he co-authored a study with his collaborator Barry S. Willer, PhD, professor of psychiatry, on management of concussion and PCS and suggested a promising new direction for helping patients recover.
In 2010, Leddy was senior first author on a groundbreaking study of the sub-symptom threshold exercise training for PCS. This study was the first to demonstrate that treatment with controlled exercise was a safe program that appears to improve PCS symptoms when compared to notreatment baseline, and showed that a randomized controlled study was warranted to support development of new treatment guidelines.
Leddy followed that study in 2011 with an assessment of an exercise Leddy treadmill protocol that proved reliable for identifying patients with worsening concussion symptoms.
The Leddy team also established the Buffalo Concussion Treadmill Test (BCTT) to use in acute concussion and in PCS. Today, the BCTT, Bike Test, and the “Buffalo Protocol” for exercise evaluation and rehabilitation for sport-related concussion are used throughout the world to manage concussed patients.
CURTIS SELECTED AS PRESIDENT-ELECT OF APM
Anne B. Curtis, MD, SUNY Distinguished Professor and Charles and Mary Bauer Professor and chair of medicine, has been selected to serve as president-elect of the Association of Professors of Medicine (APM). She assumed the role in July and will become president of the APM in July 2023.
The APM is an organization of more than 100 chairs of Departments of Medicine in the U.S. and Canada that works to advance issues of importance to medical education and patient care. As a part of the Alliance for Academic Internal Medicine (AAIM), the APM works to aid professional development and research in internal medicine.
“It’s an honor to be selected among my peers, who are chairs of Departments of Medicine throughout the U.S.,” Curtis says. “We will cover topics that department chairs confront on a regular basis: recruitment and retention of faculty, the education of medical students and residents, the impact the COVID-19 pandemic has had on departments of medicine, challenges faced by women faculty, diversity, physician compensation plans, and so on.”
Being in the APM president-elect position also places Curtis on the AAIM board of directors for the next three years.
“I am extremely pleased to see Dr. Curtis named to this important position. Department of Medicine chairs are responsible for monitoring a wide range of key issues,” says Allison Brashear, MD, MBA, UB’s vice president for health sciences and dean of the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences. “I am particularly interested in the work of this organization in the areas of diversity and inclusion and in advancing women’s leadership in medicine.”
Curtis
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TEACHING WAYS TO DISPEL MEDICAL DISINFORMATION: UB RECEIVES COMPETITIVE AWARD FROM AAMC
The University at Buffalo is one of five universities nationwide that has been awarded a grant from the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) that supports teaching health sciences students how to dispel medical disinformation.
The grants are part of a national strategic initiative developed by the AAMC with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to increase confidence in COVID-19 vaccines and address medical misinformation and mistrust by educating health sciences students.
In 2019, the World Health Organization had already identified vaccine hesitancy as one of the top 10 threats to global public health, and that was before the pandemic.
“Achieving this national recognition is extraordinary for the University at Buffalo and an important step in stopping the spread of disinformation that negatively impacts efforts to combat COVID-19,” says Allison Brashear, MD, MBA, vice president for health sciences and dean of the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at UB. “Clinicians and learners across UB’s health sciences schools are uniquely positioned to work with their patients and public audiences to address health misinformation.”
The goal of the UB project is to develop an interprofessional education (IPE) experience for all of UB’s health sciences students in the Jacobs School, School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, School of Nursing, School of Dental Medicine and School of Public Health and Health Professions.
UB students will begin the new training program as a pilot starting this fall.
“Educating our health professions students to approach conversations with patients about vaccine hesitancy using specific evidence-based strategies reduces variability and strengthens patient outcomes,” says Patricia J. Ohtake, PhD, assistant vice president for interprofessional education and associate professor of rehabilitation science in the School of Public Health and Health Professions. “Using an interprofessional approach ensures members of the healthcare team are consistent in their approach to discussing vaccine hesitancy and are able to support previous conversations patients may have had with other health care team members.”
The UB project was developed by co-principal investigators Nicholas M. Fusco, PharmD, clinical associate professor in the Department of Pharmacy Practice in the School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences; and Alison M. Vargovich, PhD, clinical assistant professor in the Division of Behavioral Medicine in the Department of Medicine in the Jacobs School.
