SPRING 2022
THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES DIVISION
UChicago was someplace where I would be inclu
go Medicine and the Pritzker School of Medicine are among the leaders in the national sh
Inclusive language in society documents
“We Ask Because We Care”
As new, enlightened students and trainees came into academic medicine, th
‘Let’s meet all your needs’ The profound journey of LGBTQ+ healthcare
How Pritzker School of Medicine students, faculty, staff and alumni are helping advance healthcare for a group that has long been marginalized
that people are very complex get the healthcare they deserve
ystem’s awareness the most profound experience
exist as their true self
more complicated than that
Dear Colleagues,
Dean’s Letter
S
pring is a time of renewal, and this year feels especially so as we begin to return to familiar activities. It is also a time of transition. Earlier this year, I announced my intention to step down as Dean of the Biological Sciences Division and the Pritzker School of Medicine and Executive Vice President for Medical Affairs in September 2022. It has been an honor and privilege to serve in this capacity for the past 12
I am confident that the
years, and I am delighted that President Alivisatos intends to make biological
Biological Sciences Division
discovery and medicine a high priority for the University during his presidency.
and the University of Chicago Medicine will continue to grow in eminence and impact.
As I contemplated these exciting opportunities, it became clear to me that this is an opportune time to transition to new leadership for the BSD and the University of Chicago Medicine. When I first came to the University of Chicago as a postdoctoral fellow in 1978, I was particularly impressed by the opportunities afforded to students and trainees for seamless training and scientific collaboration across academic and intellectual disciplines. This continues to be a distinguishing characteristic of this institution and a focus of our training programs, which mark another important transition this spring as David Kovar, PhD, becomes the next Dean for Graduate Affairs. Dr. Kovar is a distinguished basic scientist who will lead the efforts to evolve our training programs to meet the needs of the next generation of scientific workforce. He succeeds Victoria Prince, PhD, who has held the position of Dean for Graduate Affairs for 12 years. During her tenure, Dr. Prince led efforts to streamline operations in the graduate programs, launched several high-profile training initiatives and increased the emphasis on diversity in our graduate community. I would like to thank Dr. Prince for her leadership and look forward to working with Dr. Kovar in the months ahead. The cover story of this issue, which begins on Page 19, highlights one of the many ways our institution continues to evolve. The University and our alumni have become leaders in the national shift to provide more emphasis on diversity, equity and inclusion for LGBTQ+ patients, faculty and students. Much of this movement has been prompted by advocacy on behalf of
Kenneth S. Polonsky, MD The Richard T. Crane Distinguished Service Professor Dean of the Biological Sciences Division and the Pritzker School of Medicine Executive Vice President for Medical Affairs The University of Chicago
our medical students, and a separate feature story details their passionate commitment to health equity. My successor will find this institution in a strong position; in U.S. News & World Report’s latest biological sciences doctoral program rankings, which are published every four years, the BSD placed No. 11 overall, with our programs in paleontology, ecology and evolution, and cell biology ranking nationally as well. Pritzker also continues to rate highly among its peers, ranking No. 20 in U.S. News’ latest annual ranking of research-intensive medical schools. I am confident that the BSD and UChicago Medicine will continue to grow in eminence and impact after the conclusion of my term. I know our alumni share in this optimism as well, and I would like to thank you all for the wonderful opportunities that have been provided to me in over 30 years at this institution.
IN THIS ISSUE C OV E R S T O R Y
Improving healthcare for the LGBTQ+ community 19
Spring 2022 Volume 75, No. 1 A publication of the University of Chicago Medicine and Biological Sciences Division. Medicine on the Midway is published for friends, alumni and faculty of the University of Chicago Medicine, Biological Sciences Division and the Pritzker School of Medicine.
For too long, the healthcare system has marginalized — and sometimes discriminated against — LGBTQ+ patients. But the tide is shifting. University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine students, faculty, staff and alumni are among those leading the way to reduce healthcare disparities and improve care for LGBTQ+ patients.
Email us at momedit@uchospitals.edu Write us at Editor, Medicine on the Midway The University of Chicago Medicine 950 E. 61st St., WSSC 322 Chicago, IL 60637
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The University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine and Biological Sciences Executive Leadership Kenneth S. Polonsky, MD, Richard T. Crane Distinguished Service Professor, Dean of the University of Chicago Biological Sciences Division and the Pritzker School of Medicine, and Executive Vice President for Medical Affairs for the University of Chicago
Richard Furlanetto, PhD’72, MD’73
MS4s Lola Akingbade, left, Christina Stiles and Helen Wei
T. Conrad Gilliam, PhD, Marjorie I. and Bernard A. Mitchell Distinguished Service Professor, Dean for Basic Science, Biological Sciences Division Thomas E. Jackiewicz, President of the University of Chicago Medical Center Vineet Arora, MD, AM’03, Dean for Medical Education, Pritzker School of Medicine
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Editorial Committee Chair Jeanne M. Farnan, AB’98, MD’02, MHPE Dana Lindsay, MD’92 Robert Mitchum, PhD’07 Coleman R. Seskind, AB’55, SB’56, MD’59, SM’59 (Lifetime Member) Abby Stayart, AB’97, PhD’12 Carol A. Westbrook, AB’72, PhD’77, MD’78 Student Representatives Shira Fishbach, LAB’13, AB’17 (Pritzker) Helen Wei (Pritzker) James Zhang (Pritzker) Jessica Morgan (BSD) Alexandra Smith (BSD) University of Chicago Medicine Marketing and Communications Anna Madrzyk, Editor Editorial Contributors Jamie Bartosch Genevieve Bookwalter Kate Dohner Diane Dungey Ted Gregory Ellen McGrew
Devon McPhee Angela Wells O’Connor Sarah Richards Lorna Wong Matt Wood Yuqing Zhu
Photo Contributors Scott Clark Sherri and Brock Fenton/Field Museum Jimmy Fishbein Candi Gard/Pritzker School of Medicine Robert Kozloff Jean Lachat Tyler Lockman/ Pritzker School of Medicine Bruce Powell Richard Pyle Anne Ryan
Joe Sterbenc University of Chicago Photographic Archive, Hanna Holborn Gray Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library Mark Westneat Richard Winterbottom Joel Wintermantle Nancy Wong John Zich
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6
34
David Kovar, PhD
F E AT U R E S
Q&A with David Kovar, PhD 6 Meet the new Dean for Graduate Affairs, and learn how his love of sports propelled him to take on this role.
Life after retirement 10 Alumni are flying planes, volunteering in prisons, building houses, writing books, biking coast to coast and more.
D E PA R T M E N T S
Alumni profile 18 Roy Curtiss III, PhD’62, is a pioneer in microbiology, genetics and vaccinology.
From anatomy to advocacy 28 Courses teach medical students how to advocate for changes that relieve racial, economic and other inequities in healthcare.
Midway News
Pritzker News
Highlights from Dean Polonsky’s 12-year tenure 2
Meeting their match in obstetrics and gynecology 36
UChicago Medicine to build the city’s first freestanding cancer center 8 BSD News Researchers build a tree of life for one of the world’s largest fish families 34 How two major groups of bats use echolocation differently 35
Match Day returns in person 38 AΩA and GHHS inductees 39 Your Letters 40 Your News 42 In Memoriam 42
Design Wilkinson Design PHOTO BY MARK WESTNEAT
1
LEADERSHIP
Midway News
Dean Polonsky to step down after 12-year tenure leading the BSD and Pritzker
K
enneth S. Polonsky, MD, will step down in September as Dean of the Biological Sciences Division and the Pritzker School of Medicine and Executive Vice President for Medical Affairs for the University of Chicago. Polonsky will remain on the faculty and serve as a senior advisor to University of Chicago President Paul Alivisatos. A search to replace him is underway, and his successor is expected to be in place on October 1, 2022. “I am deeply grateful for all that has been achieved under Kenneth’s leadership, and that he will leave the Medical Center and the Biological Sciences Division and Pritzker School of Medicine very well-positioned to continue an upward trajectory,” Alivisatos said in a statement. A prominent diabetes researcher, physician and educator, Polonsky is the Richard T. Crane Distinguished Service Professor. Born and educated in Johannesburg, South Africa, Polonsky first came to
U.S. Senator Dick Durbin and Dean Polonsky discuss the need for more funding for medical research during a 2014 meeting on campus. Polonsky and Robert Grossman, PhD, at the 2016 launch of the National Cancer Institute Genomic Data Commons.
the University of Chicago in 1978 for a fellowship in endocrinology. He joined the faculty in 1981 and served as chief of endocrinology and as director of the University’s Diabetes Research and Training Center. In 1999, he moved to St. Louis, Missouri, to serve as chair of the Department of Medicine at Washington University and physician-in-chief at Barnes-Jewish Hospital. Polonsky returned to the University of Chicago on October 1, 2010, to take leadership roles as Dean of the BSD and Pritzker and Executive Vice President for Medical Affairs. “I am indebted to the University for setting me on the path for a successful and productive academic career, and it has been gratifying to see how our faculty continue to offer similar opportunities for research training and career development for students, residents and fellows,” Polonsky said.
Polonsky and then-University of Chicago Medical Center President Sharon O’Keefe enjoy the Match Day 2018 program at the Pritzker School of Medicine.
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THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO MEDICINE AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES DIVISION
The Duchossois Family Institute, which opened in 2017, focuses on achieving wellness through the intersection of the microbiome, the immune system and genetics.
High-profile recruits during Polonsky’s tenure include paleoanthropologist Zeresenay “Zeray” Alemseged, PhD. In 2018, Alemseged was named the Donald N. Pritzker Professor of Organismal Biology and Anatomy.
BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES DIVISION (BSD) HIGHLIGHTS
Dean Polonsky introduces candidates for degrees during the University of Chicago Convocation in June 2014.
“During this time, through our collective efforts, there have been many notable accomplishments to which you have all contributed and which should be a source of significant institutional pride.” Kenneth S. Polonsky, MD
PHOTOS BY JEAN LACHAT, ROBERT KOZLOFF, BRUCE POWELL, JOEL WINTERMANTLE, NANCY WONG AND JOHN ZICH
During Polonsky’s tenure, the BSD has invested substantially in recruiting research-intensive faculty to basic science and clinical departments and research infrastructure. Shared research facilities and research core laboratories have been expanded and enhanced. These investments have been enabled by the strong financial performance of the BSD, fueled by external grant funding, philanthropy and through expanding clinical practice. Research awards and expenditures have increased. In fiscal year 2021,
BSD-sponsored program awards totaled $466 million, representing more than 60% of the sponsored program awards to the University of Chicago. A significant component of the recent increases in National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding is through large awards, including funding for the NIH HEAL Data Platform, the National Cancer Institute (NCI) Genomic Data Commons, the Medical Imaging and Data Resource Center, the Illinois Precision Medicine Consortium, and the Statistics and Data Management Center for NRG Oncology. New centers and institutes have been created and existing centers have been strengthened, allowing for
Mark Siegler, MD’67, left, Carolyn Bucksbaum, Polonsky and then-University President Robert J. Zimmer, PhD, in 2011 at the event announcing the creation of the Bucksbaum Institute for Clinical Excellence.
uchicagomedicine.org/midway
a sharper focus on strategic scientific priorities. Neuroscience. The Neuroscience Institute consists of 90 faculty from 16 departments spanning three divisions. The Grossman Center for Theoretical and Computational Neuroscience fosters partnerships between theorists and experimentalists to address fundamental questions of how brain circuits generate complex human behaviors.
Cancer. Enhanced investments have been made in research recruitment in cancer in basic science and clinical departments, and in the UChicago Medicine Comprehensive Cancer Center. Microbiome. The Duchossois Family Institute was established in 2017 with a $100 million gift from Janet and Craig Duchossois and The Duchossois Family Foundation. The institute focuses on investigating the microbiome with the goal of reducing susceptibility and/or enhancing resistance to a range of human diseases and inflammatory conditions. Data science and use of big data and artificial intelligence in biology and medicine.
The Center for Translational Data Science is a world leader in the development
of secure computing architecture for large-scale data and hosts all the data for NCI-supported cancer clinical trials. At the Center for Physics of Evolving Systems, researchers are using artificial intelligence to model, test and validate the low-dimensional organizing principles that give rise to complex biological systems. The Center for Research Informatics was established to create an infrastructure to provide faculty with access to large data sets and assistance in analysis of these data. The Institute for Population and Precision Health uses large-scale epidemiologic and population data to develop novel approaches to prevent disease, promote health and reduce health disparities. Education. The new undergraduate major in neuroscience has grown substantially and is attracting outstanding students. The Pritzker School of Medicine is one of the most selective and diverse medical schools in the country. More than 35% of the students who entered in 2021 are from groups underrepresented in medicine. The doctor-patient relationship.
The Bucksbaum Institute for Clinical Excellence, established in 2011 with a $42 million gift from Matthew and Carolyn Bucksbaum, focuses on improving the doctor-patient relationship on our campus as well as nationally and internationally.
MEDICINE ON THE MIDWAY
SPRING 2022
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Sharon O’Keefe and Polonsky talk with a worker during a 2012 tour of the Center for Care and Discovery under construction.
UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO MEDICINE HIGHLIGHTS
Under Dean Polonsky’s leadership, UChicago Medicine has evolved from a hospital and clinical practice focused almost exclusively in Hyde Park in 2010 to a health system, with the incorporation of Ingalls Hospital and health system in 2016. UChicago Medicine now has 10 ambulatory facilities in various locations in the Chicago area and several other practice sites. Expansion plans include a large ambulatory facility in Crown Point, Indiana, to open in 2023 and a state-ofthe-art cancer center on the Hyde Park campus to open in 2026.
Derek Douglas, the University’s Vice President for Civic Engagement and External Affairs, chats with Polonsky at the groundbreaking for the new Emergency Department.
The Hyde Park campus has been transformed with the opening of the Center
for Care and Discovery in 2013, the new and expanded Emergency Department and parking garage, and other construction projects.
UChicago Medicine’s new state-of-the art Emergency Department opened in December 2017, with Level 1 adult trauma services added in May 2018.
National recognition for quality and safety. UChicago Medicine received an
A grade from the industry watchdog The Leapfrog Group 21 consecutive times. UChicago Medicine also received nursing Magnet status, a highly prestigious recognition of the quality of nursing care. Substantial attention has been given to expanding healthcare access to the South Side community. This has been accom-
plished through expansion of capacity and the opening of the Level 1 adult trauma center, now the busiest trauma center in the Chicago area. UChicago Medicine has played a leading role in setting up the South Side Healthy Community Organization, a partnership with Advocate Health Care and a group of South Side community hospitals and federally qualified health centers. This $150 million initiative aims to transform healthcare on the South Side of Chicago by investing in community-based resources. The financial position of both UChicago Medicine and the BSD is strong and has met or exceeded budget targets in each year of Polonsky’s tenure. Medicine and Biological Sciences Development was extremely successful during the last campaign, raising just under $1.2 billion.
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➣ 70-80% of admissions during the pandemic were from South Side neighborhoods. UChicago Medicine is currently the single largest provider of Medicaid services in the state of Illinois for both inpatient and outpatient medical care.
THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO MEDICINE AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES DIVISION
Polonsky speaks at the ribbon cutting for UChicago Medicine River East, one of 10 ambulatory clinics that opened during his tenure. Ken and Lydia Polonsky with two of their grandchildren, Jonah and Simon Vaang, during the Day of Service and Reflection (DOSAR) in 2018, when they joined UChicago Medicine volunteers to work on community projects.
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MEDICINE ON THE MIDWAY
SPRING 2022
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G R A D U AT E E D U C AT I O N
Midway News
5 questions with David Kovar, PhD BY YUQING ZHU
David Kovar, PhD, Professor of Molecular Genetics and Cell Biology, is the new Dean for Graduate Affairs in the Biological Sciences Division. Now in an overlapping role with the current Dean, Victoria Prince, PhD, he formally begins his term on July 1. PHOTO BY ANNE RYAN
David Kovar, PhD, at his lab in the Cummings Life Science Center. He will take over as Dean for Graduate Affairs on July 1.
What do you hope to achieve as the new Dean for Graduate Affairs?
I have some really big shoes to fill in Vicky Prince, who has done an incredible job as Dean. I hope to continue the many wonderful things that she accomplished. As a graduate program chair for the last six years, many of the things I hope to achieve come from my personal experiences. First, I want to pursue having a person in the office who would be an advocate for students and help them navigate difficult problems such as conflicts with their advisor. I also want to increase funding for students. I hope to work hard to bring philanthropy into the system so we can get an endowment. In particular, I’m thinking of international students who have less external funding available to them. There’s a wealth of talented international students we’re missing out on because of this disparity. Finally, I don’t think I have all the answers. I look forward to talking with different people to get their 6
THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO MEDICINE AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES DIVISION
ideas and help them implement good ones. I have the suspicion that my best ideas during my time as Dean will come from others! What are you looking forward to?
