School of Medicine

George F. Van Hare III, MD, director of the Division of Pediatric Cardiology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, has been named president-elect of the Heart Rhythm Society, a global research and education group focused on cardiac rhythm disorders.

Patients with the most lethal form of acute myeloid leukemia (AML) – based on genetic profiles of their cancers – typically survive for only four to six months after diagnosis, even with aggressive chemotherapy. But new research led by the School of Medicine indicates that such patients, paradoxically, may live longer if they receive a milder chemotherapy drug.

The parasite that causes river blindness infects about 37 million people in parts of Africa and Latin America, causing blindness and other major eye and skin diseases in about 5 million of them. A study from the School of Medicine sheds light on the genetic makeup of the parasite, a step toward the goal of eradication.

A combination of two topical drugs that have been in use for years triggers a robust immune response against precancerous skin lesions, according to a new study. The research, from the School of Medicine and Harvard Medical School, shows that the therapy activates the immune system’s T cells, which then attack the abnormal skin cells. The study was published Nov. 21 in The Journal of Clinical Investigation.

Three School of Medicine faculty members are among 391 new fellows selected by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the world’s largest general scientific society. Azad Bonni, Phyllis I. Hanson and Gary D. Stormo will receive the highest honor awarded by AAAS.

Samuel Achilefu, the Michel M. Ter-Pogossian Professor of Radiology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, has been elected as a fellow to the Royal Society of Chemistry and to The Optical Society.

New research at the School of Medicine shows that excess weight increases the risk that a benign blood disorder — called monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance — will progress into multiple myeloma, a cancer of the blood.

Washington University in St. Louis is launching a bold $25 million initiative over the next five years to develop innovative technologies aimed at improving science and medicine worldwide. The Imaging Sciences Initiative – a partnership between the School of Engineering & Applied Science and the School of Medicine – will support the development of new imaging technologies to diagnose and treat disease as well as study intricate biological structures, metabolism and physiology, and critical molecular and cellular processes.

A national clinical trial involving Washington University physicians at St. Louis Children’s Hospital will compare three commonly used anti-seizure medications used to treat seizures that last over five minutes and don’t respond to initial treatment. Such seizures can strike anyone but are most common in people already diagnosed with epilepsy.

Phyllis I. Hanson, MD, PhD, the Gerty T. Cori Professor of Cell Biology and Physiology at the School of Medicine, has been named chairperson of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Membrane Biology and Protein Processing Study Section.