Health sciences students at UB will learn together with their peers from other professions about how they can work as a team to tackle medical misinformation and disinformation.
“The idea is never to force a patient to change, in part because that doesn’t work,” Vargovich says, “but to learn how to have productive conversations that hopefully result in patients reconsidering their viewpoint, or at least being more open to continued discussion.”
The goal is to ultimately improve trust between health professions students and the patients and communities they serve. A key step is providing trainees with a framework to approach these conversations effectively and respectfully.
“It is a team effort to dispel medical misinformation and vaccine hesitancy,” says Fusco, “as well as a team effort to develop this educational innovation, which would not be possible without the creative expertise of our research team.”
To read more about the project, visit https://medicine.buffalo. edu and search “medical disinformation.” — Ellen Goldbaum
Fusco Vargovich
2022 Igniting Hope Conference
Now in its fifth year, the Igniting Hope Conference at the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences has received national attention for its work in addressing the social determinants of health and for serving as a catalyst for change.
This year’s conference, held August 13, was needed more than ever, say organizers, who hoped that it would help provide a way for the community to heal and move forward after the devastating, racially motivated mass shooting on May 14 at Tops Market, in a predominantly Black neighborhood in Buffalo.
The 2022 conference focused on “Advocating in a New Reality: Breaking Barriers, Maintaining Resilience and Reconstructing a Community of Care.” It took place in the Jacobs School and on Zoom, was free, open to the public, and funded in part by the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences of the National Institutes of Health.
One of the goals of this year’s event was to help channel the community’s response to the May 14 shooting. In a message to local organizations, Pastor George F. Nicholas of Lincoln Memorial United Methodist Church and convener of the African American Health Equity Task Force, one of the organizers, called the conference “a crucial tool we use to raise awareness about health equity.”
“Along with our partner, the University at Buffalo, we brought national experts to engage in robust dialogue with local community leaders as we work to address the root causes that drive health disparities,” he says. “We promoted a public dialogue on health equity while advocating for real systems change, which will eliminate race-based health disparities.”
Timothy Murphy, MD, SUNY Distinguished Professor and director UB’s Community Health Equity Research Institute, concurs: “This trauma must strengthen our commitment to solve the underlying systemic problems that are directly responsible for the targeting of the East Side of Buffalo.
“When you look at who attends, it’s half community members and half university members, that is special and incredible,” adds Murphy, who is also director of UB’s Clinical and Translational Science Institute. “It is so important for us as faculty and students to learn from the community firsthand about the root causes of health disparities to guide our work in these areas.”
KEYNOTE SPEAKERS
Keynote speakers included: • Rev. Dr. Heber Brown III, former pastor of Pleasant Hope Baptist
Church in Baltimore, and founder of the Black Church Food
Security Network, which advances food security and food sovereignty by co-creating Black food ecosystems anchored by
Black congregations in partnership with Black farmers. • Ruth S. Shim, MD, associate dean of diverse and inclusive education, Luke & Grace Kim Professor in Cultural Psychiatry and director of cultural psychiatry, University of California,
Davis, and co-editor of Social (In)Justice and Mental Health. Her research focuses on mental health disparities and inequities. • Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, author, activist, Leon Forrest
Professor of African American Studies at Northwestern
University, MacArthur Foundation Fellow and author of “Race for Profit: How Banks and the Real Estate Industry Undermined
Black Home Ownership.” Taylor writes and speaks on Black politics, social movements and racial inequality in the U.S. Breakout sessions focused on mental health; housing and economic development; food and nutrition; and senior services.
To read more about the conference, visit https://medicine. buffalo.edu and search “Igniting Hope.” — Ellen Goldbaum
Brown Shim Taylor
Jonathan Daniels, MD ’98, associate director of admissions, Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences
The Life and Legacy of Jonathan Daniels, MD ’98
School mourns the loss of a role model and leader
Story by Dirk Hoffman Photos by Sandra Kicman
The late Jonathan D. Daniels, MD ’98, had a clear mission in life—to erase the term “underrepresented minorities in medicine” from the health care lexicon.
As associate director of admissions at the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, he was a tireless advocate for diversity—recruiting and mentoring hundreds of scholars from traditionally underserved backgrounds.