I’ve been primarily associated with molecular biosciences during my time here. I’m looking forward to getting to know the rest of the division and learning more about what graduate student life is like throughout the BSD. Hopefully, I can learn from everyone and provide for all students equally, both personally and scientifically. What does your research focus on?
My lab has had a long-standing interest in the actin cytoskeleton, which is self-organized into different networks and structures. Each is tailored to a different fundamental process, such as cell motility and cell division. The networks are incredibly complicated, requiring a perfect combination of many factors. When I started my lab 17 years ago,
I thought it was too difficult to think about all the processes all together, so we’ve focused on one at a time. But all these networks actually interact — positively and negatively — in really interesting ways. Lately we’ve been thinking about their synergy. We are asking questions of how multiple networks get assembled at the same time and same place in the same crowded cytoplasm using many of the same components. What do you enjoy about working with graduate students?
What helped you decide to become Dean?
It stems from my love of sports! I played soccer growing up and in college. I’ve always viewed science as like being on an athletic team or orchestra or anything you would do as part of a group. I view sports, my science, mentoring of students, being program chair and now Dean in the same light — we need to work together and help each other. That’s the way to make the most progress. As for sports, now I spend most of my free time coaching or watching my kids play. They’re heavily into soccer, basketball and volleyball. That’s my self-care — spending time with my kids and watching them play sports. Though mostly I try to stay out of their way!
PHOTO BY JEAN LACHAT
I remember when I started my lab I worried that I wouldn’t get as much satisfaction out of science anymore, because I wouldn’t be doing much of it myself. In fact, the opposite has happened — it’s much more satisfying to help people in your lab have success, discover things and to see them grow as scientists and go on to do great things on their own. I also love
that grad students tend not to be set in their ways, unlike me. They’re open to possibilities and have pushed our lab in exciting ways that I never dreamed we’d go. I owe that all to the students.
BSD graduate programs, Pritzker rank nationally
U
niversity of Chicago programs ranked
Biology, ranked second in the country behind
gynecology ranked for the first time at
among the best in the nation in
Yale University after placing No. 1 in 2019 and
No. 19.
the 2023 U.S. News & World Report
2015. The ecology and evolution program
Pritzker also ranked among the top 10 in
survey of medical schools and biological
ranked No. 10, and the cell biology program,
the country for average National Institutes
sciences graduate programs.
which encompasses elements of several basic
of Health funding per faculty member
The Biological Sciences Division moved
science departments, ranked for the first
($300,610) and tied with Johns Hopkins
up two places to No. 11 in the rankings of the
time at No. 18, in a tie with the University of
University as the fourth most selective
country’s best biological sciences doctoral
Michigan and the University of North Carolina
medical school in the country.
programs, tied with Columbia University,
at Chapel Hill.
Cornell University and Duke University. U.S.
In the annual U.S. News survey of research-
U.S. News also released medical school student diversity metrics. Pritzker ranked
News ranks the nation’s biological sciences
intensive medical schools, the Pritzker
No. 9, first among the top 20 schools. Only
programs every four years.
School of Medicine tied with the University
four of the top 20 research medical schools
of California, San Diego for the 20th spot.
ranked in the top 20 for diversity.
The paleontology program, which draws from the interdepartmental and inter-
The primary care program placed No. 30,
institutional Committee on Evolutionary
internal medicine No. 22 and obstetrics and
uchicagomedicine.org/midway
To see the full list of graduate school rankings, visit usnews.com.
MEDICINE ON THE MIDWAY
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U N I V E R S I T Y O F C H I C AG O M E D I C I N E
Midway News
UChicago Medicine plans to build city’s first freestanding cancer center BY LORNA WONG
Kunle Odunsi, MD, PhD, AbbVie Foundation Distinguished Service Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology; Director, University of Chicago Medicine Comprehensive Cancer Center; and Dean for Oncology.
PHOTO BY NANCY WONG
“Cancer death rates on the South Side are almost twice the national average, and cancer is the second-leading cause of death for area residents. This is one of the key reasons we are building this cancer center.” Kunle Odunsi, MD, PhD Director, University of Chicago Medicine Comprehensive Cancer Center
T
he University of Chicago Medicine plans to build a $633 million, 500,000-square-foot facility dedicated to cancer care on the Hyde Park campus. Slated to open in 2026, it would be Chicago’s first freestanding clinical cancer center. “The University of Chicago has long been recognized for its strength in basic and translational research with fundamental and seminal contributions by our faculty to understanding the basic biology of cancer and its treatment,” said Kenneth S. Polonsky, MD, Executive Vice President for Medical Affairs at the University. “Our health system is looking to build upon this legacy by establishing a cancer program of the future, where groundbreaking science and compassionate, complex care intersect to provide an unrivaled approach to prevent, diagnose, study, treat and cure cancer.” The new cancer center will represent one of the largest investments made by the academic health system for patients and the community. If approved, the new cancer center will add to an emerging ecosystem of care on the South Side, where community hospitals play a vital role in providing access to care for vulnerable and lower-income patients, and where academic health systems like UChicago Medicine play a critical role in treating the sickest patients and those who require complex care. Indeed, a collaborative of 13 South Side care providers, including UChicago Medicine, established the South Side Healthy Community Organization, which will serve over 400,000 residents with more seamless and more accessible healthcare.
➣ See story on facing page A significant portion of the planning and design will focus on the patient and family experience, including making sure
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THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO MEDICINE AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES DIVISION
all services throughout the care journey are in the same location and creating a healing and stress-reducing environment. The cancer center, which includes inpatient and outpatient care, will have a focus on prevention and early detection of cancer and be a hub for research into the more aggressive forms of cancer that affect residents on the South Side and many other communities of color across the country. “The cancer center will increase access to vital complex care treatments for South Side patients while bringing the best cancer hospital in the state to the neighborhoods that need it most,” said Candace Henley, a cancer survivor, founder of The Blue Hat Foundation and member of the UChicago Medicine Community Advisory Council.
NE W CANCE R CENTER Location
57th Street, between Maryland and Drexel Avenues Anticipated annual volume
200,000 outpatient visits and 5,000 inpatient admissions Key features ■
128 hospital beds dedicated to patients with cancer
■
100 exam rooms
■
Outpatient services
■
Full suite of imaging and diagnostic solutions
■
Clinical trials unit and research clinic space
■
Stem-cell treatment and processing facilities
■
Genetic testing and counseling
■
Radiation oncology and infusion services
■
Urgent care to serve unique needs of patients with cancer
Ambitious health equity initiative builds momentum and progress BY ANGELA WELLS O’CONNOR
I
n late 2020, a group of healthcare organizations based on the South Side of Chicago, along with community members and leaders, came together to discuss a sweeping initiative — one designed to tackle the most pressing and complex health challenges and disparities facing South Side communities, including those related to chronic disease, maternal and infant health, and behavioral health. The group hopes to transform the landscape of health and healthcare on the South Side of Chicago, where life expectancy can be 30 years shorter than in neighborhoods just 10 miles to the north. UChicago Medicine is one of 13 healthcare organizations in the coalition, now known as the South Side Healthy Community Organization (SSHCO). The collaborative includes hospitals, health systems and federally qualified healthcare organizations — along with hundreds of community members and leaders representing healthcare interests, grassroots organizations and the faith community. In July 2021, the Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services granted
funding to the coalition to implement its proposed Healthy Community Model — nearly $150 million over five years. In the first year, $26 million will support hiring providers, care coordinators and community health workers, as well as providing patients with improved access to specialty care and developing technology platforms that can better connect care providers. Brenda Battle, RN, BSN, MBA, the University of Chicago Medicine’s Senior Vice President for Community Health Transformation and Chief Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Officer, was a prominent voice in the development of the initiative and is now one of 16 members on the SSHCO’s board of directors. She emphasizes that the Healthy Community Model is designed to create a new healthcare ecosystem that prioritizes prevention, early intervention, access and care coordination. “Ultimately, we want keep people healthy, reduce health disparities and increase health equity for South Side residents,” Battle said. “We are hoping that, together, we can find ways to better connect our existing health organizations,
UChicago Medicine’s $607 million community benefit investment
A
s part of its commitment to advance health equity, the University of Chicago Medicine invested $607 million in benefits and services to the community in fiscal 2021. This includes $520.4 million invested at the University of Chicago Medical Center and $86.5 million invested at UChicago Medicine Ingalls Memorial. Last year, as the COVID-19 pandemic continued, UChicago Medicine prioritized vaccine distribution, education and outreach, including addressing the challenges
uchicagomedicine.org/midway
of access, misinformation and distrust that were leading to low vaccination rates in Black and brown communities. Through UChicago Medicine’s community health division, the Urban Health Initiative, the health system continues to partner with community members and leaders, including its Community Advisory Council, to address community health concerns like chronic disease and trauma. For more information and to read the 2021 Community Benefit Report, please visit community.uchicagomedicine.org/2021.
The South Side Healthy Community Organization (SSHCO) aims to tackle the most pressing and complex healthcare challenges facing South Side communities.
S O U T H S IDE H E A LTHY CO MMU NIT Y O RGANIZ ATION Serving more than 400,000 residents
90
primary care providers and obstetrics hires
Access to nearly
50
priority specialists
250
community healthcare workers/coordinators
increase access to care, address some of the most challenging social determinants of health and, ultimately, ensure a stronger, healthier community.”
“Through partnerships, datadriven programs and meaningful investment, the University of Chicago Medicine is committed to advancing health equity and supporting the most relevant and pressing health concerns in the communities we serve.” Brenda Battle, RN, BSN, MBA Senior Vice President for Community Health Transformation and Chief Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Officer, UChicago Medicine
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Where are they now? Building houses, flying airplanes, writing books — and more. A dozen Pritzker School of Medicine alumni talk about their postretirement pursuits. STORIES BY GENEVIEVE BOOKWALTER
LAWRENCE DEVOE, MD’70 Augusta, Georgia Retired in 2020 as Professor Emeritus of Medical College of Georgia, Augusta University. Runs five miles daily and has authored two books.
Retired obstetriciangynecologist Lawrence Devoe, MD’70, following a 5-mile run in New York’s Central Park last fall.
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THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO MEDICINE AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES DIVISION
Love of vinyl records My second book, Still Sealed, was published in August 2021. It is about record collecting, in particular very special kinds of limitededition records that are hard to get. It starts off in Chicago. The main character is a wealthy, retired record collector with a bucket list of 12 records he hasn’t yet been able to find. I have been collecting records since age 11. In my retirement, I have a lot more time to listen to them. There are some on the shelf that I thought, “I’ll get around to those one day,” and that day has arrived. Writing for magazines, too I’m a professional writer for two entertainment magazines — one devoted to record and audio equipment reviews, and the other focused on video discs, films and streaming content. Both are subjects I’ve known a lot about, and my writing about them has taken off since I retired. Travel time My wife, Anne, and I love to travel, and we are now getting the chance to take all those trips that were postponed by the pandemic.
ANDREW J. ARONSON MD’69, MPH, MBA Chicago, Illinois
“Traveling makes me appreciate how lucky I have been.”
Retired in 2020 from working as a locum tenens pediatric nephrologist; former Section Chief of Pediatric Nephrology at the University of Chicago Wyler Children’s Hospital and LaRabida Children’s Hospital. Manages money/investments, travels and spends time with family and enjoying cultural events. Teaching and trading After my fellowship at the
uchicagomedicine.org/midway
In her retirement, Frances McNiell Gill, SB’61, MD’65, has taken up drawing and painting again. She also enjoys singing in choral groups and gardening.
FRANCES MCNIELL GILL, SB’61, MD’65 Gladwyne, Pennsylvania Retired in 2002 as Associate Professor of Pediatrics, University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine. Paints, draws and sings, and traveled widely pre-pandemic.
PHOTO BY JOEL WINTERMANTLE
University of Chicago, I became head of pediatric nephrology and served until 1999 when I “retired” for the first time. I then became immersed in learning to trade bond and other futures, while I consulted and taught in several Chicago-area pediatric programs. I enrolled in the MBA/MPH joint degree program at the University of Illinois Chicago, where I was also a medical staff member. In addition, I became a registered investment advisor and commodity future advisor because I toyed with trading professionally. Longtime interest My interest in trading developed as a young person when I learned what was happening at the Board of Trade and how the trading of agricultural commodities was crucial in commerce. Then later, when financial futures expanded to include stock indexes and other instruments, new areas were open as well. Second act Since I enjoyed consulting in nephrology, I decided to limit trading and investing to personal accounts and continue to practice and teach part time. I began to work as a locum pediatric nephrologist, retiring for the last time in 2020 when the pandemic made it unattractive to travel and the demand for locum physicians declined because of restrictions and quarantine requirements. My wife, Iris K. Aronson, MD, retired at the same time from the UIC dermatology department. Cultural pursuits We now spend much of our time in Michiana, Michigan, and go into the city to enjoy the Lyric Opera, Chicago Symphony and theater. I consider myself fortunate that I can continue to actively follow my decades-long interest in markets.
Andrew Aronson, MD’69, MPH, MBA, enjoys pursuing his decades-long interest in financial markets.
Love of singing I have sung all my life. I was not a soloist but sang in choral groups. I particularly enjoyed performing the big choral pieces with orchestra: requiems, masses and oratorios such as Handel’s Messiah. Exploring the world I retired several years early, because medicine had changed so much and because I was unsure how long I would be well enough to do what I wanted, especially travel. I went to many new countries to learn about the people and see the beauty there, and I took many photographs. The cameras now are so good that anyone can enjoy photography. Green thumb I have been an enthusiastic gardener all my life. My house was on an acre of land with mature trees. I particularly like native plants, and so I added many native trees, shrubs and flowering plants. I also had masses of spring bulbs. Now I live in a villa, really a rowhouse, in my retirement community. I have planted flower beds in the front and back and have a plot for vegetables in the community garden. These activities helped me handle the stress of raising a family and of 30 years of practice at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.
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WILLIAM CONWAY, PHD’79, MD’81 Charleston, South Carolina Retired in 2021 as head of musculoskeletal radiology at the Medical University of South Carolina. Involved in efforts to decrease recidivism in the South Carolina and federal prison systems. Getting started My background and training in
Jerrold Seckler, MD’68, with his plane. A pilot and flight instructor, he volunteers to fly patients who need to travel for medical care.
JERROLD SECKLER, MD’68 Chicago, Illinois Retired in 2011 as a private practice urologist in Arlington Heights, Illinois. Flies his own plane and in 2016 received the FAA’s Wright Brothers Master Pilot Award for 50 years of safe flying. Lifelong pilot I’ve been a pilot for a long time. I learned how to fly when I was in medical school. I used to cut classes and take the 55th Street bus over to Midway to take flying lessons. I got my pilot’s license way back in 1967. I’ve been flying ever since. Once I retired, I really started to fly substantially more often. I’ve owned an airplane since the early ’70s. I was part of the crew of a single-engine turboprop that did a circumnavigation of the globe. And I have flown well down into Antarctica (75 degrees south latitude). I’ve flown on every continent. I do a moderate amount of flight instruction, too. It’s kept me busy, sort of a second career. Angel Flights These are flights that take people who can’t afford transportation to various places for medical care. Over the last 10 years or so I’ve been doing them, I’m up to 111 of these flights. Angel Flights are extremely rewarding. I don’t tell the passengers that I’m a retired physician. I just tell them I’ve been flying for 55 years. They like to have an experienced pilot at the controls.
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THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO MEDICINE AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES DIVISION
genetics initially sparked my interest in the justice system and how it uses DNA evidence. I connected with a woman, the mother of a prisoner, who was a prison activist, and that led me to getting more involved in prison programs. Access to education I am working with three state educational institutions to see if they would be willing to team up with the South Carolina Department of Corrections to offer online courses and degrees to prisoners. I’m also partnering with the head of entrepreneurship at the University of South Carolina to design a basic course on entrepreneurship to educate incarcerated individuals. Part of the course will involve writing a business plan. Brainstorming I’m Catholic, and the Jesuits are the premier educational portion of the Catholic Church, with more than 27 colleges throughout the country. I’ll be meeting with a small group of Jesuit college presidents to learn about their in-person prison education experiences. My hope is to also convince them to introduce online courses and degrees for inmates in the federal prison system. Musical connections Meanwhile, I sing in a men’s chorus, and we’ve helped establish a men’s chorus in the local prison. We go out and coach the prison chorus once a month. Our chorus invites inmates to join our chorus after they are released with the idea of serving as mentors to these men.
