DMU Magazine - Summer/Fall 2019

For alumni & friends of Des Moines University

summer/FALL 2019

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I N I AG

S I R T E Y FOR TH V I N U A E NG

SEIZING A RARE OPPORTUNITY FOR GROWTH AND INNOVATION

FUT URE

viewPOINT

perspectives worth pondering

Editor/ Publications Director Barbara Dietrich Boose

What a difference a year can make!

Art Director Julie Probst Photography Brett Roseman Rich Sanders

By President Angela L. Walker Franklin, Ph.D.

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am particularly proud to introduce this issue of DMU Magazine with a celebration of our University’s major achievements during this past year. Certainly, 2019 will be recorded as a pioneering time when big decisions were made and extraordinary dreams were realized. Together, we have set the course for an incredible future for our University. Here are just a few of the year’s highlights.

• Bold move – planning a new campus in West Des Moines:

Later in December, we submitted what we thought was a reasonable proposal to the city of Des Moines to add much-needed parking spaces, an electricity generator and new landscaping. Those requests were denied. As the saying goes, when one door is closed, another likely opens, and often in the most

unexpected way. So, with a recently ratified strategic plan, Vision 2021, we asked ourselves: if we cannot add these few amenities, how could we ever propel the University to new levels of growth and innovation, to add new programs and expand in various ways?

That triggered more creative thinking. As we explored options for the future of the campus, our attorney and late friend, Bill Lillis, introduced us to the McKinney family, who sold us the 88-acre property in West Des Moines that will become our future home. We announced our purchase of the land on June 3 in partnership with the city of West Des Moines. At the time of this printing, the city was well into the grading to complete Grand Avenue over to South 88th Street, creating the south border of the new campus. Work on the property will begin next spring.

Please keep up with us on the campus plans and development by visiting www.dmu.edu/new-campus.

• Excellent student and faculty performance: At the

core of our institution, and thanks to the continuing dedication of our superb faculty, our students continue to exceed national averages

on board exam pass rates and in residency matching. The University’s research enterprise continues to grow. DMU is now at record levels of research activity and funding, which is exciting for the future delivery of therapies and care across the health spectrum. We are also forging new academic and research partnerships with other institutions including Drake University and Iowa State University.

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Submit letters and editorial material to: Editor DMUmagazine 3200 Grand Avenue Des Moines, IA 50312-4198 barbara.boose@dmu.edu

Overall, I commend the DMU leadership team for doing a wonderful job of keeping the University in top form, which makes advancements like these and many others possible. From our faculty to admissions to finance and accounting, from research and academic affairs, from development and alumni relations to the DMU Clinic, we are operating with great excellence and efficiency to ensure our students and employees have the finest possible experiences.

Here’s to another great year ahead!

Angela L. Walker Franklin, Ph.D., has served as DMU’s 15th president and CEO since spring of 2011.

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The mission of Des Moines University is to improve lives in our global community by educating diverse groups of highly competent and compassionate health professionals.

A change of address can be registered through the enclosed “Got News?” form or through the University’s website, www.dmu.edu/alumni.

You can also call 515271-1388, or send your change of address to: Alumni Relations Des Moines University 3200 Grand Avenue Des Moines, IA 50312-4198 515-271-1388 alumni@dmu.edu www.dmu.edu

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• Record-setting campaign:

On Dec. 8, 2018, our campus launched the public phase of the largest campaign in the 121-year history of DMU. Purple & Proud: the Campaign for Des Moines University launched with 70 percent of its $25 million goal earned. We now have nearly $23 million toward that goal at only eight months into the two-year timeline.

The campaign supports three priorities: optimizing our facilities, supporting our students with scholarships and programming, and investing in our faculty to drive innovation. We are very grateful for the generous support of our employees, alumni, students and friends who demonstrate the value DMU delivers in education, research and community service.

Thank you, all!

President Angela L. Walker Franklin, Ph.D.

3200 Grand Avenue Des Moines, IA 50312-4198

WE’RE SOCIAL!

Summer/Fall 2019

For alumni & friends of Des Moines University

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F E AT U R E S

A unique and lasting legacy

If Gregory Kolbinger, PA-C’85, had a motto, it could be “I’ll serve where I’m needed.”

Retired in June as assistant professor emeritus of family medicine, he served his country as a medical service specialist with the U.S. Air Force and his medical alma mater in numerous roles across campus.

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No horsing around – this is physical therapy

In a new academic elective, DMU physical therapy students work with children and adults with disabilities who experience therapy while on horseback. This form of physical therapy provides emotional and social advantages as well as physical benefits.