And as one of the few Black physicians practicing in the city of Buffalo, he served as a role model to his pediatric patients in mostly Black and brown families as he provided care to multiple generations.
Daniels died tragically in an early morning fire on July 4 at his North Buffalo home, along with his two adult daughters, Jensen; and Jordan, a 2022 graduate of the UB School of Management.
He is survived by his wife, Janessa E. Givens Daniels, senior associate director in the UB Office of Financial Aid; and daughter, Jillian, a 2020 alumna of UB’s College of Arts and Sciences.
Allison Brashear, MD, MBA, UB’s vice president for health sciences and dean of the Jacobs School, says Daniels’ death creates a huge void in the Jacobs School and beyond.
“He was a treasured colleague, physician, mentor and friend,” she says. “His absence has left an unfillable hole in our school and the Buffalo area communities.
“We can honor him by advocating for change and helping to knock down the barriers to health equity,” Brashear says. “We all need to open our minds to ways to improve diversity and inclusion in the university.”
Daniels was the first of his immediate family to graduate from college, but his journey was not along the traditional path.
He paused his undergraduate studies to join the United States Army Reserve 365th Evacuation Hospital as a combat medic and served during Operation Desert Storm.
After returning to Buffalo and receiving his undergraduate degree, he applied to UB’s medical school, but was wait-listed.
Not to be deterred, Daniels enrolled in a newly created postbaccalaureate program whose aim was to diversify the physician workforce by guaranteeing medical school admission to everyone who successfully completed the program.
It was created by the nonprofit Associated Medical Schools of New York, an organization Daniels worked closely with throughout his career to expand the pool of scholars pursuing careers in medicine and health care.
The level of influence Daniels had on diversity initiatives and the admissions process at the Jacobs School cannot be overstated in the opinion of David A. Milling, MD ’93, executive director of its Office of Medical Education and a personal friend of Daniels for more than 20 years.
“Because he came to medical school through the postbaccalaureate program, Jonathan understood the importance of pipeline programs helping Black and brown students in New York state,” Milling says. “He was a fierce advocate for helping to prepare students for medical school through that process.”
Daniels “was an integral part of the team that helps to ensure that our students are successful,” says Milling.
“He was an extremely level-headed, thoughtful consensusbuilder who was able to have the conversations that were sometimes emotional, but always helped us to reach consensus,” he says.
Dori R. Marshall, MD ’97, associate dean and director of admissions at the Jacobs School, worked alongside Daniels on the school’s admissions committee before both were elevated to admissions leadership positions.
David A. Milling, MD ’93, executive director of the Office of Medical Education Juneteenth Celebration; left to right: DeVin Sanford, support specialist, Office of Medical Computing; Jonathan Daniels, MD; Allison Brashear, MD, MBA, vice president for health sciences at UB and dean, Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences; Gil Wolfe, MD, UB Distinguished Professor and Irvin and Rosemary Smith Chair of the Department of Neurology.
Jonathan Daniels, MD, having fun with Charles Lafargue, left, and Shyon Small, right, during last year’s Second Look Weekend, sponsored by the Jacobs School’s chapter of the Student National Medical Association. Both Lafargue and Small are currently members of the Class of 2026.
Rev. George Nicholas, above, pastor of Lincoln Memorial United Methodist Church and co-convener of the African American Health Equity Task Force. Daniels was a caring physician and role model for Nicholas’ four sons. “He established relationships with them, took the time to really talk to them not only as a physician, but as a Black man speaking to a Black boy, which is so important.”
“When I was asked if I would be interested in being director, I was also asked if I wanted an assistant director and I said ‘yes’ and immediately reached out to Jonathan,” she says.
The two were instrumental in shaping the school’s transition to a more holistic review process—looking at more than the traditional metrics when considering medical school applicants.
“We did everything together. We made decisions about the admissions committee and outreach to undergraduates,” Marshall says. “We developed the holistic process, helping committee members feel comfortable about stepping back from GPA and MCAT scores and looking much more holistically at applicants.”
Marshall notes Daniels was passionate about connecting with Black and Hispanic high school and college students, who are underrepresented in medicine.
