School of Medicine

Many with psychiatric problems want to quit smoking, but psychiatrists and caseworkers typically don’t prescribe medications to help them or refer them to services aimed at smoking cessation, researchers at the School of Medicine and BJC Behavioral Health in St. Louis have found.

Welders exposed to airborne manganese at estimated levels below federal occupational safety standards exhibit neurological problems similar to Parkinson’s disease, according to School of Medicine research. The more they are exposed to manganese-containing welding fumes, the faster the workers’ signs and symptoms worsen. The findings, published Dec. 28, suggest current safety standards may not adequately protect welders.

Ramaswamy Govindan, MD, the Anheuser-Busch Endowed Chair in Medical Oncology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, is one of two researchers to receive the 31st annual Alton Ochsner Award Relating Smoking and Disease. The award recognizes investigators who promote understanding and awareness of that relationship.

A new study by the School of Medicine, published Dec. 22 in Nature Communications, helps explain why development of a better vaccine for tuberculosis has been stymied.

Carolyn Baum, of the Washington University School of Medicine, was selected to receive two distinguished honors from the American Occupational Therapy Association and the American Occupational Therapy Foundation in recognition of her many contributions to the occupational therapy profession.

Scientists at the School of Medicine have detailed the structure of a molecule that has been implicated in Alzheimer’s disease. Knowing the shape of the molecule — and how that shape may be disrupted by certain genetic mutations — can help in understanding how Alzheimer’s and other neurodegenerative diseases develop and how to prevent and treat them.

An international team led by Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis has selected a third investigational drug to be tested in a worldwide clinical trial — already underway — aimed at finding treatments to prevent Alzheimer’s disease.

Measuring brain waves, Washington University researchers have found that clinically depressed children don’t respond to rewards the way other children do. The findings may show how the brain processes emotions in young children with depression.

School of Medicine scientists have designed small molecules that prevent bacteria from sticking to the wall of the bladder, halting the development of urinary tract infections in mice. The technology is the basis of a startup company: Fimbrion Therapeutics.

Jennie H. Kwon, DO, has been selected as a 2016 National Academy of Medicine fellow in osteopathic medicine. Kwon, an instructor of medicine in infectious diseases at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, was chosen based on her scholarship, professional accomplishments and expertise.