School of Medicine

Listed below are this month’s featured news stories. • Risks of MS drug found to be low (week of Mar. 1) • Plant sterols lower cholesterol (week of Mar. 8) • PET scans help test lung drugs (week of Mar. 15) • Arts as Healing program (week of Mar. 22) • Genetic basis of ADHD (week of Mar. 29)

Robert Cohen, Post-DispatchIbrahim Al Hoqail (right), dean of the medical college at King Fahad Medical City, asks a statistics question of instructor Stuart Boxerman.Sweeping changes in the Saudi health care system recently filled a WUSM classroom with a group of medical executives and physicians from King Fahad Medical City, a four-hospital complex based in Riyadh. As health care in Saudi Arabia moves toward privatization, many doctors and health care officials are finding themselves in new, unfamiliar roles. Some have turned to the WUSM health administration program to gain the skills they’ll need to manage their new environment.

Clinicians who care for patients infected with HIV are testing a new set of experimental treatments that may eliminate the hidden copies of the virus that previously have made a cure unattainable.

In this PET image, the arrow shows inflammation of the lungs.A noninvasive approach for assessing lung inflammation should accelerate efforts to develop drugs for inflammatory lung conditions like cystic fibrosis and pneumonia, scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis report. Researchers have used positron emission tomography (PET) scans to monitor artificially induced inflammation in the lungs of healthy volunteers. The new imaging process may help doctors monitor the conditions of patients with inflammatory lung diseases and should make it easier for investigators to test potential anti-inflammatory drugs.

Tiles painted by cancer patients and their familiesPatients undergoing treatment at the Siteman Cancer Center have a new option to pass the time. They can get creative and paint ceramic tiles for a display in the treatment area. Arts as Healing, a program facilitated by the School of Medicine’s Medical Photography, Illustration and Computer Graphics (MedPIC) department, is currently working on “Your Square Matters,” which allows patients and their families to paint a 4-inch square ceramic tile. Already, more than 400 tiles have been completed and are on display in Siteman’s infusion center.

In recent years, one in five U.S. Latina teens attempted suicide. Though this rate is startlingly higher than their non-Hispanic peers, “efforts to understand the phenomenon have been hampered by a dearth of solid statistics and research,” says Luis H. Zayas, Ph.D., professor of social work at Washington University in St. Louis and an expert on mental health issues in the Latino community. “We have developed a new research model that will help us to understand what is really behind those statistics.” More…

Gregory StorchGregory A. Storch, M.D., has been named director of the Division of Infectious Diseases in the Department of Pediatrics and the first Ruth L. Siteman Professor of Pediatrics at the School of Medicine. The new endowed professorship, given by Alvin J. and Ruth Siteman, will support leadership in pediatric infectious diseases.

The 30-week trial is called MARS and is part of a national study sponsored by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute.

Researchers found that Rad9, previously considered a “watchman” that checks for DNA damage, is actually a “repairman” that fixes dangerous breaks in DNA. More medical news

Photo by Tim ParkerNelson Flagg and his wife, Rose, work with Vicki Friedman to paint tiles while Nelson is treated at the Siteman Cancer Center.”Your Square Matters” allows patients and their families to paint a 4-inch square ceramic tile; more than 400 tiles have been completed and are on display.