Imagining the university of the future

An institutional commitment to providing the best medical/health sciences education, a compelling need for outstanding health care professionals and 88 acres of Iowa farmland are enabling DMU to seize a rare opportunity: creating a brand new medical and health sciences campus on a blank slate.

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A story of resilience, inner strength and the Marines

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www.youtube.com/ dmuedu

Stephanie Zobel grew up in a rural area in a family wracked by mental illness and poverty. She had every reason to fail, much less get into medical school, but the DMU osteopathic student beat the odds given her personal resilience, service in the military and a supportive spouse.

Cheers to the 2019 Alumni of the Year

These stellar graduates have put their DMU education to worthwhile use in their careers, causes and support of the University.

The Pulse Alumni News

Clinical students donned white coats in a unified ceremony on Aug. 23.

Class Notes

My Turn

www.facebook.com/ DesMoinesUniversity

www.twitter.com/ desmoinesuniv

instagram.com/ desmoinesuniv#

THE pulse news from around campus

A recent scientific discovery was so remarkable, the online science news service EurekAlert! compared it to “finding medicine’s version of the Loch Ness monster”: a new type of immune cell that may play a key role in the development of type 1 diabetes.

The group’s research, published as a featured article in the May 2019 issue of the journal Cell, identified an unusual lymphocyte, a type of white blood cell, that is a dual expressor, or DE, cell. It’s a hybrid between two cells involved in the immune system, B lymphocytes and T lymphocytes.

The cell was discovered by a research team from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, IBM Research and four collaborating institutions. On the team was Chunfa Jie, Ph.D., a biostatistician in the department of biochemistry and nutrition at DMU. “Some researchers commented on PlumX Metrics, an online platform allowing people to interact with individual pieces of research output, that this finding may be revolutionizing what we know about type 1 diabetes,” Jie says. “The textbooks may need to be rewritten.”

Previously known as juvenile

diabetes, type 1 diabetes can occur at any age and is estimated to affect 1.25 million Americans. With the disorder, the immune system mistakes the beta cells in the pancreas that produce insulin, the hormone that regulates a person’s blood sugar level, as hazards and eliminates them. The newly discovered cell may explain the underlying mechanism at the cellular level responsible for this.

B and T lymphocytes possess different cell receptors that work together to help identify and target antigens – the bacteria, viruses and other foreign invaders that trigger an immune response. Scientists have long believed that in type 1 diabetes, the B and T cells instead seek out and attack normal cells, including the beta cells that produce insulin, which leads to the high blood sugar levels that characterize diabetes. The DE lymphocyte that the researchers discovered and its cell protein,

known as the x-Id peptide, occur more frequently in the blood of type 1 diabetes patients than in nondiabetic subjects. The findings strongly support a connection between DE cells and type 1 diabetes.

Jie says the researchers will further investigate that link and the characteristics of the DE cell. Their work was supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health and the Norman Raab Foundation; in March, the group gave a presentation to the Los Angeles-based W.M. Keck Foundation, which they hope will provide additional support. Most important, Jie says, is what the research may lead to.

“Type 1 diabetes affects so many people. There’s currently no way to cure it,” he says. “This continued research may allow us to find ways to prevent it and cure it.”

DMUmagazine welcomes letters from readers. The editor reserves the right to

WRITE TO US!

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select letters for publication and to edit for style and space. Brief letters are encouraged. Please send letters via e-mail to Barbara.Boose@dmu.edu or to Barbara Boose, Editor, DMUmagazine, 3200 Grand Ave., Des Moines, IA 50312.

OMM Fellows land top research award

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MU’s osteopathic manual medicine (OMM) Fellows complete a 12-month experience divided nearly equally in clinical and academic duties. They spend time with attendings in the University’s on-campus OMM Clinic in the mornings and then, in the afternoons, primarily teach in OMM lectures and labs and proctor practical exams, among other duties. And this March, the four OMM Fellows received first place in the Louisa Burns Osteopathic Research Forum for original research by a college of osteopathic medicine at the American Academy of Osteopathy (AAO) Convocation in Orlando, FL. OMM Fellows Samantha Tyler, Anna Johnson, Kody Kasten and Erika Kolakowski won with their poster, “The Immediate, Intermediate, and Long-Term Effects of Osteopathic Manipulative Treatment on Pulmonary Function in Adults with Asthma.”