William Conway, PhD’79, MD’81, during a TV interview about his men’s chorus working with the local prison to establish a chorus for inmates.
Lois Svoboda, MD’66, says she developed “a dormant artistic side” during retirement. Her travel adventures have included riding a zipline across the Nujiang River in China and going on two safaris in Zimbabwe.
Thinking about retirement Michael H. Silverman, MD’73, says a recent Coffee & Conversations session on retirement was a big help in both providing valuable perspective as well as helping him look ahead to his next chapter.
PHOTO BY ROBERT KOZLOFF
Coffee & Conversations is a new, virtual event series hosted by the University of Chicago Medical & Biological Sciences Alumni Association (UChicago MBSAA). The camera-on, Zoom discussions are hosted by fellow alumni. In October 2021 the topic was “Retirement: Tips for Enjoyment Post-Career.” “My 50th-year Pritzker reunion is approaching, and yet I’m still working, essentially full time,” said Silverman, former Alumni Council President. “I left clinical practice about 12 years after medical school and have been working in pharmaceutical clinical research ever since. I now work as an independent consultant for emerging biotech and pharma companies that lack internal medical resources and need expert clinical guidance.”
LOIS SVOBODA, MD’66 Fremont, Nebraska Retired in 2021 from a private practice in psychotherapy. Resolving to “try to do something each week that I had never done before,” she played percussion in a band, taught ESL classes, became a CASA advocate and traveled widely. Resettling refugees I got involved in a group of about
20 people here in Fremont who couldn’t stand to do nothing about what was going on in Afghanistan last August. So, we have this long list of people who have been helping in whatever way that they could to resettle Afghan refugees. Recently, we helped our sixth family. Swimming I’ve swum regularly for over 50 years; that keeps me sane and it keeps me balanced. We swim regularly and about a year and a half ago I joined a swim team. Creative outlet Eight years ago, I started making jewelry using flowers from my garden in my spare time. I enjoy it because you can’t beat the raw material. My job is to keep them as pretty as they were. Continuing work I’ve continued counseling former cult members off and on through the years. Most therapists don’t know much about cults and don’t want to. It’s incredibly complicated and crosses all kinds of boundaries, like family, sense of self/ self-esteem, money, religion, sex and education. It just violates so many different parts of a person.
“I wake up daily with a sense of wonder at the diversity and beauty of our world.” uchicagomedicine.org/midway
Former Alumni Council President Michael H. Silverman, MD’73, is thinking about what he will do after he retires. He found a virtual conversation with fellow alumni, sponsored by the UChicago MBSAA, helpful.
“At my age, retirement is something that comes up all the time,” said Silverman, 72. “Interestingly, I haven’t made any decisions regarding retirement, partly because I love what I do and partly because I don’t have a plan to keep myself productively occupied postretirement. But I do have questions, which is what drew me to this event.” A few things impressed Silverman about the session, he said. “We had a spectrum of ages and career stages, which really facilitated the dialogue,” he said. “People were asking questions and trying to learn.” Alums who might not have known each other before bonded over similar preretirement concerns, he said. And finally, Silverman said, he realized that he should think seriously about creating a plan for how to spend his days when he’s not working anymore.
The next Coffee & Conversations discussion on “Post-Retirement Pursuits” will be June 24, 2022, from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. CDT. To RSVP, please go to tinyurl.com/Coffee ConvoJune24.
“A major theme that emerged was use of time. How do use your time when you retire? “The conversation was just so open and flowing and personal and unguarded. It was a pleasure to participate,” Silverman said. “We were instant friends, sharing personal thoughts in collegial, nonjudgmental fashion.”
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LUCILLE (LUCY) LESTER, MD’72 Chicago, Illinois Retired in 2013 as Professor of Pediatrics and Section Chief of Pediatric Pulmonology at the University of Chicago Medicine. Researched and wrote Women and the Practice of Medicine: A New History (1950-2020). Focus on women physicians As a medical student, trainee and later as a faculty member at the University of Chicago, I made numerous observations — over this 40-year period — that there were differences in the way men and women practiced medicine. I had the idea for much of that time to evaluate this and write a book. It took retirement and the respite from clinical and administrative responsibilities, and from raising two children — who by then were well launched in their own academic careers — to begin the process of writing. I started by developing a questionnaire and used it as a template to interview women physicians of different ages and disciplines who had obtained their MDs from 1949 to 2011. I asked about their education, family, job satisfaction, pay equity and career advancement, experience of harassment or discrimination, acceptance by peers, supervisors and patients, and whether they felt they practiced differently than their male peers. I found most of the women physicians I interviewed were very happy to speak to me and wanted to relate things that they had long forgotten. I also found that many did not know much about the recent history of what life was like for women docs; I therefore decided to incorporate some of the stories that their interviews generated into seven chapters organized by decades and covering seminal historical events that took place from 1950 to 2020 as the structure for the book. Return to campus Soon after I retired from fulltime work, my husband and I moved to Cape Cod to enjoy the beach! Three years later, we returned to Chicago and now live in Hyde Park, a few blocks walk from Regenstein Library. After months of reading and thinking about the book, it took days in the wonderful quiet of Regenstein to really start to write. The process of finding a publisher and navigating contracts and production was a major learning experience. I’m now working on a second book. Sweet skill In addition, I still enjoy making pastry and desserts for my friend Mary Mastricola, chef and co-owner of Hyde Park’s wonderful French restaurant, La Petite Folie.
Lucille (Lucy) Lester, MD’72, interviewed female physicians on a wide range of topics for her book. She and her husband live in Hyde Park, and she did most of the writing in the quiet of Regenstein Library.
Philip Lisagor, MD’72, owns a small ranch outside of Reno, where he enjoys riding his horses. He competes in some equestrian events.
For more information on the book, visit https://link.springer.com/978-3-030-74138-9. 14
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PHILIP LISAGOR, MD’72 Olympic Valley, California Retired in 2009 as Chief of Surgery, Reno VA Medical Center, and Assistant Dean, University of Nevada School of Medicine. Has a small horse ranch, earned an MFA in fiction and directs an outreach program for Jewish prison inmates. Family ties My wife, Susan Blumenfeld Lisagor,
AB’72, and I live in northeast California. Our daughters, Jessica Lisagor and Sara Davidson, JD’09, and their families have houses a stone’s throw away. Susan’s sister, Joan Blumenfeld-Krone, AB’71, lives across the Truckee River. Outreach to Jewish inmates In the Army, I did three combat tours in Iraq. Everywhere you went as a Jewish service member, there were prayer books from Aleph. I wanted to do something to pay them back, because they were always there for me. So, I started volunteering with Jewish inmates in the state penitentiary system. I visit there one Friday a month to help them welcome the Sabbath and just talk to them as people. I’ve been doing this for about 10 years. It’s been a meaningful thing for me. I hope it has been for the inmates. Horses and skiing I have been active all my life. I’m a pretty passionate skier and also an equestrian. I have horses, I ride, I compete a little bit in jumping and three-day events. I have three acres outside Reno where the horses live. I grow pasture. Retirement tip It’s nice if you have some activities you can put your passion into after retirement. If you don’t have activities, find some that you may feel passionate about and are easy for entry-level learners.
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RICHARD FURLANETTO, PHD’72, MD’73 Santa Fe, New Mexico Former pediatric endocrinologist at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and University of Rochester. Scientific Director of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation from 1999 to 2003.
Richard Furlanetto, PhD’72, MD’73, working on a construction site as part of a Habitat for Humanity volunteer crew.
Volunteers with Habitat for Humanity and as a docent at two Santa Fe museums. Part of a team I’ve always liked building things, so
when I retired I volunteered at Habitat for Humanity in Santa Fe. It was a good decision — it’s a great cause, I’ve learned a lot about how houses are built and I’ve made good friends within the group of regular volunteers who do a lot of the work. You learn to work together, making it a really enjoyable experience. Frustrated archaeologist I’m also a docent at two museums in Santa Fe. I’ve always liked archaeology, and New Mexico has a long and fascinating history. Being a docent is like teaching. It’s fun. Woodturning I also like to make things — like bowls and vases — out of wood. Some are utilitarian but most are more artistic, with different shapes and types of wood.
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KENNETH GASS, MD’74, PHD’74 Bellingham, Washington
Francis Pien, MD’69, continues to work, including taking care of COVID-19 patients, but has cut back his hours to about 40 a week.
Retired in 2012 as a general pediatrician at PeaceHealth St. Joseph Medical Center, Bellingham, Washington. Tandem cycles with his wife, Francie, including national and international tandem bike tours. Bicycle built for two I’ve been cycling seriously for
Kenneth Gass, MD’74, PhD’74, and his wife, Francie, on their touring tandem bike, which hitches to their car or packs into two 50-pound Rolie bags for flights. Since giving up running in 2014, he has cycled 52,000 miles, nearly 13,000 of those on the tandem.
eight years after my running legs gave out, while Francie continues to run on trails. Since inviting her to join me on a tandem, together we brought our usual mileage to about 2,500 miles per year. Last year we rode almost 6,000 miles with our cross-country ride, from San Diego to St. Augustine, Florida. Working together Tandem cycling demands teamwork and communication. That’s the great thing, to share the effort, the sights and the quiet with your spouse. On the cross-country ride, we really needed each other. At one point along the way, I was in spasms from over-pushing and understretching. Francie had to pull me through it. We were a team and that felt good. Public health I’ve been fortunate enough to be on the board of a local foundation that has an endowment from the sale of a private renal dialysis center. We’re tasked to address the social determinants of health in our county. Serving as the head of the children and family committee has allowed me to stay actively connected to my profession.
FRANCIS PIEN, MD’69 Honolulu, Hawaii Still in practice at Internal Medicine and Infectious Diseases, Inc., in Honolulu. Cut his work hours from about 100 a week to 40 taking care of COVID-19 patients and as a hospital infection control/microbiology consultant, and volunteers as a chaplain advisor. Teaching around the world I’m an infectious disease doctor. I’ve been to maybe 120 countries. I’ve been around the world teaching parasitology and microbiology. An opportunity came up maybe five years ago that changed my life. There was an article in a humanitarian journal. It’s by a University of Chicago medical school graduate (Roger P. Holland, PhD’77, MD’79), the dean of a new African medical school in Ethiopia and he wanted people to teach basic science. I wrote to him and he said I really fit in. Until COVID, I was going there every year. The first time for 10 weeks, the other times for six weeks. I gave about 60 lectures during a six-week curriculum. Serving as a chaplain advisor and training new students I received theology training while in
medical school at the University of Chicago Divinity School, as well as taking a student chaplaincy clerkship. I now interact with both medical students and hospital chaplains to show them that the spiritual and physical bodies are strongly interconnected.
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THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO MEDICINE AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES DIVISION
GEORGE RHYNEER, MD’64
“I’m fully retired, but busier than I’ve ever been.”
Anchorage, Alaska Retired in 2010 as a full-time cardiologist in private practice. Held general cardiology clinic days at the Alaska Native Medical Center, volunteers in out-of-town clinics and helped raise money to start a clinic in Anchorage for Medicare patients.
MICHAEL BIHARI, MD’66 Cape Cod, Massachusetts Retired in 2006 from the healthcare consulting firm he founded, Sprain Ridge Consultants. Went to culinary school, helped develop a community coalition to fight teen substance abuse. Meals and more Shortly after we moved here, I got
involved with working at a homeless shelter for families. I worked there for two years. I would stay overnight covering for staff. I’m also an accomplished chef; I went to cooking school. So, I taught cooking lessons at the shelter. I would make holiday meals and that kind of stuff. Opening a community health center The most important thing I did was to work at a free clinic with volunteer physicians. I knew a lot about the healthcare system, and I became a volunteer to help get things organized. I was asked to join the board of directors and became president of the board, which I did for four years. When I started, we were a free clinic with about 400 patients. When I left, we were a federally qualified and funded health center with three locations and 15,000 patients. It’s now grown to five locations and about 20,000 patients.
Cooking is a passion for Michael Bihari, MD’66, who tried his hand at catering and running a healthy lifestyle cooking school. He also works with a coalition to help prevent teen substance abuse.
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George Rhyneer, MD’64, appeared in a TV ad campaign supporting an alcohol tax in Anchorage to fund addiction treatment and other services.
Alaska Native Medical Center I got invited to go over there and help them out in their clinic, take care of their patients in the office. I’d actually taken care of Native patients before. Initially I got to Alaska courtesy of the U.S. Public Health Service in the late ’60s to take care of tuberculosis. I traveled to the Native villages by dog team and ski plane. I really had an affinity for the culture and the people. It was so much fun talking with and seeing the people again. Surprisingly, every day I was in the clinic, I would meet children of people that I met out in their village. I could remember one guy saying my name is such and such, and I said, “I have a picture of one of your ancestors in my living room. An artist.” They’d say, “Oh, that’s my grandpa.” Helping the homeless Our
church has done things for the homeless; a couple years ago, they had one night every week that homeless families could come to the church and spend the night. We open up the church, put out cots. It gets well below zero around here. There are homeless families living in their cars, in tents around town. It’s really unacceptable. Fundraising That’s been one of my fortes late in life, fundraising. I just don’t have a problem getting on the phone or having somebody over and saying, “Hey, how about $5,000?” I went down to Juneau and got a million dollars and got the clinic started in Anchorage for Medicare patients, who were being turned away by family doctors. I never saw patients in it, I just made it happen. That was probably the most satisfying project.
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Developing vaccines
PHOTO BY SCOTT CLARK
ALUMNI PROFILE
to address worldwide problems
Roy Curtiss’ pioneering work in microbiology, genetics and vaccinology has helped save millions of lives BY KATE DOHNER
HONORS The American Society for Microbiology’s Lifetime Achievement Award, member of the National Academy of Sciences, American College of Veterinary Microbiologists’ 2020 Distinguished Microbiologist
INVENTIONS 54 patents
MENTORSHIP 108 postdoctoral trainees and fellows, 23 graduate students, and hundreds of undergraduate and high school students
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R
oy Curtiss III, PhD’62, probably didn’t imagine that his work cross-breeding chickens as a junior high school student in the 4-H club in the 1940s would lead to a lifelong career. After completing undergraduate studies at Cornell University, Curtiss began studying bacteriophage viruses at Brookhaven National Laboratory and exchanging ideas during regular meetings with worldwide experts in phage genetics — five of whom went on to win the Nobel Prize. These sessions inspired Curtiss’ passion for genetics and the microbiological sciences, leading him to pursue graduate studies in microbiology at the University of Chicago. While at UChicago, Curtiss worked with several researchers now recognized for their pioneering work, including Eugene Goldwasser, SB’43, PhD’50, who discovered the anemia drug erythropoietin, and James “Jim” Moulder, SB’41, PhD’44, who conducted groundbreaking research on infectious diseases. “Jim taught me the importance of sharing ideas,” Curtiss said. “The scientific community only sees progress when we disseminate knowledge and work together in a collegial environment.” His experience working with Moulder spurred Curtiss’ early research aimed at understanding the mechanisms by which microbial pathogens, bacteria and viruses cause disease. These investigations led to the co-discovery of the molecular genetic means by which Salmonella invades cells, along with the development of a weakened strain of E. coli, which was later used to perfect the technology for creating human insulin. While at UChicago, Curtiss named the bacterial strains he identified “chi” strains, in recognition of
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Roy Curtiss III, PhD’62, with his wife and research collaborator, Josephine “Josie” Clark-Curtiss, PhD
the University. Today, there are more than 17,000 such strains. In the late 1970s, Curtiss shifted his focus from basic research to vaccine development. He subsequently founded the company Megan Health to develop animal vaccines and has since created five licensed vaccines to control Salmonella and other pathogens in poultry and swine — work that has lessened the incidence of food-borne disease in the U.S. and saved many lives. In 2021, his company Curtiss Healthcare shipped 51 million doses of a new poultry vaccine in its first week of availability. Over his 67-year career, Curtiss has advanced research at leading institutions across the country — from the University of Alabama at Birmingham to Washington University in St. Louis to Arizona State University to the University of Florida, where he is now a professor in the Department of Infectious Diseases and Immunology. Today, Curtiss continues to push forward vaccine development as he works to create vaccines that control fertility in wildlife species and act as therapeutic agents to target and destroy tumors and cancer cells. Most recently, he and his team have begun developing bacterial strains to improve vaccines’ effectiveness in inducing long-term, protective immune responses. Beyond his research prowess, Curtiss is committed to training the next generation. “I’ve always had an open-door policy,” Curtiss said. “I could be talking to the president of the university, but if you have a question, you can come in and ask me. It’s wonderful to see the people who’ve come through my door go on to do amazing things all over the world.”