“Jonathan had a way of connecting with students and making them feel comfortable and confident,” she says. “It was almost effortless. Once he was in a room with a group of students, he would smile at them, relax them and reassure them that he supported them and believed in them. And he told them if they wanted this, they could make it happen.”
Data show the Jacobs School has made significant strides in increasing the number of underrepresented students in its medical school classes—23.75 percent of total admissions over the past four years have been students underrepresented in medicine, according to Marshall.
Emmekunla K. Nylander, MD, ’96, says when Daniels was named associate director of admissions, “it was a monumental thing.”
“To have a physician of color involved in a leadership role in admissions was huge. I have heard from incoming students who have said ‘wow, I interviewed with a Black doctor today who looked like me.’” she says. “That had such a huge impact on them.
“Many of those students who are coming in now, I know he advocated for. The majority of underrepresented students in this year’s class are because of him,” Nylander says.
The Rev. Kinzer M. Pointer, pastor of Liberty Missionary Baptist Church and co-convener of the African American Health Equity Task Force, served with Daniels on the Jacobs School’s Standing Committee on Diversity, Inclusion and Learning Environment and says Daniels was masterful at asking “thoughtful, contemplated questions.
“He would ask really insightful questions that would force you to think about what your answers are,” he says. “And he would simply sit quietly and wait for you to think about it and to respond. He was often out front of the rest of us.”
Pointer says Daniels was also “incredibly intuitive, generous, and giving of his time and attention.
“It did not matter who you were, if he thought you needed him, he found time for you,” he says.
Pointer co-teaches a first-year elective at the Jacobs School called Health in the Neighborhood that addresses health inequities and disparities and is based in an underserved East Side neighborhood where students meet with community members and leaders.
“I go out of my way to tell the students ‘you are not here by accident’ because sometimes when you are young, you can lose sight of the goal,” he says. “Dr. Daniels would say ‘forward.’ He would remind them you can’t get anywhere standing still.”
Pointer says he would often find Daniels in the lunch area on the first floor of the Jacobs School building, not far from the Office of Medical Admissions.
“He didn’t have to eat his lunch there, but he did that on purpose because he always wanted to be positioned, where if a student needed his help, he would be there,” he says.
“This is my 42nd year in pastoral ministries, and I’m telling you I don’t meet a lot of Jonathan Danielses—they just don’t “Jonathan had a way of connecting with students and making them feel comfortable and confident. It was almost effortless.” Dori R. Marshall, MD ’97, associate dean and director of admissions
Daniels attending the March for Our Lives in June 2022 following the murder of George Floyd. Pictured to his right is medical student Sydney Johnson. Daniels enjoying a laugh with Terence Clark, MD ’71, during a recent Reunion Weekend.
Emmekunla K. Nylander, MD, ’96, obstetrician and gynecologist
exist,” Pointer says. “And that is not an indictment of us as much as it is an acknowledgment of who Dr. Daniels was.”
Beyond his influence in the Jacobs School, Daniels was beloved in the community for his work as one of only three Black male pediatricians practicing in the city of Buffalo.
Raul Vazquez, MD ’89, president and CEO of Urban Family Practice, brought Daniels into his practice as medical director for pediatrics at the Jefferson Avenue location in May 2021 after Daniels worked for 19 years at Main Pediatrics.
“When Jonathan was a medical student, he did a rotation through my practice on Niagara Street,” Vazquez says. “Over the years we always talked about him practicing with me so when the opportunity arose last year, I told him I had to hold him to his word.
“I looked at it as a partnership-type relationship, not as an employee of mine,” he adds. “I brought him in to practice in the area of Jefferson Avenue which was important because there were not a lot of Black and brown providers in that area.”
Vazquez, who recently completed a term as president of UB’s Medical Alumni Association, says Daniels “was a quiet builder who did a lot of things in the background.”
Nylander is an obstetrician-gynecologist in the community who knew Daniels since medical school, and would routinely refer patients to him.
“We would often see each other at the hospital and converse about our shared patients,” she says. “He was taking care of a large population of our community, and I know he had a special relationship with all his patients and their parents.
“To his patients, Jonathan was more than just their doctor,” Nylander adds. “He was a role model, somebody that they looked up to because we don’t see that a lot—people who look like us in those professions.”
