Medicine & Health

A psychiatrist at the School of Medicine writes in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) that although mortality from cardiovascular disease has declined in the United States over the past several decades, patients with severe psychiatric illness are not enjoying the benefits of that progress.

Scientists have shown how developing brain tumors can turn an encounter with a signaling molecule from a fatal experience for the tumor cells into a cue for their own growth and multiplication. Researchers at the School of Medicine found the transformation relies on at least two other molecules that can be modified with existing drugs, opening the possibility that they may be able to use the established drugs to treat brain tumors.

ShawAndrey Shaw, the Emil R. Unanue Professor of Immunobiology in the Department of Pathology and Immunology at the School of Medicine, has been named an investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI). Shaw was one of 15 researchers selected nationwide.

MackinnonSusan Mackinnon has been elected to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences, one of the highest honors medical scientists in the United States can receive. Mackinnon was honored for her professional achievement in the health sciences.

Studying efforts to combat obesity in children, a research team led by investigators at the School of Medicine has found that children who lose weight are able to keep it off more effectively if they participate in a maintenance-targeted treatment program, although the effectiveness of the maintenance program lessens over time. The researchers report their findings in the Oct. 10 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.

William F. Stenson, M.D., has been named the Dr. Nicholas V. Costrini Professor of Gastroenterology & Inflammatory Bowel Disease at the School of Medicine. Washington University Chancellor Mark S. Wrighton made the announcement with Larry J. Shapiro, M.D., executive vice chancellor for medical affairs and dean of the School of Medicine.

The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation is bringing together a distinguished group of scientists, legal scholars, jurists and philosophers from across the country to help integrate new developments in neuroscience into the U.S. legal system. The Law and Neuroscience Project is the first systematic effort to bridge the fields of law and science in considering how courts should deal with new brain-scanning techniques as they apply to matters of law.

An extra degree of precision will be added to radiation treatments for prostate cancer at the School of Medicine following the installation of two new technologies in the Department of Radiation Oncology. The move to adopt these technologies was led by Jeff Michalski, professor of radiation oncology.

Peter Humphrey, M.D., Ph.D., has been named the Ladenson Professor of Pathology in the Department of Pathology and Immunology at the School of Medicine. The announcement was made by Larry Shapiro, M.D., executive vice chancellor for medical affairs and dean of the School of Medicine.

A little health information is not enough to help obese children get into better shape, according to a recent analysis. “Providing information is a necessary component, but it’s not sufficient,” said Denise Wilfley, Ph.D., lead author of the study and professor of psychiatry at the School of Medicine and of psychology in Arts & Sciences.