Bringing the needs of the LGBTQ+ community into focus
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From the classroom to the clinic, embracing the mission to make sure all patients are truly ‘seen’ and receive the healthcare they deserve
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HE A LTH C A R E F O R A L L
BY TED GREGORY
Consider the people a patient interacts with during a visit to the doctor’s office or the hospital. If every single one of those people questions a fundamental element of who the patient is, it becomes easy to see how a traditional healthcare
A
fter earning his medical degree at the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine, Michael Brownstein, SB’62, MD’66, headed to Los Angeles for a surgical internship. He decided to focus his training on plastic surgery, with the goal of becoming a board-certified plastic surgeon. “I dreamed about becoming a plastic surgeon to the stars,” Brownstein, now retired, said from his home in Scottsdale, Arizona. “That was what I was determined to do. No matter where I went for additional training, I was coming back to Beverly Hills to open a practice.” Following his general surgery residency at the University of New Mexico, Brownstein completed a plastic surgery residency at the University of California, San Francisco. That’s where he was exposed to — and moved by — the plight of transgender patients and where his dream of becoming Hollywood’s premier cosmetic surgeon was replaced by a new aspiration. Brownstein instead became a pioneer in genderaffirming surgery in the late 1970s, perhaps the first in the U.S. to perform “top surgery” — removal of the breasts and chest reconstruction — on a patient
system complicates and
‘We’ve made it known that we are present.’
exacerbates transgender
A half century after Brownstein earned his medical degree at the University of Chicago, Christian Carrier, MS1, came out as gay during the summer after his high school graduation in Naperville, Illinois. He was tentative about his involvement in advocacy until his junior year as a biology major at Miami University in Ohio. That’s when he decided to pursue a minor in women’s, gender and sexuality studies, which made him more aware of the importance of advocacy and its role in fields like medicine. During some medical school interviews, he recalled feeling as if he were being interrogated about his sexuality, until he came to Pritzker. “UChicago stood out to me,” Carrier said. “Throughout the interview process, they were really good at demonstrating diversity, emphasizing social determinants of health, and emphasizing community service and inclusion as well.” The faculty and students he spoke with seemed genuinely interested in getting to know him and learning about his personal journey to medicine, he said. “So, when it came down to the decision, I felt like UChicago was someplace where I would be included, where I could be myself and pursue the passions I had from Miami and continue them.”
individuals’ health issues.
Michael Brownstein, SB’62, MD’66, who retired 10 years ago, was a pioneer in gender-affirming surgery.
PHOTO COURTESY OF MICHAEL BROWNSTEIN, MD
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transitioning from female to male. The patient was pleased, and more patients followed. Therapists and others working with LGBTQ+ patients began referring transgender patients to him. His reputation and practice grew rapidly. But the surgical community was less than supportive. “The reaction from the patients was totally positive,” Brownstein said. “The reaction in the medical community — at least from my surgical colleagues — was very negative. It was an undercurrent of, ‘How can you work with these patients? What’s happened to your practice that you have a need to do this type of surgery?’” “Now,” Brownstein added, “they’re all doing it.” More than four decades later, the growing awareness of the needs of LGBTQ+ patients — as well as LGBTQ+ faculty and students — is leading to more clinicians and centers providing specialized care; more emphasis on LGBTQ+ issues in medical school and the workplace; and greater involvement in advocacy and activism. The University of Chicago Medicine and the Pritzker School of Medicine are among the leaders in the national shift.
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PHOTO BY NANCY WONG
The Progress Pride Flag, designed in 2018 by artist Daniel Quasar, includes a chevron with the colors pink, blue and white (from the transgender flag) and black and brown (to represent people of color) in addition to the rainbow colors representing LGBT pride.
Christian Carrier, MS1, and Samantha Morris, MS2, are LGBTQ+ student leaders at Pritzker.
Samantha Morris, MS2, landed at Pritzker by a different path. After earning her bachelor’s degree with a major in Latin, she worked for two years — first as a teacher and tour guide in Rome, then as a standardized patient and gynecological teaching associate at Tulane University School of Medicine in her hometown of New Orleans. She also volunteered at a local healthcare clinic. Like Carrier, Morris felt affirmed and validated during her Pritzker interview. The school’s diversity also impressed her. “That diversity, paired with the smaller class size and seeing the connections that students have with each other was powerful,” Morris recalled. “By the time I finished my interview day, I was thinking, ‘If I get in, this is where I need to go.’” Those impressions and experiences early in their medical education have had a profound impact on both medical students. Carrier is one of the 2021-2022 leaders of OUTPatient, Pritzker’s organization for LGBTQ+ medical students, and Morris is a former OUTPatient leader. In May 2021, OUTPatient became a chapter of the Medical Student Pride Alliance, a national body. During 2020-21, OUTPatient created a mentorship program, revamped Pritzker’s LGBTQ+ health curriculum, and established a volunteer program with the renowned Howard Brown Health, which provides healthcare and social services for the LGBTQ+ community in Chicago. Morris and Carrier have both had an individual impact as well. Morris created an inclusive sexual history-taking document for her Pritzker class. In January 2022, the Chicago Tribune published
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Carrier’s op-ed challenging the Food and Drug Administration’s “outdated and homophobic policy” barring men who have sex with men from donating blood unless they abstain for three months, despite a national blood shortage. All of this shows how young people are helping drive the movement toward a more inclusive healthcare system. “I think over the past year,” Morris said, “we’ve made it known that we are present and that we have goals for improving queer healthcare and the experiences that we have had, and the experiences that patients continue to have.”
New transgender clinic For the seventh consecutive year, UChicago Medicine is a Human Rights Campaign Foundation LGBTQ+ Healthcare Equality Leader. The designation is based on equity and inclusion policies and practices for an institution’s LGBTQ+ patients, visitors and employees. UChicago Medicine earned the maximum score in each section of the foundation’s index. “I sense a genuine, expressed interest from faculty and leadership of the University to make sure that we are inclusive,” said Amanda Adeleye, MD, Assistant Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology. She also serves on the American Society for Reproductive Medicine LGBTQ Task Force, working on appropriate, inclusive language in society documents. “I certainly appreciate that effort.” UChicago Medicine started the “We Ask Because We Care” initiative, which includes asking patients
“ We’ve made it known that we are present and that we have goals for improving queer healthcare and the experiences that we have had, and the experiences that patients continue to have.” Samantha Morris, MS2
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HE A LTH C A R E F O R A L L
Amanda Adeleye, MD, provides fertility services for transgender and gender-diverse patients.
about their sexual orientation and gender identity. Gathering that information allows staff to treat each patient with respect, help build trust, provide more effective care, identify gaps in healthcare and find ways to close them. In addition to asking patients about their sexual orientation and gender identity, “We Ask Because We Care” directs staff and healthcare workers — from those in the call center to frontline
PHOTO BY JIMMY FISHBEIN
UChicago Medicine started the “We Ask Because We Care” initiative, which includes asking patients about their sexual orientation and gender identity.
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clinicians — to ask patients about their pronouns and name, sex assigned at birth, and sex on legal documents. Patients can choose not to answer any of the questions. Information gathered from the questions becomes part of a patient’s medical record and is protected by the same privacy standards that apply to all patient information. Executing change to adopt a more inclusive environment, especially in the field of medicine, can also present challenges — challenges of great magnitude and some minutiae. Iris Romero, MD, SM’07, Dean for Diversity and Inclusion for the Biological Sciences Division and a member of UChicago Medicine’s gender-affirming care team, ran into one such challenge about two years ago, when the hospital began reconsidering the name of the place where people go after giving birth. “For more than 30 years, we called that place the Mother Baby Unit,” said Romero, Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology. “We never thought about it until now: ‘Wait, not everybody who’s going to have a baby is going to use the word mother.’ So, we thought we’ll just change the sign in Mitchell.” It was a little more complicated than that.
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“There was so much back and forth about verbiage,” she said. “Everybody wanted to call it something different.” Weeks later, the sign was changed to Three North. A similar experience unfolded with the Women’s Health Center, which ended up being called the OB/GYN Clinic. Looking back, what amazed Romero about the experience was how enthusiastic the staff was to embrace the changes and the broader approach of including LGBTQ+ individuals in the UChicago Medicine health system. “We’ve had people come out of the woodwork saying, ‘We want to help. How can we take care of those patients also?’” Romero said. “I think it’s the moment we’re in. Whether it’s race, gender, sexual orientation — everyone is really having a sort of internal awakening, about the privilege that maybe they’ve carried around and that others have not benefited equally.” Romero counts herself fortunate. She was the first in her family to attend college. A lesbian, she has seen over the years acceptance of same-sex relationships grow and legal protections enacted. She has considered how much she benefited from that direction and realized that transgender people have been left behind. “I couldn’t be like, ‘Oh great, everything’s good for me. Everybody loves lesbians now. Peace out,’” she said, laughing. “I just felt that I definitely had an obligation to give back and advocate for transgender individuals who are still in a different place in their journey with their healthcare experience.” One of the more profound ways that commitment manifested itself is her leadership with colleague Andrew Fisher, MD, who specializes in gynecology, gender-affirming hysterectomy and pregnancy care for transgender patients, in creating the Transgender Clinic for Affirmation and Reproductive Equity in May 2021. Known as TransCARE, the weekly clinic connects transgender and gender-diverse patients to doctors and services that include hormone therapy, gender-affirmation surgery, fertility services, voice services, mental and behavioral health services, pediatric and adolescent care, sexual health, and more. Apart from their unique needs, transgender patients often have very negative interactions with the healthcare system. Consider, Fisher said, the people a patient interacts with during a visit to the doctor’s office or the hospital. If every single one of those people questions a fundamental element of who the patient is, it becomes easy to see how
Tide has shifted The healthcare system’s awareness of LGBTQ+ patients’ needs is a relatively recent development that gained momentum in about 2008 for several reasons, said Loren Schechter, MD’94, who has performed gender-confirmation surgeries for two decades and worked with the American Civil Liberties Union and many other legal groups to support gender-affirming healthcare.
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Andrew Fisher, MD, co-leads the Transgender Clinic for Affirmation and Reproductive Equity (TransCARE) at UChicago Medicine. The clinic, which started last year, connects transgender and gender-diverse patients with trans-friendly doctors in different fields of medicine, such as surgery or endocrinology.
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a traditional healthcare system complicates and exacerbates transgender individuals’ health issues. “So,” Fisher added, “we wanted to create a safe space for these patients where they can come in, talk about who they are, be heard, be understood, and not have to climb over all the barriers that they typically have to just to be able to get the healthcare that they deserve.” Patient interest in TransCARE has been strong, said Fisher, Assistant Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology. Many simply didn’t know how to access the care they needed. Doctors have helped them establish care with mental health specialists, endocrinologists, surgical subspecialists and others. Three couples are pregnant. Julie Chor, MD’04, MPH, Associate Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology, provides inclusive care for LGBTQ+ patients and teaches the medical ethics course for first-year Pritzker students. She is among those working with Fisher and Romero to enhance LGBTQ+ care, particularly in obstetrics and gynecology. And she’s working with two Pritzker students on research based on interviews with LGBTQ+ individuals about their first pelvic exam. She has seen the awareness of LGBTQ+ healthcare continue to grow and was especially encouraged by the enthusiastic participation in a clinic workshop on transgender care and language around gender. “People in the workshop came up and told me that they’re excited to learn more,” Chor said. “Some of them mentioned they felt a little nervous because they didn’t want to say the wrong thing, which is common, but everybody seemed to really care about providing compassionate care.” Much of making LGBTQ+ patients feel welcome is about having the right language and being comfortable using it, Chor said. “I would not claim expertise,” she added. “What I tell people is that I can guarantee that I’m committed to learning and doing as good a job as I can, but recognize that I’m not perfect and have things to learn.”
“What we’re really trying to do is help Schechter, author of the first surgical atlas on gender-affirming surgery, also established the first fellowship in gender-affirmation surgery in the U.S., in 2017, at Weiss Memorial Hospital in Chicago. Driven largely by young people more comfortable with gender fluidity and wider LGBTQ+ representation in media, the overall social environment became more open to diversity, added Schechter, Director of Gender Affirmation Surgery at Rush University Medical Center and member of the executive committee for the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH). In addition, the power of social media was brought to bear on public entities and private corporations, which found themselves in the spotlight, pressured from a growing number of people who saw diversity, equity and inclusion as priorities. The broader influence of the internet also helped galvanize the movement, allowing people to share their stories and realize that their experiences were not isolated, Schechter said. “So, you had all these somewhat disparate groups coming together from all over the world,” he said, “and the milieu starts to change.” The Affordable Care Act became law in 2010, providing federal protections for LGBTQ+ patients in healthcare. Four years later, Medicare removed its ban on gender-affirming surgery, leading to a significant and unexpected increase in requests for the surgery, Schechter said. The increase has continued at a steady pace, he added. (Although the
them understand that people are very complex and made up of many different facets. We want our students to embrace the mindset of being open-minded, being curious with patients and, most of all, making sure that patients feel cared for.” Adam Eickmeyer, MPH Director of Medical School Education
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Iris Romero, MD, SM’07, is Dean for Diversity and Inclusion in the Biological Sciences Division, and co-leader of the TransCARE clinic.
“Whether it’s race, gender, sexual orientation — everyone is really having a sort of internal awakening, about the privilege that maybe they’ve carried around and that others have not benefited equally.” Iris Romero, MD, SM’07 Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology
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administration of then-President Donald Trump removed some LGBTQ+ protections in 2020, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services under President Biden reinstated them in 2021.) John Schneider, MD, MPH, has witnessed the shift firsthand over the past two decades. An epidemiologist and infectious disease specialist, Schneider is Director of the University’s Chicago Center for HIV Elimination and medical director for the Hyde Park clinic of Howard Brown Health. He specializes in providing high-quality care for young Black sexual minority men and for Black transgender women, and he has been researching HIV for years.
Schneider remembers the early 2000s, when some in the medical profession were unaware of what the acronym LGBT meant, as “frightening times.” A key turning point came in 2007, when the Fenway Institute, which advocates and delivers healthcare to underserved groups, partnered with the American College of Physicians to publish The Fenway Guide to Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Health, the first U.S. medical textbook to address LGBT individuals’ healthcare needs.
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LGBTQ+ medical students, once concerned about being public with their gender and sexuality, and straight students have been powerful players in that shift. “Change happens from the ground up,” said Schneider, Professor of Medicine. “As new, enlightened students and trainees came into academic medicine, the system was forced to change.”
‘Out’ faculty and a curriculum overhaul Students at Pritzker already learn about LGBTQ+ health in a first-year course, Health Equity Advocacy and Anti-Racism (HEAR), said Adam Eickmeyer, MPH, Director of Medical School Education at Pritzker. Also, Eickmeyer covers the topic — specifically, inclusive and affirming communication skills with all patients — in a clinical skills course he teaches. “One of the things that I think Pritzker does a really good job of is trying to remind students of the humanity in the patients they are going to be seeing,” he said. “For a very long time, Pritzker has been a leader in educating students about health inequities and about their role as future physicians in mitigating health inequities.” A key to educating future physicians, Eickmeyer and others said, is that the skills their Pritzker education is trying to impart center on being inclusive and should be used with all patients. “A lot of the issues that impact LGBTQ+ folks also impact other populations,” he said. “So, what I’ve tried to do is take an intersectional approach. It’s important, I think, when we’re training physicians that we’re not training them to put people in boxes based off of some categories and then go down a checklist. What we’re really trying to do is help them understand that people are very complex and made up of many different facets. We want our students to embrace the mindset of being open-minded, being curious with patients and, most of all, making sure that patients feel cared for.” During their clinical rotations, students receive training in LGBTQ+ care based on its connection to the clinical specialty, Eickmeyer said. One constant among all clerkship directors, he noted, is that “they care tremendously” about mitigating health disparities. That perspective is threaded throughout a Pritzker student’s education, regardless of what specialty they may choose, and has become a powerful draw for the school. Another feature that sets the University of Chicago apart is the Biological Sciences Division (BSD) web
Internist and infectious disease specialist Aniruddha “Anu” Hazra, MD, works to expand testing and screening for sexually transmitted infections. This includes bringing healthcare to the LGBTQ+ community in a minivan retrofitted as a mobile mini-clinic.