Javeena A. Edwards, MBA ’05, says Daniels cared for her son and two daughters and she always appreciated his thoroughness and cautious nature.
“My oldest is 21 and he had been going to see Dr. Daniels for 19 years,” said Edwards, chief financial officer for Girl Scouts of Western New York.
Edwards says it was important to her to have a physician of color for her children, and especially for her son, being a Black male, to see the potential he could achieve.
“Dr. Daniels was always keen on education. He would ask my son what his thoughts were beyond high school, and I always appreciated that he had those conversations with him.”
The Rev. George Nicholas, pastor of Lincoln Memorial United Methodist Church and co-convener of the African American Health Equity Task Force, says Daniels took special care as a pediatrician for his four sons.
“He established relationships with them, took the time to really talk to them not only as a physician, but as a Black man speaking to a Black boy, which is so important,” he says.
It is a rather cruel irony that the untimely death of a man who was relentless in advocating for diversity in medicine leaves a tremendous void in a community lacking in physicians of color.
“The goal of everything we have done is to try and increase the number of Black and brown students that we have trained,” Milling
says. “We need to make sure that pipeline continues from medical school to residency here in Buffalo.
“We need to try and keep those physicians here. That is a huge part of Jonathan’s legacy,” he adds. “We have to continue to build those bridges between undergraduate medical education and the transition to graduate medical education in Buffalo.”
Marshall acknowledges the void Daniels’ death left in the community, but says UB has the building blocks in place to begin to address the issue, in no small part due to Daniels’ efforts.
“The fact that we have so significantly changed the numbers of medical students currently in our school who are Black and Hispanic means that we have an opportunity to create an environment that welcomes them and keeps them interested in Buffalo for residency and for their careers beyond,” she says.
“We have to create that climate that keeps our students interested in serving in our communities because we are building something wonderful,” Marshall says. “Jonathan would be so upset with us if we let that fall apart.”
Nicholas says he greatly admired Daniels’ refusal to remain silent on issues of great importance such as racism.
“Sometimes when physicians or others gain professional prominence, they are hesitant to speak up on issues of race out of fear that it will impact their climb to whatever professional aspirations they may have,” he says.
“But Jonathan was not like that at all. He spoke his mind. He spoke truth,” Nicholas says. “If it made some people uncomfortable, the solution was to resolve the issue. That often led to conversations. That will be greatly missed.”
Milling says that based on who he was and growing up in Buffalo, Daniels “understood all of the nuances that were in place, especially during these last two or three years where we have had so much racial upheaval and turmoil in the country.”
The killing of George Floyd by Minneapolis police in May 2020 and several other national events that summer stirred Jacobs School students to demand action.
They drafted a resolution to “acknowledge and respond to the recent acts of race-based violence against Black people nationally” and an eight-page addendum with recommendations.
Jacobs School faculty, staff and students would gather for several town hall meetings, moderated by Daniels, to discuss the school’s strategic plan for diversity and inclusion.
“Jonathan was instrumental in helping us to craft a response to our students who had forwarded a resolution that expected the medical school to change and to act on many issues,” Milling says.
As the Jacobs School recently embarked on developing a revised curriculum that includes anti-racism principles (see related article on page 24), Daniels was again in the forefront of the discussions.
“In all the years I worked alongside him, I cannot recall a single instance of Jonathan being angry or raising his voice,” Pointer says. “After the George Floyd incident, I saw a brief period of sullenness, but I think it was just his disappointment in our human condition in America.
“The students had some ideas about what the school needed to do, and he got right in, rolled up his sleeves and said, ‘let’s get to work,’” he says.
And following the horrific tragedy on May 14, 2022, where 10 people were killed in a racially motivated shooting at a Tops market just a little more than a mile from the Jacobs School, Daniels again took a lead role, saying “we have to figure out what we need to do,” Pointer says.
Although Daniels was steadfast in his educational mission, he also connected with the UB and Buffalo community through the role most dear to him—being a devoted family man.
“There are many aspects of what he did, but then there is who he was,” Milling says. “He was an upstanding family man with values, setting the example for everyone around him, not just the students, but colleagues and friends.”
