School of Medicine

Repeated exposure to influenza viruses may undermine the effectiveness of the annual flu vaccine. A team of researchers led by Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis has developed an approach to assess whether a vaccine activates the kind of immune cells needed for long-lasting immunity against new influenza strains. The findings could aid efforts to design an improved flu vaccine.

Researchers at the School of Medicine have identified a gene that plays an important role in fertility across multiple species. The study could have implications for understanding human infertility and early menopause.

The School of Medicine is one of 10 sites and a coordinating center forming the Centers for Research in Emerging Infectious Diseases, funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis has developed a saliva-based test for COVID-19 that is faster and easier than the swab tests currently in use. The test could help simplify and expand the availability of COVID-19 diagnostic testing across broad populations.

John Lynch, MD, professor of medicine at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, has been named president of Barnes-Jewish Hospital. Meanwhile, Katherine Henderson, MD, assistant professor of clinical medicine at the School of Medicine, has been named the hospital’s chief medical officer.

Raman Malhotra, MD, associate professor of neurology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, has been elected president of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, a professional society dedicated to sleep medicine. He will serve as president-elect this year and take over as president in 2021.

A study led by researchers at Washington University School of Medicine details the nature of delays in autism diagnoses for African American children. Such delays can result in significant consequences for young children and their families.

Washington University School of Medicine scientists have developed a vaccine that targets the SARS-CoV-2 virus, can be given in one dose via the nose and is effective in preventing infection in mice susceptible to the novel coronavirus.

COVID-19 caught public health systems in the U.S. unprepared to detect, track and contain the virus. The pandemic has exposed a multitude of deficiencies that require a wholesale reinvention of the field of public health, said four leading experts in a recently published essay.

Gastric bypass surgery is the most effective therapy to treat or reverse type 2 diabetes in severely obese patients. New research from Washington University School of Medicine indicates that weight loss after surgery, rather than the surgery itself, drives metabolic improvements.