Medicine & Health

Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis asthma specialist Mario Castro, MD, is seeking volunteers for a study investigating whether taking vitamin D can make asthma medication more effective. Study participants must be 18 or older and have a physician’s diagnosis of asthma. They also must have been taking some type of therapy to control their asthma for at least one year.

Artery-opening brain stents designed to reduce high risk of repeat strokes instead significantly increased strokes and deaths, results of a multi-center clinical trial show.

Lisa M. Moscoso, MD, PhD, has been named associate dean for student affairs at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

Washington University’s American Cancer Society Institutional Research Grant (ACS-IRG) is now accepting applications from junior faculty for pilot project awards through 4 p.m. Oct. 14.

Seasonal flu vaccines will be offered to School of Medicine faculty and staff at no cost beginning Oct. 4. The School of Medicine strongly recommends that all employees, even those with no direct patient contact, get a vaccine.

Two leading members of the faculty at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have been named Alan A. and Edith L. Wolff Professors in their respective fields. Raphael Kopan, PhD, has been named the Wolff Professor of Developmental Biology, and David Sibley, PhD, has been named the Wolff Professor of Molecular Microbiology.

Donations collected by check boxes on state income tax forms, fees from license plates and revenue from state lottery tickets have raised millions for breast cancer research and prevention programs, researchers at Washington University in St. Louis have found.

This summer, 18-year-old Mogboluwaga Oginni shadowed physicians as they repaired shattered hips, twisted ankles and dislocated shoulders. He also learned about patient billing and the steps to cast broken legs.

A newly established fund to support innovative cancer research at the Alvin J. Siteman Cancer Center has awarded its first two $900,000 grants to high-tech efforts to undermine cancer cells’ ability to resist treatment. The awards will help scientists use genetic data to find new ways to attack treatment-resistant breast cancer and precisely target treatments for various kinds of cancer cells based on their responses to radiation therapy.

Though some cardiologists may have dabbled in musical pursuits from an early age, few have opened for Aerosmith. How does one who dropped out of college to play drums and follow dreams of being a professional musician end up chief of cardiology at a major medical school? “I needed a day job,” says Douglas L. Mann, MD. Today, Mann studies inflammation and its role in heart failure.