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“The opportunity to go on this journey with page, Out Faculty @ BSD, a compilation of clinical and basic science faculty who identify as LGBTQIA+ or as allies of the community. A total of 18 faculty members, including Romero, Brandon Baird, MD, the voice surgeon for the TransCARE program, and internist Aniruddha “Anu” Hazra, MD, currently include their photos and profiles on the page, as do 18 allies, including doctors Adeleye, Chor, Schneider and Fisher. Pritzker is undertaking a curriculum renewal, for which planning started in 2021. The updated curriculum, expected to be in place by Autumn Quarter 2023, will establish health disparities and physicians’ role in mitigating them as a formal part of students’ medical education. The new curriculum also will adopt health equity, community engagement and advocacy, which emerged from a survey of the medical school and health system, as a new domain — what Eickmeyer called “a central theme longitudinally across all four years of the curriculum.” Inclusion and belonging will be another curriculum domain. “The way we’re thinking about this is teaching students about health disparities and issues related to that, but also teaching them — and I don’t want to simplify this too much — how to with a sense of professionalism interact with people who are different than you,” he said. “Because no matter what specialty you go into after medical school, you’re going to interact with people who are different from you, and a lot of people don’t necessarily consciously think about that as they’re going through their
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medical education. But for us, it’s something that’s really important.”
Hazra’s ‘different’ job Being on the front lines of LGBTQ+ care has become familiar to internist and infectious disease physician Aniruddha “Anu” Hazra, MD, Assistant Professor of Medicine, who considers Schneider a mentor. Hazra’s clinical and research interests center around HIV and sexually transmitted infections prevention among sexual and gender minorities. And he works to expand access to testing and screening while dismantling the stigma that surrounds STIs. “I love my job,” he said, smiling. Part of that job is getting LGBTQ+ patients to feel comfortable talking about their sexuality with physicians. “It’s very different from a lot of my friends’ jobs,” Hazra added. “That’s for sure. I talk about sex for probably the majority of my job, which is great. That’s what I want to do.” Apart from his UChicago Medicine clinic, Hazra works in what one might consider nontraditional settings, particularly for the Chicago Center for HIV Elimination. Pre-pandemic, Hazra would drive to clubs and other queer meeting spaces — even outdoor places where patients cruise — to perform testing and HIV prevention. And, from time to
someone and to participate in their transition and to give them the agency to exist as their true self is the most profound experience.” Erika Sullivan, SM’09, MD’11
“ Change happens from the ground up. As new, enlightened students and trainees came into academic medicine, the system was forced to change.” John Schneider, MD, MPH Professor of Medicine MEDICINE ON THE MIDWAY
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time, he now hops in a retrofitted van — a mobile mini-clinic that includes interview space and an exam section complete with a fold-down table, sink and other features — and brings healthcare to the LGBTQ+ community. “All of this goes back to sexual health access and sexual health delivery,” he said, “and meeting folks where they’re at.” So many people in vulnerable populations will not or cannot come to a clinic, Hazra said. “This is really understanding that, for a lot of these vulnerable populations, it’s sometimes easier and better to figure out innovative ways to meet them halfway.”
“‘Let’s meet all your needs’ really speaks to the role of primary care.”
A profound journey for physicians About 1,400 miles west of Hyde Park, Erika Sullivan, SM’09, MD ’11, has become a leader in LGBTQ+ healthcare policy — an almost accidental occurrence. A family practice physician, Sullivan focuses on PrEP (pre-exposure prophylaxis) for HIV prevention and LGBTQ+ health — especially transgender health — at University of Utah Health in Salt Lake City. When she completed her family medicine residency in 2014 in Utah, one of Sullivan’s attending physicians, Bernadette Kiraly, MD, who had been treating transgender patients for several years, was PHOTO COURTESY OF ERIKA SULLIVAN, MD
Erika Sullivan, SM’09, MD’11
Family medicine physician Erika Sullivan, SM’09, MD’11, helped establish the University of Utah Transgender Health Program, a multidisciplinary center for gender-diverse patients.
reducing her client load to become a clinic director. Kiraly asked Sullivan if she’d like to start treating transgender patients. “I said, ‘Yeah, I’d be happy to, but I don’t know anything about this medicine; I’ve never learned anything,’” Sullivan recalled. “And she said, ‘Don’t worry. You’ll figure it out.’ And, sure enough, I did. And then, well, sometimes I feel like my name is on a 26
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bathroom wall somewhere: ‘For good trans care, go see Erika Sullivan.’” The number of her transgender patients grew rapidly, and Sullivan found that treating the population was fulfilling in powerful and unanticipated ways that center on serving a marginalized population eager to make changes for a better life. “We could get really philosophical about why people go into medicine,” she said. “These patients are excluded from receiving healthcare in a real, profound and distressing way. So, when you see that and you see that you can be a provider who sees them as a person — not just a trans person — who has needs, and then systematically say, ‘Well, let’s meet all your needs,’ that really speaks to the role of primary care.” In addition, Sullivan said, she experienced disillusioning challenges early in her residency and as a faculty member in primary care — a specialty, she said, that often feels like she’s treading water trying to treat so many societal problems that manifest themselves in patients’ ill health. When Sullivan lectures on the topic and talks more informally about it, she tells people the reason to offer trans care is “entirely selfish,” she said. “The opportunity to go on this journey with someone and to participate in their transition and to give them the agency to exist as their true self is the most profound experience,” Sullivan said, “because most patients don’t really want to change. No one wants to exercise to lose weight. No one wants to take their medicine.” Her transgender patients, by and large, are the exact opposite. “They are so eager for change,” Sullivan said. “To be a partner in that is such a profoundly emotional experience. I just can’t speak highly enough about it.” The power of those personal experiences has led Sullivan to expand LGBTQ+ healthcare in her region and LGBTQ+ healthcare training at the institution where she is an assistant professor in family and preventive medicine. She was a leading force in creating a comprehensive HIV PrEP program and gender-affirming hormone therapy at University of Utah Health for patients across an expansive region of the U.S. that includes all or parts of Utah, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming and Nevada. In 2017, she also helped establish the University of Utah Health Transgender Health Program, a multidisciplinary healthcare center for gender-diverse individuals.
PHOTO BY JEAN LACHAT
About the same time, Sullivan helped create an elective program in transgender health for fourthyear medical school students. And, she’s working to expand the capacity of other healthcare providers to offer similar care, in part by serving as co-chair of the Mountain West Transforming Care Conference, an annual gathering on gender-affirming care, sexual health and HIV prevention in primary care. “When you make that connection with someone who has had really bad experiences in healthcare and you sort of change their mind about what healthcare could be,” Sullivan said, “there is no other patient interaction that is going to give you as powerful of an endorphin-dopamine rush. So, if we start training our students on how to do this, the joy that they get from the practice of this medicine will self-perpetuate, and more and more and more people will recognize why this is so fulfilling as a career.”
Loren Schechter, MD’94, is Director of Gender Affirmation Surgery at Rush University Medical Center and member of the executive committee for the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH). He is the author of the first surgical atlas on gender-affirming surgery.
“And I already see it with the Pritzker
Reasons for optimism It’s clear that healthcare for LGBTQ+ patients has improved even since Chor earned her degree in 2004. Progress has been particularly rapid in the last decade. “There’s certainly been a lot of work going on to kind of catch up to things,” Chor said. She noted that the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists is reviewing the use of gendered language in its documents and on its website. It’s also producing more educational materials for its members. But much work still needs to be done in educating practicing physicians and in medical schools, said Chor and others. Doctors who have been working in the field offer several suggestions to enhance the healthcare system’s approach to — and medical school education on — LGBTQ+ health. A major step is normalizing the care and being inclusive and welcoming. Fisher called it “taking it out of the box.” It’s asking the right questions of every patient and being open-minded, curious and empathetic. Romero said the field should move more toward ease of access and cultural competence. She also said the University of Chicago should continue strengthening its partnership with Howard Brown Health. Eickmeyer said “more professional infrastructure,” in the form of research and conferences, also would help. As for education, Carrier said the most important step is incorporating LGBTQ+ care in Pritzker’s
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overall curriculum. Fisher would like to build TransCARE into a robust educational resource for medical students and residents. All of them are optimistic. The reason? Medical school students. “What I appreciate about the people I’ve taught in the past five years or so,” Eickmeyer said, “is that they think outside the silos and really try to get to the root of these problems. For me, seeing the passion and the brilliance in the students and trainees is what definitely makes this time different.” Fisher said he hopes that in 15 to 20 years UChicago Medicine’s TransCARE and other clinics like it will be unnecessary, because all healthcare providers will be well-versed in how to care for all populations. “I rely so much on medical students to be the voice of change,” he said. “I know that sounds kind of cheesy and corny, but it’s their generation that’s going to be able to introduce these changes, to bring into medicine a kind of baseline understanding. And I already see it with the Pritzker students. They’re asking about how they can get more education opportunities. They’re walking around with pronouns on their badges, and it’s awesome. They’re already coming from the right place. “I think if we just keep that up, keep pushing, and we just keep working a little bit harder, we’re going to see that in 20 years, this is not going to be an interesting story.”
students. They’re asking about how they can get more education opportunities. They’re walking around with pronouns on their badges, and it’s awesome. They’re already coming from the right place.” Andrew Fisher, MD Assistant Professor of Medicine
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Learning advocacy alongside anatomy Pritzker prepares future doctors to challenge inequities in healthcare BY DIANE DUNGEY
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olunteering at a children’s mental health unit and a counseling clinic fueled Tony Liu’s passion for a career in psychiatry, while revealing one of its challenges: too few medical professionals to meet the growing need. Ideas for making the mental healthcare system more sustainable were on Liu’s mind, and a course required of University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine first-year students nudged him to put them into words. Liu, MS1, wrote an op-ed as the
PHOTO BY NANCY WONG
mental healthcare practitioners to account for the full scope of their work and to address a shortage of mental health professionals such as social workers. Op-eds by Christian Carrier, MS1, and Tecora Turner, MS1, also were published in the Chicago Tribune. Carrier called for ending an FDA policy barring blood donation by men who have had recent sexual contact with other men. Carrier called the rule “unethical and unfair to gay and bisexual men and, most importantly, to the millions of patients who desperately need blood transfusions.” Turner challenged lawmakers to address the unequal distribution of healthcare resources that contributes to disproportionate breast cancer deaths for Black women in Chicago. Three more op-eds by first-year students were published on KevinMD.com, a website featuring writing by medical professionals that has over 500,000 subscribers across several social media platforms. Rohan Moghe, MS1, called for awareness
“I am especially proud of the advocacy work that our learners do here given that most are drawn to Pritzker and the University of Chicago because Tony Liu, MS1, is one of three first-year Pritzker students whose op-eds were published recently by the Chicago Tribune. The students wrote their op-eds for a course on the American healthcare system.
final course assignment in The American Healthcare System, taught by Venkatesan Ram Krishnamoorthi, MD, MPH, and Gregory W. Ruhnke, MD, MPH. He also submitted it to the Chicago Tribune. Liu’s was one of three op-eds written by students in the course to be published in the newspaper’s opinion pages. The assignment is part of a growing emphasis at the Pritzker School of Medicine to teach medical students to advocate for changes that relieve racial, economic and other inequities in healthcare. “I can think of no better time than the pandemic and our country’s racial reckoning to teach future physicians how to advocate in the public domain for public health and for their patients,” said Vineet Arora, MD, AM’03, Herbert T. Abelson Professor of Medicine and Dean for Medical Education. Ideas into action
Liu’s op-ed advocated for retooling medical billing practices — a key topic that students learn about in Krishnamoorthi and Ruhnke’s course — to allow 28
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of the deep commitment to health equity, social justice and serving our community.” Vineet Arora, MD, AM’03
and resources for physicians’ mental health. Michelle Verghese, MS1, argued that travel bans in response to Omicron were ill-considered. Hassaan Asif, MS1, wrote about exorbitant prescription drug prices, using his personal example of forgoing an updated epinephrine pen for his allergy due to the high price, even with good insurance. Newsweek published an op-ed by Anna Thorndike, MS1, calling for increased funding for healthcare and services for people who are homeless. And a letter to the editor by Meredith Hollender, MS1, on the controversial ShotSpotter technology, was published by the Chicago Sun-Times. “I was floored,” said Krishnamoorthi, who had offered the op-ed writing option for the first time and invited Shikha Jain, MD, AB’03, a faculty member at the University of Illinois Chicago and
co-founder of the advocacy group IMPACT (Illinois Medical Professionals Action Collaborative Team), to lead an op-ed workshop for students. The resulting work aligns with the University’s commitment to social justice and with professional codes, said Arora, also a co-founder of IMPACT. The American Board of Internal Medicine, in a charter endorsed by 109 physician organizations, calls on doctors to “work actively to eliminate discrimination in healthcare.” The American Medical Association Declaration of Professional Responsibility includes an imperative for physicians to “advocate for social, economic, educational and political changes that ameliorate suffering and contribute to human well-being.” Yet, “while advocacy is an important part of becoming a physician, our research shows few medical schools have formal advocacy curricula,” Arora said. Making ‘the ask’
Physicians are motivated to challenge systemic problems as a way to help their patients, but the doctors benefit as well, said Krishnamoorthi, Assistant Professor of Medicine. Being a vehicle for change keeps burnout and cynicism at bay. “It takes the idealism and passion that students bring into medical school and helps to preserve it,” he said. Students come to Pritzker with knowledge and often with experience in social justice work, Krishnamoorthi said. That is honed in the required Health Equity, Advocacy and Anti-Racism (HEAR) course. “In the HEAR course, we don’t just teach about the causes and results of structural inequities,” said Milda Saunders, MD, MPH, Associate Professor of Medicine. “We also work with students to envision solutions, on a large scale or in our own backyard.” By the time they arrived at the final assignment in Krishnamoorthi’s course, most students readily saw problems they were eager to address. Pinning down solutions was a little harder. “In advocacy, we identify a problem. We identify a specific target of that problem that we think needs to be changed. We identify who could actually change it. And then, make the ask,” Krishnamoorthi said. Liu did his research, then sat propped in his bed and wrote. The op-ed came together readily, said Liu, a former journalist who plans to continue on his advocacy path. “It’s important that we express our voices,” he said. “I’m excited to see what all my classmates do. I think Pritzker is cultivating a generation of physicians who will work to make our healthcare system more equitable.” uchicagomedicine.org/midway
Most med schools offer, but don’t require, advocacy courses Most U.S. medical schools teach advocacy, but the majority of courses are elective, according to a study co-authored by Vineet Arora, MD, AM’03, Dean for Medical Education. Researchers found:
Ram Krishnamoorthi, MD, MPH
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Of 134 U.S. medical schools listing courses online, 103 (77%) offered advocacy content.
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Advocacy was part of 114 required courses and 238 elective courses.
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Elective courses were more likely to be centered on advocacy; include field experiences and skills building; and focus on specific populations, particularly children.
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Few courses focused explicitly on health inequities among racial and ethnic minorities.
“The practice of advocacy is a skill like any other, and one that deserves the attention of education.”
The study was published in the journal
Ram Krishnamoorthi, MD, MPH
Academic Medicine.
Student-written op-eds on mental health, breast cancer disparities and the FDA’s blood donation policy were published by the Chicago Tribune.
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New state law allows unused medications to be donated
Student research focuses on healthcare disparities
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Several new studies led by Pritzker School of Medicine students identify disparities in patient records and in access to COVID-19 resources.
Alan Hutchison, PhD’16, MD’19, was a
medical student volunteer in one of the free clinics when the idea first came to him: Why couldn’t unused medications be donated to people who couldn’t afford them? He’d seen the power of such an exchange. Another volunteer had brought unused drug samples from the medical practice where she worked to patients at the clinic. But there was no broader framework for redirecting medications in Illinois. That changed January 1, 2022, with a new state law championed by Hutchison. The Illinois Drug Reuse Opportunity Program Act allows unexpired, unopened medications to be donated, prioritizing patients who are indigent. Getting the law passed was not easy. Hutchison said Pritzker School of Medicine training and previous advocacy experience, for which he received the Jane Morton and Henry C. Murphy Award for student leadership in 2015, helped him
“I believe advocacy should be expected in our profession.” Alan Hutchison, PhD’16, MD’19
tackle the problem. “This is the kind of advocacy I didn’t know was possible until I was a student at Pritzker,” said Hutchison, now a gastroenterology, hepatology and nutrition fellow at the University of Chicago Medicine. While taking a required Pritzker course on healthcare disparities in 2011, Hutchison learned about the Human Rights Campaign’s Healthcare Equality Index. Known as HEI, it evaluates healthcare facilities on equity for LGBTQ+ 30
patients, visitors and employees. Hutchison lobbied for participation by UChicago Medicine, which now has been named an LGBTQ+ Equality Alan Hutchison, PhD’16, Leader for six MD’19 consecutive years. Hutchison said the experience helped him visualize, years later, how to help make medications available to patients who can’t afford them. He participated in the Clinton Global Initiative University hosted by the University of Chicago in 2018 and learned about the legislative process. He found a collaborator, oncology pharmacist Elizabeth Lindquist. He took the idea to Pritzker’s healthcare disparities class and Nikita Deshpande, now an MS4, signed on. They got a bill drafted, identified sponsors, testified in Springfield — and the bill died in 2019. “The cards seemed stacked against us,” Hutchison said. They didn’t give up. In 2021, with a broader coalition and new sponsors in State Rep. Will Guzzardi and State Sen. Karina Villa, the bill passed and Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed it into law. Now, Hutchison is working on implementation and on familiarizing physicians, including via presentation during UChicago Medicine Grand Rounds. With that work continuing, Hutchison is contemplating other problems he could try to solve. He keeps a list of them on Evernote, titled “Advocacy.” “There’s an infinite number of small things that I’m looking forward to tackling once the drug repository is up and running,” he said.
