Medicine & Health

A groundbreaking for a new, $50 million Shriners Hospitals for Children-St. Louis recently was held on the Washington University Medical Center campus. The planned hospital, at the corner of Clayton Road and Newstead Avenue, will replace the Shriners Hospital in Frontenac. Shown is a rendering of what the building will look like from Interstate 64/Highway 40.

In an engineering breakthrough, a Washington University in St. Louis biomedical researcher has discovered a way to use light and color to measure oxygen in individual red blood cells in real time. The technology, developed by Lihong Wang, PhD, the Gene K. Beare Distinguished Professor of Biomedical Engineering, could eventually be used to determine how oxygen is delivered to normal and diseased tissues or how various disease therapies impact oxygen delivery throughout the body.

In the next decade, the Washington University Medical Center campus will be transformed by renovations and new construction as part of the Campus Renewal Project. Shown is a preliminary rendering of what the Medical Center’s north campus may look like.

Frederick Sweet, PhD, professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, died Thursday, March 7, 2013, following a stroke. He was 74.

Leesa M. Galatz, MD, associate professor of orthopaedic surgery and director of the Shoulder and Elbow Fellowship program, is pioneering new treatments for rotator cuff injuries.​

Lihong Wang, PhD, the Gene K. Beare Distinguished Professor of Biomedical Engineering at Washington University in St. Louis, has received a three-year, $300,000 grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to study oxygen consumption rates of individual cells using photoacoustic microscopy, a novel imaging technology he developed that uses light and sound to measure change.

Studying gene activity in tissue removed from injured knees, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have found that genes related to obesity and aging may contribute to the development of osteoarthritis, the most common knee disorder and the most common disorder in all of the joints.

Those interested in participating in a national study to help the American Cancer Society understand how lifestyle, genetics and the environment affect cancer may enroll in the study April 30 or May 1 on the Washington University Medical Campus.

March 15 was Match Day for 120 soon-to-be physicians in this year’s Washington University School of Medicine graduating class. They and medical students across the country learned where they will do their residency training. Shown are students Ignacio Becerra-Licha and Somalee Banerjee after they learned where their residencies will take them.

People with HIV have an elevated risk of heart attacks, diabetes and insulin problems, and there are not many drug options to prevent those problems due to concerns that they will weaken the immune system. But a new study by researchers at the School of Medicine has shown that a diabetes drug appears to be safe in patients and does not dampen their immunity.