“In our research, we observed increases in both objective spirom-

©ISTOCKPHOTOЕЛЕНА БАБЕНКОВА

Newly discovered cell may unlock secrets of type 1 diabetes

news from around campus

THE pulse

Halm takes helm as new COM dean Steven J. Halm, D.O., FAAP, FACP, brought a wealth of clinical practice, teaching and service experiences to DMU when he took the reins as dean of the College of Osteopathic Medicine (COM) on July 8.

Since 2015, Halm had served as assistant dean and chair of simulation medicine at Campbell University’s School of Osteopathic Medicine.

He also was associate professor of internal medicine and pediatrics and the faculty adviser for the Campbell University Community Care Clinic, a student-run free clinic.

“I feel extremely privileged to have the opportunity to join the leadership team of Des Moines University, especially at a time when the institution is embracing great change and new commitments to innovation in all dimensions of the University,” he says. “I have been impressed with the quality of students and the curriculum, and I appreciate the hard work the faculty has applied to ensure the College of Osteopathic Medicine delivers the strongest student outcomes among all medical schools nationwide.”

Prior to his work at Campbell University, Halm was the medical director of the Clinical Evaluation Center (Simulation Center) and associate professor of clinical sciences for the West Virginia School of Osteopathic Medicine. Earlier, he served as chief

of service for the medical staff of Cone Health in Greensboro, NC. He also ran his own private practice in Reidsville, NC, Triad Medicine and Pediatric Associates PLLC. “Dr. Halm was distinguished from a field of strong candidates because of his deep personal commitment to the education of future leaders in medicine and the richness of his portfolio including extensive clinical, educational and service experiences,” says Ralitsa Akins, M.D., Ph.D., provost at DMU. “He also has deep experience with two other colleges of osteopathic medicine that will serve DMU well as we advance our mission.”

Halm earned his doctor of osteopathic medicine degree from Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine after graduating with a bachelor of science degree in biology from Allegheny College.

His postgraduate training includes holding an American Association of Colleges of Osteopathic Medicine/American Osteopathic Association Health Policy Fellowship at Ohio University’s Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine; participat-

ing in the comprehensive instructor workshop at Harvard University’s Institute for Medical Simulation; and completing the internal medicine and pediatrics residency program of the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education at the Milton S. Hershey Medical Center and Penn State Children’s Hospital in

Hershey, PA. Halm describes his move to DMU as “easy to decide professionally.”

“Coming here is a way to have an influence on others for positive outcomes,” he says. “It’s an opportunity to influence the future.”

etry results and subjective quality of life survey results,” Tyler says. “We are really excited by the results and encouraged that the judges were, too.”

In addition, Anna Johnson received fifth place in the A. Hollis Wolf Osteopathic Case Presentation at the AAO Convocation. Her timed case presentation was titled “Psoas and dyspnea: how OMM discovered an unexpected correlation.”

“I learned a lot about word choice and presenting information in an efficient and effective manner,” she says. “It was really fun and also an opportunity to spread the joy of osteopathy.”

Kate Heineman, D.O.’90, chair and assistant professor of DMU’s osteopathic manual medicine depart-

ment, says the University’s OMM Fellowship program has been “running strong” since its initial members graduated in 1977. Four students are selected annually for the program based on their OMM skills.

“Most of our candidates choose to pursue the OMM Fellowship experience because they want to further develop their understanding of osteopathic principles and practice and their clinical skills with osteopathic manipulative treatment,” she says. “We feel we are building leaders in their chosen fields and in the entire profession.

“There is no doubt that the OMM Fellowship year helps to develop future physicians who have a strengthened commitment to our distinct osteopathic heritage,” Heineman

adds. “They never forget the OMM Fellowship experience and are better for it, particularly with their enhanced patient care skills and the significantly increased confidence in their teaching skills.”

Several DMU OMM Fellows have become leaders in their careers and the profession. They include Boyd Buser, D.O.’81, FACOFP dist., past president of the American Osteopathic Association; Michael Rowane, D.O.’89, FAAFP, FAAO, past AAO president; and several AAO Fellows, OMM department chairs and textbook authors.

Board-certified in neuromusculoskeletal medicine/osteopathic manipulative medicine, Heineman also is a former DMU OMM Fellow.

“It is a very rewarding experience

for the OMM faculty as we are able to closely mentor this small group of future physicians who get to thoroughly immerse themselves in osteopathic principles and practice,” she says.

Interacting with the OMM faculty is just one benefit of the Fellowship, says Samantha Tyler. “I really believe that my education at DMU would not have been complete without learning as much as I could from each of the faculty in the OMM department,” she says. “I also have a huge passion for osteopathic medicine and hope to inspire firstand second-year students to share that passion and use it in their future practice, as all D.O.s should.”