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Michael Sun, MS3, was lead author of a study published in Health Affairs that focused on negative descriptors such as noncompliant, agitated or challenging that are in patients’ electronic records. Black patients had 2.5 times the odds of having such descriptors entered into their records by medical providers, compared to white patients. Negative descriptors may affect care, weaken patients’ trust in providers and “exacerbate racial and ethnic healthcare disparities,” according to the study. The study received national media attention, including in The New York Times. A separate study, led by Maria Paz, MS2, and Diana Marino-Nunez, MS2, found that online COVID-19 vaccination resources were less accessible in Spanish than in English in the 10 most populous U.S. cities, where vaccination of Hispanic residents lagged. Accessing Spanish-language information on public health websites required more clicks, the researchers found. Among eight major retailers giving vaccines, five did not offer the main COVID-19 vaccination information page in Spanish and four had no vaccine scheduling in Spanish, according to the study, published in the Journal of General Internal Medicine. A third study, led by Sharon Zeng, MS2, linked inequitable vaccine coverage in Chicago to disproportionate COVID-19 deaths in spring 2021. The study, which will be published May 27, 2022, in JAMA Network Open, was highlighted by WBEZ in an examination of Chicago’s vaccine rollout.
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H O N O R S A N D AWA R D S
Five BSD faculty members named AAAS fellows
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ive Biological Sciences Division faculty members were named 2021 fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) for their distinguished contributions to the sciences. Maria-Luisa Alegre, MD, PhD’93,
Professor, Department of Medicine: Recognized for “distinguished contributions at the interface of basic immunology and transplantation science and therapeutic modalities for transplantation.” Michael Coates, PhD, Professor, Department of Organismal Biology and Anatomy: Recognized for his “distinguished contribution to the field of vertebrate paleontology, particularly for original studies on phylogenies and morphological evolution of jawed vertebrates, and on evolution of tetrapods from lobe-finned ancestry.”
Yoav Gilad, PhD, Professor, Department of Medicine; Dean for Biomedical and Health Informatics: Recognized for “pioneering contributions in comparative transcriptomics studies and seminal contributions to our understanding of regulatory mechanisms and their contributions to human common disease.” Marcelo Nobrega, MD, PhD, Professor, Department of Human Genetics; Chair, Committee on Genetics, Genomics and Systems Biology: Recognized for “pioneering contributions to characterizing the function of regulatory genetic variation contributing to human disease.” Phoebe Rice, PhD, Professor, Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology: Recognized for her “pioneering research in structural biology investigations of mechanisms of DNA bending and structural biology in microorganisms.”
Recognized as thought leaders in healthcare Vineet Arora, MD, AM’03, Herbert T. Abelson Professor of Medicine and Dean for Medical Education, was recognized as one of the 2022 LinkedIn Top Voices in Health Care. The LinkedIn team recognized 15 individuals in healthcare for content that is insightful, timely and conversational, and that engages with their communities. Arora was also one of the University of
Chicago Medicine leaders recognized by Crain’s Chicago Business as one of its 2022 Notable Executives of Color in Healthcare. Also honored were Brenda Battle, RN, BSN, MBA, Senior Vice President for Community Health Transformation and Chief Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Officer, and Rajlakshmi Krishnamurthy, MD, Chief Clinical Transformation Officer and Vice President of Population Health.
Doriane Miller, MD’83
Miller honored for diversity leadership Doriane Miller, MD’83, is one of the
recipients of a 2022 University of Chicago Diversity Leadership Award, presented each year during the celebration of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s legacy. Miller, Professor of Medicine and Director of the Center for Community Health and Vitality, has dedicated her career to advancing health equity and addressing healthcare disparities. Among her many accomplishments, Miller developed the Community Grand Rounds program, sharing information and research to improve health on the South Side. She is also a senior investigator on a $20 million grant from the National Institutes of Health, working to establish a center to address multiple chronic diseases associated with health disparities.
G R A D U AT E E D U C AT I O N
UChicago offers new master’s degree in precision health
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he University of Chicago’s new Master of Science in Precision Health program launches in Autumn Quarter 2022. One of the first of its kind, the program applies emerging technologies and methodologies in precision medicine to a broader population health context. Courses will be taught primarily by renowned faculty in the University’s Institute for Population and Precision
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Health, and cover topics that include epidemiology, biostatistics, population health, bioinformatics, genomics, and equity and inclusion. Additionally, students can personalize their studies by choosing an area of concentration: data science, clinical research or entrepreneurship in medicine. The program can be completed in one year, including a culminating capstone project. The student body will include recent
undergraduates, working professionals and trained clinicians. The program is designed to help graduates compete for advanced careers in clinical and academic research, pharmaceuticals and medical startups, or go on to doctoral programs or medical school. For more information, visit precisionhealth.bsd.uchicago.edu.
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Alvin Tarlov, MD’56, and the revitalization of general medicine in the U.S. BY SARAH RICHARDS
Alvin Tarlov, MD’56, chaired the Department of Medicine from 1968 to 1981.
UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PHOTOGRAPHIC ARCHIVE, HANNA HOLBORN GRAY SPECIAL COLLECTIONS RESEARCH CENTER, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO LIBRARY
“General Medicine had been sort of floating around and lost, and Alvin Tarlov really made it an academic section. He wanted to make General Medicine an academic, smart, well-respected place that could also command research funding resources.” Deborah Burnet, MD’89, AM’03 Chief, Section of General Internal Medicine
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THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO MEDICINE AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES DIVISION
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ellness journey, holistic healthcare, integrative medicine: All of these terms highlight the increasing emphasis on viewing patients as whole individuals who harbor more than a specific ailment or medical need. Today, good healthcare does more than just address a patient’s illness or injury; it also endeavors to care for that person’s mental, physical, emotional and social needs, with the understanding that each of these components plays a role in an individual’s overall health. Many may not realize that the University of Chicago Medicine played a key role in this evolution nearly 50 years ago by establishing one of the first sections of general internal medicine in 1973. At the time, most physicians in the United States were focused on subspecialization — fields such as cardiology or pulmonology — in part because the National Institutes of Health was expanding its funding of subspecialized research. In fact, the University of Chicago’s School of Medicine, established in 1927, had been organized around subspecialties, a decision that had placed it ahead of its time. By the late 1960s, however, Alvin Tarlov, MD’56, the new Chair of Medicine, was helping to spearhead a shift in thinking that would reverberate across the United States. Growing up, Tarlov’s uncle, neurosurgeon Isadore Tarlov, had greatly influenced his nephew with his time spent helping migrant workers in Coney Island, New York. As a young doctor, Alvin Tarlov studied rehabilitation and recidivism after being assigned in the 1960 doctor’s draft to help with a malaria drug trial at an Illinois prison. (Lisa Belkin, Tarlov’s stepdaughter, is writing a book about her stepfather’s experience working on this University of Chicago-led clinical trial and the friendship Tarlov struck up with one of the prisoners who volunteered to participate.) Tarlov was confident in his belief that doctors needed to view their patients as whole individuals — not merely organs or appendages that weren’t working correctly — and that a bona fide section of general internal medicine would only strengthen subspecialties.
Half a century ago, a team of physicians lead by Alvin Tarlov, MD’56, recommitted the University of Chicago to running a leading-edge program in general medicine. Hospitals across the country took note.
“Patients would talk to us about life and what bothered them about their living circumstances,” Tarlov, 92, recalled from his home in Tucson, Arizona, where he now lives. “They wanted to talk to you.” Although subspecialization meant doctors developed expert knowledge in specific areas, Tarlov and his colleagues knew that many patients arrived at their doctor’s office piggybacking multiple illnesses; they also knew patients receiving sophisticated subspecialty care developed health problems unrelated to their original illness. Other factors, including the establishment of Medicare and Medicaid, which removed the financial barriers to accessing healthcare for many individuals, and the transformation of Hyde Park from an all-white neighborhood to a multiracial community, led Tarlov to believe a change in approach was needed. In 1969, a committee created by Tarlov to study medical training recommended residents receive “intensive, comprehensive training in general medicine as an optimal basis for advanced training, whether in a subspecialty or general internal medicine.” Over the course of four years, UChicago established a Section of General Internal Medicine that included services for inpatients, outpatients and consultations. “General Medicine had been sort of floating around and lost, and Alvin Tarlov really made it an academic section,” said Deborah Burnet, MD’89, AM’03, Professor of Medicine and Chief of the Section of General Internal Medicine. “He wanted to make General Medicine an academic, smart, wellrespected place that could also command research funding resources.” To succeed, Tarlov hired a team of young, talented, indefatigable physicians, including Richard Byyny, MD, and Mark Siegler, MD’67, now Lindy Bergman Distinguished Service Professor of Medicine and Surgery. Siegler, who directs the MacLean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics and the Bucksbaum Institute for Clinical Excellence, was a new attending when Tarlov called him in to his office in 1972. Siegler still remembers Tarlov instructing him to attend eight
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months of the year, supervise new inpatient and outpatient services, run the new consultation service and manage the program for third- and fourth-year medical students. “I was about to open the door to leave when Al said, ‘I have one more idea: We should set up a general medicine intensive care unit,’” said Siegler, who still laughs today with Tarlov about the encounter. “He said, ‘Break down some of the walls in the individual patient rooms and set up a medical intensive care unit. I’ll count on you to attend 12 months of the year.’ I said, ‘What’s an intensive care unit?’” Soon, other institutions were bolstering their general internal medicine programs as well. But the establishment of general internal medicine also brought about novel challenges. “The medical intensive care unit saved many lives, prolonged many lives, but in the process raised all sorts of new ethical questions that humans had never faced before,” said Siegler. In order to respond to these complex cases, Siegler created a new field, clinical medical ethics. To him, the moral principles guiding medical professionals were meant to be an intrinsic part of the exercise of medicine, not philosophical principles debated in academia. “Clinical medical ethics has to be practiced and applied not by nonclinical bioethicists, but by licensed clinicians in everyday encounters, both inpatient and outpatient,” Siegler said. Today, UChicago Medicine’s Section of General Internal Medicine is home to faculty who are recognized nationally in the areas of medical education, ethics, clinical care, and research in healthcare disparities and outcomes, as well as several multidisciplinary academic programs. General internal medicine physicians conduct roughly 60,000 outpatient visits per year — but Burnet still echoes the thoughts of Tarlov when she talks about her department today. “It’s a characteristic of general medicine doctors that we have a broad view and don’t see medicine as just the drugs we give to patients, but rather as people in their context and in the neighborhoods where they live.”
Alvin Tarlov, MD’56
Today, UChicago Medicine’s Section of General Internal Medicine is home to faculty who are recognized nationally in the areas of medical education, ethics, clinical care, and research in healthcare disparities and outcomes, as well as several multidisciplinary academic programs.
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BSD News
O R G A N I S M A L B I O L O G Y A N D A N AT O M Y
Damselfish diversity Professor leads multigenerational academic effort to analyze a fascinating fish family
PHOTO BY RICHARD WINTERBOTTOM
BY MATT WOOD
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amselfish form one of the largest fish families in the world, with at least 422 different species, including the clownfish of “Finding Nemo” fame. These small, colorful fish mostly live around coral reefs in tropical and temperate waters and make popular pets for aquariums. They’re also very diverse, with different body sizes, feeding habits and unique behaviors. Some species, like the three-spot damselfish in Florida and the Caribbean, are territorial and aggressively defend their habitats. Others, like the longfin damselfish in Belize, tend to patches of algae like farmers, herding and
protecting shrimp that fertilize the “crops” with their excrement. Because of this fascinating diversity, damselfish are of keen interest to evolutionary biologists. Mark Westneat, PhD, Professor of Organismal Biology and Anatomy, has been studying them for more than 25 years, scuba diving and collecting samples around the world, from the Florida Keys to French Polynesia. In a study published in PLOS One, Westneat continued his study of this remarkable group of fishes, building a new phylogeny, or tree of life that shows how different species are evolutionarily related to each other, for 345 of the 422 known species of damselfish. Using the newly completed tree of life, his team 34
THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO MEDICINE AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES DIVISION
PHOTO BY RICHARD PYLE
used computational and statistical methods to look for clues that could be driving the diversification of different damselfish species over time, since the group first emerged about 55 million years ago. For example, some damselfish are herbivores that hang around the bottom of the ocean, tending to their algae farms or feeding on other plant detritus. Others spend their time higher up in the water column, hovering around the edges of coral reefs and forming a “wall of mouths” to feed on plankton. A third group does a bit of both, mostly spending time at the bottom but occasionally popping up to feed on plankton. The team’s phylogenic analysis showed that medium-sized, planktivorous damselfish tended to diversify into different species at the highest rates. Large and small body sizes have evolved independently at least 40 times, and species transition between different feeding styles as they diversify as well. Some groups of damselfish — like the small, brightly colored, planktivorous Chromis genus — find an evolutionary niche that works and remain relatively stable with few new species. But species from the opposite end of the spectrum, like the herbivorous, bottom-feeding giant damselfish, find the same success as well. Damselfish, like all the creatures in the sea, are affected by climate change, and developing such a complete and detailed phylogeny will be important for understanding how new conditions might impact their ability to thrive. “The more species we have in our tree of life, the more we can be certain that the patterns we’re seeing are real,” Westneat said. “Solving the tree of life is one of the grand challenges of science. Once you have a well-resolved family tree, you can do a lot of cool evolutionary biology to understand where these species came from and where they might be headed.”
The yin and yang of bats
BY MATT WOOD
PHOTO BY SHERRI AND BROCK FENTON/FIELD MUSEUM
M Study provides first anatomic evidence for how two major groups of bats use echolocation differently
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ost bats navigate their world through echolocation, or emitting distinct sounds and listening for the returning echo. Echolocation helps bats orient themselves, forage for food and avoid obstacles while flying. New research from the University of Chicago shows that two major groups of bats have different inner ear structures that enable different modes of echolocation. The research, published in Nature, was a collaboration among Zhe-Xi Luo, PhD, Professor of Organismal Biology and Anatomy; Benjamin Sulser, SB’16, a former PhD student in Luo’s lab now at the American Museum of Natural History; and Bruce Patterson, PhD, of the Field Museum. Twenty years ago, genetic studies of the mammal tree of life revealed that echolocating bats belong to two lineages: Yinpterochiroptera, or “Yin” bats, and Yangochiroptera, or “Yang” bats. This suggests that the hearing function for echolocation evolved quite differently, possibly twice, among the bats. But do the ear structures for hearing differ between these two long-separated lineages of bats as well? Sulser began this work as part of his undergraduate thesis in Luo’s lab. He found that the inner ear ganglion, a major structure of neurons that connects the sound-capturing structures of the inner ear to the brain, has different anatomical configurations between Yin and Yang bats. The new findings started with CT scans of several teaching specimens of bat skulls from the University’s Biological Sciences Collegiate Division. After the initial discovery in 2016, it took another three years for the team to complete a full-scale
survey across 39 species of bats from almost all bat families, using more specimens from the two museums to corroborate their findings. In all mammals, including bats, the sense of hearing starts with hair cells in the inner ear that vibrate in response to sound waves. These hair cells are connected to nerve cells in the inner ear spiral ganglion, which is protected by a bony canal. The canal wall has a series of holes that allow nerve fibers to poke through and connect to the main auditory nerve going to the brain. Yin bats rely more heavily on constant frequency sounds for echolocation, while Yang bats use a complex, modulated frequency. The team’s CT scanning showed that Yin bats, like most non-bat mammals, have a thick canal wall packed with tiny openings for the nerve fibers. However, most Yang bats have an open canal with no wall, allowing for more evolutionary variation of the neurons in the ganglion, which is quite distinctive compared to other mammals. The team believes that the different ear anatomies may contribute to bat diversification. Without the constraining bony canal wall, Yang bats have greater capacity for more ganglion cells and different ways to connect to the brain. This could allow them to perceive more complex echolocation signals. Nevertheless, both methods of echolocation contributed to the incredible evolutionary success of bats, Luo said. “These are different ways of achieving the same goal. It’s like these two types of bats are speaking different dialects of a language,” he said.