Jennifer Britton, UB’s senior director of alumni and constituent engagement, worked with Daniels when he was president of the Medical Alumni Association and on many UB alumni events, and says he always brought his family along and praised them for their support whenever he spoke.
“They were a proud UB family, and always came together to our events,” she says. “Their presence will be missed.”
Nylander sums up her friend thusly: “He was truly a good man, husband, father, doctor, colleague, friend and brother. He was all that and more.”
Milling says he will always remember Daniels for his consistent focus on improving the world around him.
“He always wanted us to be better. There are so many ways that we can continue to do that to honor Jonathan’s legacy,” he says.
Rev. Kinzer M. Pointer, pastor of Liberty Missionary Baptist Church and co-convener of the African American Health Equity Task Force
The Jonathan D. Daniels, MD ’98 & Family Memorial Fund has been established to support students of color and others who have been historically underrepresented in medicine. Gifts to the fund can be made online at https://buffalo.edu/campaign/ DanielsMemorialFund, or by calling toll free 1-855-GIVE-2-UB. Mailed donations should be directed to: University at Buffalo Foundation Inc., c/o Jonathan D. Daniels, MD ’98 & Family Memorial Fund, PO Box 730, Buffalo, NY 14226-0730.
Compassion and Concern for Students
The heartfelt compassion and genuine concern the late Jonathan D. Daniels, MD, exhibited for students was evident to anyone who knew him.
Bryan Velez, a second-year medical student from Colombia who grew up in New York City, first met Daniels as a UB undergraduate.
“He came to an awards banquet and introduced himself to me and some of my classmates,” he says. “He asked us if anyone needed advice or help with getting into medical school.”
Velez told Daniels one thing he was struggling with was finding physicians to shadow.
“He said, ‘no problem,’ and he let me shadow him all summer,” says Velez, vice president of UB’s chapter of the Latino Medical Student Association.
After Velez graduated with a degree in pharmacology and toxicology, he returned home to take a gap year before applying to medical school.
But one year turned into two because Velez started to have doubts about his ability to become a doctor.
“During those gap years, Dr. Daniels would call to check on me and make sure I was doing well,” he says.
“He did a great job encouraging me; he basically believed in me when I didn’t believe in myself,” Velez says. “When I finally got into medical school, so much of it was thanks to him because he kept pushing me.”
Aswad Lemar Jackson, MD ’22, is a textbook example of how the pipeline programs for minority students are designed to work.
Born and raised in Mississippi, he attended Tougaloo College and gained early acceptance to the Jacobs School through the Early Opportunity Program in Medicine.
Before starting medical school, he and his father attended the Student National Medical Association’s Second Look Weekend to get acquainted with the school and city of Buffalo.
The annual event provides an opportunity for accepted underrepresented students to take a closer look at the school during a spring weekend of events designed especially for them. Daniels played a major role, ensuring there were sufficient resources and making sure alumni were involved.
“It was my first interaction with Dr. Daniels. Coming from Mississippi to Buffalo was a big transition, so he was very pivotal in helping me,” Jackson says.
Jackson adds that in addition to being an invaluable mentor throughout medical school, Daniels also taught him many life lessons.
“I got married in December and he would give me advice about the ‘do’s and don’ts in marriage,” he says. “Our relationship was not confined to the Jacobs School. He was just a great person in general —very genuine, encouraging and always smiling.”
Jackson, who currently is in a rural family medicine residency program at Louisiana State University in Bogalusa, Louisiana, says the pipeline approach to attracting underrepresented students to medical school needs to be expanded and supported financially, beginning at the middle school and high school levels.
“It also falls on us as physicians of color. The idea of reach as you climb,” he says. “We cannot become complacent. We need to be reaching back and allowing our influence to have an impact.”
Jackson says Black physicians should be going into schools to talk to students.
“We need to open up the idea that you can aspire to be something other than a pro athlete or a rapper to be successful,” he says.
Oftentimes, it’s a case of “if you don’t see it, you can’t be it,” Jackson says.
“Young Blacks often just don’t believe it’s possible,” he adds. “If they don’t see any Black physicians, they think that is the norm. Breaking down those barriers is critical.”
Aswad Lemar Jackson, MD ’22 Photo by Douglas Levere
