School of Medicine

Plan to visit this fall’s Health Happening health and wellness fair, titled “Walk this Way.” The fair will be held from 7:30 a.m.-2:30 p.m. Oct. 28 in the McDonnell Pediatric Research Building atrium. It is open to university faculty, staff and students.

Scientists have developed a way to evaluate new treatments for some forms of attention deficit disorder. Working in mice, researchers at the School of Medicine showed that they can use brain scans to quickly test whether drugs increase levels of dopamine. The same group found that raising dopamine levels in mice alleviates attention deficits caused by neurofibromatosis type 1 (NF1), a condition that affects more than 100,000 people in the United States.

Itching is one of the most prevalent side effects of powerful, pain-killing drugs like morphine, oxycodone and other opioids. For many years, scientists have scratched their own heads about why the drugs so often induce itch while they are suppressing pain. Now researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have shown they can control the opioid-induced itching without interfering with a drug’s ability to relieve pain.  

Washington University in St. Louis has received a five-year, $3 million grant to establish a new center to develop better ways to prevent and treat type 2 diabetes in high-risk patients, including American Indians and Alaska Natives, says Debra Haire-Joshu, PhD, director of the new center. 

High-dose vitamin E supplements increase the risk of prostate cancer, results of a large clinical trial show. The study’s findings, published Oct. 12, 2011, in the Journal of the American Medical Association, are based on an updated review of data from the Selenium and Vitamin E Cancer Prevention Trial (SELECT).

A draft recommendation by the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force calling for an end to routine PSA testing for healthy men age 50 and older goes too far, says Gerald Andriole, MD, a prostate cancer expert at Siteman Cancer Center at Washington University School of Medicine and Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis.

The Children’s Discovery Institute has approved funding for three large-scale research initiatives focusing on heart and lung diseases in children. Together, the projects will receive $1.5 million over three years.The institute is a multi-disciplinary, innovation-based research partnership between St. Louis Children’s Hospital and the School of Medicine that has awarded more than $23 million in scientific grants since its launch in 2006.

Washington University School of Medicine is launching a new fellowship designed to give participants an inside look at the operation and governance of an academic medical center. Applications are due Oct. 15.

Cancer can be deadly, but it actually kills higher percentages of African-American men and women than other racial and ethnic groups. So researchers at Washington University School of Medicine and the Siteman Cancer Center in St. Louis are trying to learn why those disparities exist and what to do about them.

Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis will celebrate Campus Sustainability Week Oct. 17-21 with various speakers and information stations around the campus.