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2 0 2 2 R E S I D E N C Y M AT C H
Pritzker News
Match Day 2022: Pritzker delivers multiple ob-gyns BY DEVON MCPHEE
Fourth-years Aaditi Naik, left, Brianna Farley and Katherine Brito will train in obstetrics and gynecology. Eight students from the Class of 2022 matched in the specialty this year, the highest number in more than a decade.
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arrie Smith, MD, clerkship director for obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine, had a hunch from conversations with students that interest in an ob-gyn residency would be high this year. Still, she was pleasantly surprised by the response she received when she emailed students at the end of their third-year clerkship rotations to gauge interest in the specialty. “I was keeping track of interested students on a sticky note,” said Smith, Assistant Professor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology. “I received so many responses, I had to squish their names onto it.” This year, Pritzker saw the highest number of students pursue an ob-gyn residency in more than
PHOTO BY NANCY WONG
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THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO MEDICINE AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES DIVISION
a decade. On average, about four students pursue the specialty each year, with highs in 2019 and 2013 of six students. Eight students in the Class of 2022 matched in the specialty. “We have an amazing cohort going into ob-gyn,” Smith said. “These students are engaged, empathetic and want to make an impact in the field.” The politics of women’s health
This spike in interest comes at a time when reproductive rights face legal challenges. The Supreme Court is expected to rule in June on a Mississippi law that bans abortions after 15 weeks in a decision that would have sweeping consequences for Roe v. Wade. Students pointed to recent legislation as one of the reasons they chose to pursue women’s health. “As long as I can remember, I have always been a firm believer that people should have access to legal and safe abortions,” said Brianna Farley, MS4, a member of the national advocacy group Medical Students for Choice. “People should be able to plan their families when and how they want, if they want.” Partly inspired by her late mother, a family physician who founded a women’s health clinic in Colorado, Farley plans to pursue a career as an academic generalist and abortion provider. This would give her the opportunity to work with students, see patients across the spectrum of obstetric and gynecologic care, and conduct research that provides evidence to support reproductive rights. She also plans to explore areas such as complex family planning and pediatric and adolescent gynecology during residency. Farley noted the uncertainty of applying for an ob-gyn residency at a time when residents may receive different training depending on where they match, and that physicians may soon need to rethink how they provide care in states where services may become limited. “Ob-gyns are at the front lines of the fight for reproductive rights, and there’s a lot of work to be done,” she said. Farley matched at the University of Washington.
The 2022 Match Top specialties 1 Working toward health equity
It’s not only access to care, but equal access that fuels this class’s interest in the field. “There are a lot of racial disparities in healthcare, and Pritzker is one of the best medical schools to explore that,” said Aaditi Naik, MS4, who is conducting research into racial differences in the diagnosis and treatment of pelvic pain. “When you have a patient population that is disproportionately impacted by these disparities and you see the divergent outcomes in the clinic and hospital, it gets you fired up to do something about it.” Seeing this inequality play out during the pandemic inspired Naik to organize an art auction, “Create for a Cause,” that sold student artwork to raise funds for local, Black-led nonprofits focused on issues of racial justice. “It was a way to help the community and get involved even though we weren’t on the front line,” she said. Ultimately, Naik would like to train in gynecologic oncology, a subspecialty that would allow her to use her surgical skills and build long-standing relationships with patients — one of the aspects of medicine she likes most. It is also an area with stark differences in outcomes for women of different racial backgrounds. “It doesn’t feel right to me that in one country, groups of people can have such drastically different outcomes with the same disease, and it has nothing to do with genetics or other unchangeable factors,” she said. Access to preventive care and removing socioeconomic barriers will lead to better outcomes for all women, she added. Naik matched at the University of Wisconsin. Location-dependent care
Access to care took on a new meaning for Katherine Brito, MS4, when she participated in a reproductive health externship at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Alaska funded by the national Medical Students for Choice. She worked with physicians providing abortions to a mostly Alaskan Native population in Anchorage, and made regular trips to care for patients in Fairbanks and its environs. (The two cities are 360 miles apart.) uchicagomedicine.org/midway
“Patients would travel hundreds of miles for an abortion. There are so few providers that some residents of Anchorage must travel to the more rural Fairbanks for an appointment in order to remain within the gestational age (17 weeks + 6 days) that Planned Parenthood providers in Alaska are equipped to provide abortions. Patients in need of later-term abortions must travel to Washington state. “I was struck by how difficult it was for people to get care,” she said. “That’s also the case here in Chicago, where we have birthing deserts that negatively impact the maternal mortality of Black women on the South Side,” she said. “It’s different, but the same. Things need to change. ” Brito sees herself practicing as an academic generalist, but is also interested in exploring minimally invasive gynecological surgery and breast surgery during her residency. Brito, a leader in the Latino Medical Student Association and herself the daughter of an immigrant, would like to see the medical community invest in pipeline programs for students from poor, rural, immigrant and other underserved areas. “These communities need support and it’s people from these communities who want to return and practice medicine there, because that’s our home,” she said. Brito matched at the University of California, San Francisco.
Internal Medicine (17 students)
2 Anesthesiology (10) 3 ObstetricsGynecology (8) 4 General Surgery (7) 5 Family Medicine (6)
Top hospitals 1
University of Chicago Medical Center
2 University of California-affiliated hospitals 3 Stanford University programs 4 University of Washingtonaffiliated hospitals 5 Harvard University programs Northwestern University McGaw/NMH/VA University of Pittsburgh Medical Center programs (tie)
A glimpse of the future
Having taught and mentored these students during their time at Pritzker, Smith has no doubt they will move the field in positive directions. “Pritzker has these wonderful students who care about women’s health and patient advocacy, and I can’t wait to see what they do,” she said. With the current political environment, promise of a rewarding career, and an increasing number of women entering the medical field, Smith also expects interest in obstetrics and gynecology at Pritzker to continue at historically high numbers. “I have started sticky notes for this year and next year,” she said. “And they’re already filling up.”
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M AT C H DAY 2 0 2 2
Pritzker News
“A moment I’ll never forget” Match Day 2022 returns as an in-person celebration
“This class is truly special in their leadership and service in helping their peers, residents, faculty and surrounding community in
BY JAMIE BARTOSCH
innumerable ways during this pandemic.”
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PHOTO COURTESY JAY SHAH AND LAURA SANTANGELO
he countdown from 10 was back. And the legendary “money bag,” awarded to the student who receives their envelope last. And the hugging. Match Day 2022 was celebrated in person this year for the first time in three years. Now that COVID-19 restrictions have eased, Pritzker School of Medicine students were able to safely gather to celebrate with their classmates, teachers and family members in the Max Palevsky Cinema at Ida Noyes Hall.
Vineet Arora, MD, AM’03
Cody Sain, MS4, is headed to Boston for an anesthesiology residency at Harvard/Brigham and Women’s Hospital.
PHOTOS BY JOE STERBENC
Jay Shah, MS4, matched in internal medicine and Laura Santangelo, MS4, in internal medicineprimary, both at UCLA Medical Center.
Dean for Medical Education Vineet Arora, MD, AM’03, welcomes students, families and faculty to the Match Day celebration.
“You have risen to the call of medicine during the most challenging time in healthcare, the last two years of the pandemic,” Vineet Arora, MD, AM’03, Dean for Medical Education, told the students. “I always hear about how Pritzker students went above and beyond. We cannot be more proud of each of you and your incredible contributions.” Jay Shah, MS4, and Laura Santangelo, MS4, who participated in the couples
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match, will head together to the University of California, Los Angeles, their first choice. “When I saw that we both had UCLA, I immediately started crying,” Shah said. “It was pure shock and excitement. We had our arms in the air, we were hugging our families, it was amazing. It’s a moment I’ll never forget.” Among the 16 students who will stay at the University of Chicago Medicine is Tony Da Lomba, MS4, who matched in orthopaedic surgery. As he researched residency programs, he didn’t find any that he felt matched the commitment to patients and community at UChicago Medicine. “I’ve fallen in love with this city and didn’t want to leave. I am thrilled I’m going to be here. I am very proud to continue serving the South Side,” said Da Lomba, who designed this year’s Match Day T-shirts.
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Darlington Nwaudo, MS4, celebrates his match in orthopaedic surgery at the University of Chicago Medicine.
Gold Humanism Honor Society
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hirteen members of the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine Class of 2022 were inducted into the Gold Humanism Honor Society in February. The inductees, who are nominated by their peers, exemplify compassionate patient care and serve as
role models, mentors and leaders. Jorge Luis De Avila, MS4, was the student recipient of the Leonard Tow Humanism in Medicine Award. Carrie Smith, MD, Assistant Professor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, was the faculty recipient. PHOTO BY CANDI GARD/PRITZKER SCHOOL OF MEDICINE
Gold Humanism Honor Society inductees, from left, front row: Louisa (Dru) Brenner, Helen Wei, Itzel Lopez-Hinojosa, Courtney Amegashie, Erin Rieger, Lilly Lerer, AB’14, and Jennifer Deng. Back row: Jorge Luis De Avila, Daniel Ahn, SB’18, Cody Sain, Amelia Waltman, AB’17, and Yazan Eliyan. Not pictured: Akosua Oppong.
Alpha Omega Alpha Honor Medical Society
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The 2022 honorees are: Alumnus: Robert Guzy, PhD’05, MD’08, Department of Medicine. Faculty: Stephen Estime, MD, Department of Anesthesia and Critical Care; and Milda Saunders, MD, MPH, Department of Medicine. Housestaff: Aisha Amuda, MD, MPH, Departments of Medicine and Pediatrics; Ira Kraft, MD, Departments of Medicine and Pediatrics; and Mohamed Taha, MD, Department of Pediatrics. Rosaura Licea, MD, Department of Family Medicine, Cicero Medical Clínica San Lázaro, received the Volunteer Clinical Faculty Award, which recognizes a community physician who contributes with distinction to the education and training of clinical students. PHOTO BY TYLER LOCKMAN/PRITZKER SCHOOL OF MEDICINE
Alpha Omega Alpha inductees, from left, front row: Jorge Luis De Avila, Daniel Camacho, PhD’19, Noam Margalit, AB’15, Katherine Brito, Namrata Garg, AB’17, Helen Wei and Alyson Yee, PhD’19. Middle row: Susan Feldt, Brianna Farley, Risa Brudney and Olivia Schultz. Back row: Tyler Miksanek, Rahul Dadwani, MSc, Russell Simons, MPH, Daniel Ahn, SB’18, Darlington Nwaudo, Cody Sain and Shira Fishbach, LAB’13, AB’17.
ighteen members of the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine Class of 2022 were inducted into the Alpha Omega Alpha (AΩA) Honor Medical Society, which recognizes fourthyear medical students for academic excellence, leadership, compassion and fairness. Each fall, the AΩA class elects alumni, faculty and housestaff to the Illinois Beta Chapter (University of Chicago) in recognition of their leadership and accomplishments. Alumni are eligible 10 years after graduation. Faculty are elected based on demonstrated commitment to scholarly excellence and medical education. Housestaff are elected for their continued achievement, promise and mentorship qualities.
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FA LL 2021
THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES DIVISION
On and off the battlefield FOR THANK YOU ICE YOUR SERV
Your Letters
YO U R L E T T E R S
How military service has shaped the medical and scientific careers of alumni, faculty and trainees
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Medicine on the Midway is open for feedback Is there a story in this issue that inspires you to comment? Do you have a memory or reflection to share? Medicine on the Midway is open for feedback. Letters must be signed and may be edited for AP style, space, clarity and civility. To provide a range of views and voices, we encourage letter writers to limit themselves to 300 words or fewer. While the staff works remotely during the COVID-19 pandemic, please send letters
Enjoyed fall issue
Reflecting on military service
My memory of past issues of Medicine on the Midway (MoM) is blurry. I know I received them punctually and perused them, some with more self-application than others. But the current issue (Fall 2021) is exceptionally engaging and “kudos” worthy. I’ve caught myself reading many of the pieces in it — and considering returning to delve into the few remaining ones.
I enjoyed reading of the experiences of University of Chicago medical school graduates in the Fall 2021 issue of Medicine on the Midway. In contrast to many of your interviewees, I was not close to a combat zone, despite the fact that the Vietnam War was still raging. I had been deployed to Tripler Army Medical Center, the major referral U.S. medical facility serving American military personnel in the Pacific. I was deployed as Chief, Radiation Therapy Service, with the rank of Major.
I suspect this appeal is due not just to the diversity of the bouquet of topics in the issue and their unstinting treatment, but also due to the design, layout, visuals and the semi-gloss patina of the stock — and perhaps due to other happenstantial, one would like to think, imponderables. Could the cover have been imaginably any more apposite if it had not amply benefited from the titanium white? Congratulations. I shall look forward to future issues of MoM. Jack Aslanian, MD’71
I served at Tripler between January 1972 and January 1974. It is located in Honolulu, high above Pearl Harbor Naval Base and Hickam Airfield. Tripler is a unique facility, as it serves Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine active duty personnel, as well as veterans and Public Health patients, some from far-flung Pacific islands like Palau and the Marshalls. We had an entirely different clientele from our Chicago South Side patients. But it was an easy transition, as the general principles of medical care we learned in Chicago and the camaraderie of the medical staff were almost identical. It was clear that medical care is universal in its outreach to diverse peoples. My experience widened my horizons. Hawaii is a great interface between our European-based civilization and that of Asia. The world opened for me in a remarkable way. I also took in a strong dose of the Aloha spirit. In short, my military experience was medically enhancing, but also civilizing. I remain grateful for the experience.
via email: momedit@ uchospitals.edu.
Sidney P. Kadish, MD’67
We want to hear from you!
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Share news about your life and accomplishments: mbsaa.uchicago.edu/update-contact-info
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ALUMNI EVENTS
2021-2022 ALUMNI COUNCIL EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
ALUMNI COUNCIL
Lampis D. Anagnostopoulos, SB’57, MD’61 ✱ Juliana Basko-Plluska, AB’04, MD Jennifer “Piper” Below, PhD’11 Michael Boettcher, AB’89, MD’93 Kenneth Bridbord, MD’69, MPH Ava Ferguson Bryan, AM’10, MD’18 ✤ Courtney Burrows, PhD’15, MBA’17 Arnold Calica, SM’61, MD’75 ✱ Richard Cote, MD’80 Leonard Covello, AB’86, MD’90 Ithaar Derweesh, MD’95 Hunter Eason, MD’18 ✤
Gail M. Farfel, PhD’93 Jonathan C. Fox, AB’79, PhD’85, MD’87 Katherine M.L. Given, AB’08, PhD’13, MBA’16, MD’16 Jeffrey Goodenbour, PhD’09 Andrew Hack, AB’95, PhD’00, MD’02 Sadia Haider, AB’96, MD’01 Rajiv Jauhar, MD’91 Lucy Lester, MD’72 Daniel S. Leventhal, SM’13, PhD’16 Rosy Liao ✤ Jennifer McPartland, PhD’08 Vincent Nelson, MD’98 Loren Schechter, MD’94 Steven B. Server ✤ Coleman R. Seskind, AB’55, SB’56, MD’59, SM’59 ✱ Adhir Shroff, MD’96 Puneet Singh, MD’11 Abby Stayart, AB’97, PhD’12 Anne L. Taylor, MD’76 Cynthia Thaik, MD’90 Maimouna Traore ✤ Vishruth Venkataraman ✤ Sydney S. Yoon, MD’86 Russ Zajtchuk, SB’60, MD’63 ✱
Conversations with thought leaders Watch: Doriane C. Miller, MD’83, President of the UChicago MBSAA, talks with Dean for Medical Education Vineet Arora, MD, AM’03, about her plans for the Pritzker School of Medicine. Watch a recording on the UChicago MBSAA Vimeo channel at vimeo.com/uchicagombsaa.
Read: Fourth-year students Shira Fishbach, LAB’13, AB’17, and Russell Simons interviewed AΩA Visiting Professor Kimberly Manning, MD, about justice, Twitter and the “hidden curriculum.” Manning is Associate Vice Chair for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in the Department of Medicine at Emory University.
✱ LIFE MEMBER ✤ STUDENT OR RESIDENT REPRESENTATIVE
Read it here: bit.ly/ManningQA Kimberly Manning, MD
Follow Dr. Manning on Twitter: @gradydoctor
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Doriane C. Miller, MD’83 President Chris V. Albanis, AB’96, MD’00 Immediate Past President Karyl S. Kopaskie, AB’07, PhD’14 Vice President Mark R. Aschliman, MD’80 Alumni Awards Committee Chair Sapana Vora, PhD’14 Chicago Partners Program Chair Jeanne M. Farnan, AB’98, MD’02, MHPE Editorial Committee Chair Michael Prystowsky, MD’81, PhD Regional Programs Chair
Your News
YO U R N E W S 1950s Hugh Graham, MD’59, returned to Tulsa, Oklahoma, with his wife, Jeannie, after spending eight years in the Ozarks.
1970s David Gordon, SB’67, PhD’71, MD’73, LAB’63, wrote the books The American Cardiovascular Pandemic: A 100-Year History and Baseball Generations. The American Cardiovascular Pandemic is a historical account of the epidemiological studies and clinical trials that led to advances in the treatment of high cholesterol and blood pressure. Baseball Generations is a historically grounded analysis of the greatest baseball players over 150 years of organized baseball. Before retiring in 2016, Gordon was Associate Director, Division of Cardiovascular Sciences, at the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Gordon Telford, MD’71, wrote Franklin H. Martin, MD, FACS: From Rural Boyhood to Distinguished Surgeon. Martin had a typical rural upbringing in
Wisconsin during which he developed the strength of character and the self-confidence that made him a great leader. After attending Chicago Medical School, graduating in 1880, he became an accomplished physician and leader, founding the journal Surgery, Gynecology and Obstetrics in 1905, the Clinical Congress of the Surgeons of North America in 1910 and the American College of Surgeons in 1913 — all institutions that remain viable today. Telford’s book provides insight into the impact of Martin’s early years on these accomplishments and hypothesizes that it was because of his rural upbringing that he became a great leader. Richard L. Schilsky, MD’75, received the Allen Lichter Visionary Leader Award from the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO). A past president of ASCO, he retired in 2021 as the organization’s executive vice president and chief medical officer. He is professor emeritus at the University of Chicago, where he spent most of his career serving in leadership roles, including director of the University of Chicago Cancer Research Center, associate dean for clinical research in the Biological Sciences Division and
chief of hematology/oncology in the Department of Medicine. Schilsky was the chair of the Cancer and Leukemia Group B, a national cooperative clinical research group funded by the National Cancer Institute. Kim Williams, Sr., AB’75, MD’79, was named chair of the Department of Medicine at the University of Louisville. Beginning July 1, 2022, he will lead the scientific, clinical and education programs of the largest department of the University of Louisville School of Medicine. Williams is currently chief of the Division of Cardiology at Rush University Medical Center and associate dean for faculty diversity, equity and inclusion. He also is the founder of the Urban Cardiology Initiative, a program in Detroit, Michigan, that works to reduce ethnic disparities in heart care.
1980s David Palmer, MD’80, received the Vincent A. Persico Advocacy Award at the Illinois Society of Eye Physicians and Surgeons and Chicago Ophthalmological Society meeting in October 2021. Palmer introduced a resolution that was adopted by the
Illinois State Medical Society before being introduced into the Illinois legislature and signed into law. The law requires that topically applied operating room or hospital facility medications be labeled per the Pharmacy Practice Act if ordered 24 or more hours before surgery and that physicians provide the counseling. Patrick Horn, PhD’81, MD’83, was appointed chief medical officer at HemoShear Therapeutics, Inc., a privately held biotechnology company that develops drugs for rare metabolic disorders. Horn will lead the company’s clinical operations, clinical development, regulatory affairs, medical affairs, biometrics and pharmacovigilance functions.
1990s Elizabeth Brill, MD’94, MBA’08, was named deputy chief medical officer for the Veterans Health Administration (VA). In this role, Brill completed a 22-city media tour discussing the VA’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate. Brill was the lead witness testifying before the U.S. Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs on pending legislation affecting the VA.
IN MEMORIAM In Memoriam
1950s S. Walter Kran, MD’56, died on February 4, 2022. Kran immigrated to the United States from Jerusalem in 1947. He graduated from the University of California, Berkeley, before studying at the University of Chicago. He served in the Air Force as an officer in the Medical Corps. After his service concluded, Kran practiced radiology in San Leandro, California, for almost 30 years until his retirement in 1994. He founded the largest radiology billing service in the country and established a nuclear medicine department at San Leandro Hospital. He is survived by his wife.
1960s Philip George Schmid Jr., MD’61, died on December 14, 2021. He completed his internal medicine residency and cardiology fellowships at the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics. Schmid served as a U.S. Air Force Captain and internist at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio. He went on to become a professor of cardiology at the University of Iowa. Over his career, he authored hundreds of research publications and served as associate chief of staff for research at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Iowa City, Iowa. Schmid is survived by his wife, two children and four grandchildren.
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Florence Keiko Kinoshita, SB’63, SM’66, PhD’69, died on November 2, 2021. Noel L. Hoell, MD’64, died on February 19, 2022. Hoell completed his residency in psychiatry at the Colorado Psychiatric Hospital and the Colorado State Hospital. He was stationed in Germany, where he served as a Major in the Army for three years. Hoell practiced psychiatry in Missoula, Montana, for more than four decades. He is survived by his children, his sister and grandchildren. Albert E. Dahlberg, MD’65, PhD’68, died on March 1, 2022. After completing a pediatric internship at the University of Chicago Hospitals, he served in the Public Health Service at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) during the Vietnam War. While living in the Washington, D.C. area, Dahlberg and his wife, Pamela, marched in the first White House vigil to protest the Vietnam War. They also joined the Society of Friends Meeting and became lifelong Quakers. Dahlberg was a professor of molecular genetics and biochemistry at Brown University for 43 years. During his academic career he was a visiting professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison; University of Copenhagen, Denmark; and University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia. He received 43 years of uninterrupted funding from
the NIH for his research, mostly focused on the structure and function of the prokaryotic ribosome, and published numerous research articles on the structure and function of the ribosome. Dahlberg is survived by his wife of 58 years, Pamela; three children, Albert (Hilary), Krista and Paul (Becky); six grandchildren; and a brother (Jim) and sister (Cordelia). Monica Buchanan Knuesel, MD’65, died on January 4, 2022. In 1965, she was one of the first women to graduate with a medical degree from the University of Chicago. She dedicated her career to promoting children’s rights and well-being as a pediatrician and professional witness for the Denver Department of Health and Family Crisis Center. After retirement, she continued to work part time as a physician with the Jefferson County Children’s Advocacy Center and the Cleo Wallace Center. Knuesel is survived by her two siblings, her five sons, her grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
1970s Kenneth Begelman, MD’71, died on October 11, 2021. Begelman took great pride in the education he received at the University of Chicago, and this sentiment resulted in his teaching a course on the history of
THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO MEDICINE AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES DIVISION
medicine and surgery to medical students at the University. The course resulted in a book, A Short History of Surgery. He completed a surgical residency at the University of Florida and a thoracic surgery residency at the University of Wisconsin. After completing his medical training, he served two years in the U.S. Navy. He practiced cardiothoracic surgery in Delray Beach, Florida, until he retired in 2002 to Jackson, Wyoming, to enjoy the beauty of the Tetons. He served on the University of Chicago Medical and Biological Sciences Alumni Association’s Alumni Council for many years. Begelman is survived by his mother, Ruth; his wife, Helen; his children, Rachel, Rebecca and Benjamin; and his six grandchildren.
2000s Daniel Schnobrich, MD’07, died on November 10, 2021. Schnobrich completed his residency at the University of Minnesota. His areas of expertise were internal medicine, pediatrics and palliative care. Dedicated to helping others, Schnobrich made several trips to Tanzania to provide care to those with limited access to medical resources. Schnobrich also completed several marathons and hiked Mount Kilimanjaro. He is survived by his wife, his three children, his parents and his sister.
Faculty
Robert Mulliken, MD
R
obert Mulliken, MD, a longtime faculty member and an outstanding educator and clinician, died on March 8, 2022. He was 63 years old. Mulliken received his medical degree from the University of Illinois Chicago and began his 34-year career at the University of Chicago as an emergency medicine resident in 1987. He joined the faculty in 1990 as an assistant professor and was promoted to associate professor in 1998. Double-boarded in emergency medicine and internal medicine, he specialized in the management of the acute presentations of medical illness and critical care. His many institutional contributions included serving as interim co-chief of the Section of Emergency Medicine (2009-10), medical director of the Emergency Department in Mitchell Hospital for almost 15 years and medical director of Occupational Medicine. He served on many hospital committees — notably as chair of the Pharmacy and
Therapeutics Committee — was an early advocate for integrating advanced practice nursing into emergency care, and served as a site-PI for several National Institutes of Health and industry-sponsored clinical trials. He served as board examiner for the American Board of Emergency Medicine for almost 20 years. A two-time winner of the Emergency Medicine Residency Teacher of the Year Award, he was widely known for a famously sharp teaching style that promoted efficient test ordering and early independence. He received the Department of Medicine’s Clinical Productivity, Evaluation and Management Activity Award three times. “He was the ‘doctor’s doctor’ — someone who could be trusted to provide an authoritative yet pragmatic assessment of the most complex case,” said colleague David Beiser, MD, Associate Professor of Medicine, “and he was much loved by his patients, who would often ask for him by name.”
“ It would be difficult to overstate his impact on a generation of emergency medicine residents who viewed Dr. Mulliken as a clinical role model and an available resource for wisdom and advice.” David Beiser, MD Associate Professor of Medicine
Former faculty
Alfred Baker, MD
A
lfred Baker, MD, a distinguished hepatologist, mentor and friend to many at the University of Chicago, died on March 1, 2022. He was 82 years old. Baker joined the University of Chicago faculty in 1973, where he rose to the rank of professor and served as Director of the Liver Study Unit. He helped develop the first liver transplant program in the Midwest, which grew to be one of the largest liver transplant programs in the world. During his tenure, the University of Chicago Medicine liver program became the first in the country to perform a pediatric living donor transplant and was among the first to perform liver transplants in patients with acute liver failure, as well as multi-organ transplants (combination liver and heart). “Dr. Baker was a legend in his own right, and he built a liver transplant program that became a seat of innovations and breakthroughs in the field,” said Helen Te, MD, Professor of Medicine and Medical Director of the Adult Liver Transplant Program at UChicago Medicine, who counted Baker as a mentor and helped care for him at the end of his life. “He was known for his kind, southern gentlemanly nature and for his
“ For those of us who were privileged to have received wit that brought smiles out even during difficult times. He was beloved as a devoted teacher by his students and trainees, as a compassionate and astute physician by his patients, and as a brilliant scholar by his colleagues.” Baker received his medical degree from Wake Forest University. He completed his residency in internal medicine at Emory University/Grady Memorial Hospital and fellowship training in gastroenterology and hepatology at Tufts-New England Medical Center. After 27 years at the University of Chicago, Baker moved to Northwestern University in 2000, where he helped expand the programs in liver transplantation and general hepatology. He retired from patient care in 2005, but remained as emeritus professor there. In 2005, he also received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Liver Foundation. Despite failing vision later in life, Baker’s clinical activities did not slow, often aided by his wife of 39 years, Dot, who would accompany him on rounds and in review of labs and records. Even after leaving the University, he remained in his apartment in Hyde Park and stayed in touch with many of his former colleagues.
his tutelage, he taught us not only the science but also the art and humanity in medicine.” Helen Te, MD Professor of Medicine
“ Al’s legacy will live on in the hundreds of physicians who learned from him and the many thousands of patients who benefited from his expertise and life of care, innovation and scholarship.” David T. Rubin, MD’94 Joseph B. Kirsner Professor of Medicine
uchicagomedicine.org/midway
MEDICINE ON THE MIDWAY
SPRING 2022
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In Memoriam
Emeritus faculty
Allan Rechtschaffen, PhD
A
llan Rechtschaffen, PhD, Professor Emeritus in the Departments of Psychology and Psychiatry and the College, Director of the University of Chicago Sleep Laboratory for more than 40 years, and a pioneer of modern sleep research, died at his home on November 29, 2021. He was 93 years old. He was a seminal figure in our understanding of the biological functions and purpose of sleep, including the various stages of sleep and the detrimental effects of sleep deprivation. He also played a key role in establishing sleep research as an academic and clinical medical discipline in the 1960s. Rechtschaffen came to the University of Chicago in 1957, where he joined the faculty with Nathaniel Kleitman, PhD’23, who had established the world’s first sleep laboratory and is universally recognized as the father of sleep research. In 1953, Kleitman and one of his students, Eugene Aserinsky, PhD’53, discovered rapid eye movements (REM) during sleep and first suggested that they were associated with dreaming. Rechtschaffen, taken by Kleitman’s work, began his own research on REM sleep and dreams, but his interests quickly led to the biological function and purpose of sleep, which preoccupied him for the next 44 years. He was fixated on a fundamental question: Why do we sleep? He pursued his research with characteristic intensity, studying the effects of sleep on various physiological functions, from exercise and mental stimulation to metabolism and stress. His research focused on what happens to animals when proper sleep is deprived or disrupted. In 1963, Rechtschaffen and Gerald Vogel, SB’51, MD’54, working with William Dement, MD’55, PhD’58, of Stanford University, described narcolepsy — the first true sleep disorder identified — in a landmark paper. In 1968, Rechtschaffen and Anthony Kales, MD, of the University of California, Los Angeles, standardized the scoring system for human sleep stages, now known as the Rechtschaffen and Kales system, or simply R&K, which is still used by sleep laboratories worldwide today. Rechtschaffen is perhaps best known for his landmark finding in 1983 that sleep is essential for survival. Researchers had long been trying to study the effects of sleep deprivation, primarily with rats, but the methods used to keep them awake, such as electric shocks, created additional stress and physical responses that confounded the intrinsic effects of lack of sleep. Rechtschaffen, working with Bernard Bergmann, SM’78, PhD’80, devised a gentler apparatus that required the experimental animal to keep pace on a slowly rotating disk to avoid having its paws dipped into the water, thus staying awake. Using this new technique, Rechtschaffen and collaborators showed that rats that were continuously deprived of sleep suffered severe health effects and died after about two weeks. Rats that were deprived of only REM sleep survived longer, but ultimately died as well. The rats also displayed a sharp drop in body temperature before
they died. Rechtschaffen believed that this observation showed that sleep was essential for temperature regulation, although he never answered the question of the mechanisms underlying the lethal effect of sleep deprivation. “If sleep does not serve an absolutely vital function,” he was fond of saying, “then it is the biggest mistake the evolutionary process has ever made.”
“ He was a mensch. He was a great mentor and colleague, a person of integrity and honor to admire and emulate. His aura remains today as the wise person you always turned to for advice.” Eve Van Cauter, PhD Rechtschaffen, who earned his PhD in psychology from Northwestern University, was initially hired by the University of Chicago as a clinician in the Department of Psychiatry and was soon named Director of the Sleep Research Laboratory. He was known as a rigorous, organized and charismatic researcher and teacher, and his work was supported by competitive grants from the National Institutes of Health for nearly his entire career. He trained 25 PhD students, many of whom are still active in the field today. He co-founded the Sleep Research Society with Dement in 1960, gathering the relatively small number of researchers in the field at the time to share ideas and paper abstracts. He later served as president of the society from 1979 to 1982 and received its Distinguished Scientist Award in 1989. In 1997, The New York Times Magazine described him as “an affable, intellectually generous man,” who “looks as though his impending retirement were less a withdrawal than an embarkation.” Later, after he settled into retirement, he lamented to his wife, Karen, that perhaps he had retired too early because he still hadn’t answered the fundamental question of why we sleep. The couple raised three daughters: Laura, Katherine and Amy. Rechtschaffen loved being a father and grandfather to four grandchildren, was famous for creations from his wood shop, and spent innumerable hours building gadgets to attract birds, just as he had spent countless hours working on his disk-over-water apparatus. In his retirement, he enjoyed playing bridge and spent winters in Arizona.
Frederick H. Rawson Professor Emeritus of Medicine
“ He created the infrastructure and built the foundations that were necessary to create an environment where other people could expand the field into what it is today. If you ever needed to know anything about sleep, you just asked Al.” Thomas Roth, PhD Director, Sleep Disorders and Research Center Henry Ford Hospital
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L A S T LO O K
The beauty of science Vista IV by Linus Park, AB’21, is a zoomed-in view of a mouse kidney tissue slice. The image — acquired using confocal laser microscopy with a white light laser — was one of the entries in the 2022 UChicago Science as Art contest. Scientists were asked to share images that occurred in the course of their research. The result is a stunning collection — from subjects ranging from neurons to nanoparticles to nature — that displays the depth and beauty of scientific research that takes place at the University of Chicago. Learn more at news.uchicago.edu/ sciartwinners2022.
VISTA IV BY LINUS PARK, AB’21