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GOT DRUGS?

DMU-Drake partnership can help

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hen patients are discharged from the hospital with a variety of medication changes, this can lead to confusion – and that has the potential to negatively affect their health and increase the likelihood they’ll end up back in the hospital.

People with multiple health conditions are especially at risk of being readmitted to the hospital. Not only is this bad for patients, but it also drives up the cost of health care.

That’s why the Iowa Healthcare Collaborative (IHC) awarded a $15,000 grant to support a program in which a faculty member and student pharmacists of Drake University’s College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences counsel patients at the DMU Family Medicine Clinic.

It came about thanks to the two institutions’ efforts to foster students’ interprofessional learning: Drake pharmacy students began working with clinicians, DMU students and patients in the DMU Clinic in 2017. Now the grant will facilitate more structured, cohesive

efforts to follow up with patients after they’ve left the hospital.

“We work together to provide a transition of care for patients being in the hospital, where they’re handed a pill cup, to being at home, where they have to manage on their own,” says Megan Johnson, M.S.N., practice manager in the DMU Family Medicine Clinic. “They may have old and new medications and are confused about what to take. We want to see them seven to 14 days after they’ve been discharged to help alleviate any confusion and answer their questions.”

IHC is a provider-led and patientfocused nonprofit organization that works to promote a culture of continuous improvement in health care. It was created in 2004 through a partnership between the Iowa Hospital Association and the Iowa Medical Society to put health care

Michelle Bottenberg and Megan Johnson

kudos

CONGRATULATIONS

❱❱❱ Members of the College of Podiatric Medicine and Surgery (CPMS) Class of 2019 had a 100 percent pass rate on both the clinical knowledge and clinical skills components of Part II of the podiatric national board exams.

All 52 members of the class were selected into residency programs during match week, March 11-15. ❱❱❱ Of the 220 members of the

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providers in leadership positions to drive clinical improvements. Its grant to DMU and Drake allows Michelle Bottenberg, Pharm.D., BCPS, associate professor of pharmacy practice at Drake, to be in the DMU Family Medicine Clinic with Drake pharmacy students to review the medications of patients recently discharged from the hospital.

“Pharmacists are uniquely qualified to look at medications and perform a reconciliation of what patients received in the hospital compared to what has been prescribed to them and what they take at home,” she says. “We’re trained to also ask patients whether they take herbal products, over-the-counter medications, vitamin supplements or samples from other providers that can lead to major interactions with their prescribed medications.”

A major barrier to that being standard practice is that key sections of the Social Security Act, which determines eligibility for health care programs such as Medicare Part B, omit pharmacists as health care providers, so they’re not able to be reimbursed for the clinical services they provide.

“We’re trying to get away from fee-for-service health care to a more valuebased system,

osteopathic medicine program’s Class of 2019, 219 landed residencies, for a match rate of 99.5 percent. ❱❱❱ The physician assistant Class of 2019 achieved a first-time pass rate of 100 percent on the Physician Assistant National Certifying Examination. ❱❱❱ DMU President and CEO Angela Walker Franklin, Ph.D., was among the 27 Iowa leaders who share life lessons in the 2019 book You Are Destined for Greatness

by Aaron Putze. ❱❱❱ Rebecca Shaw, M.D. FACOG, chair of the department of specialty medicine and an obstetrician/gynecologist, was named one of 10 2019 “Women of Influence” by the Des Moines Business Record. She was praised as a mentor and educator of the next generation of physicians as well as a volunteer for the Des Moines Symphony Foundation.

but we’re not getting paid that way yet,” Bottenberg says. “The grant is part of that transition to leveraging all our professional strengths to always put the patient at the center of care.”

In addition to benefiting patients, the DMU-Drake collaboration lets students of both institutions learn from each other. Students in the third year of Drake’s four-year pharmacy program work with DMU clinicians, students and patients in the DMU Family Medicine Clinic every Wednesday and Friday.

“The goal is to have a team working together to help patients avoid being readmitted to the hospital,” Johnson says.

The IHC grant brings a third benefit: It connects the DMU Clinic to six other clinics in Iowa that also received it the grant, one of which uses the same electronic health record (EHR) system. That fosters even more interprofessional education and interaction.

“The Iowa Healthcare Collaborative is truly collaborative,” Johnson says. “The other clinic uses the EHR system in ways we don’t, and everyone is willing to share ideas for making the best use of it.”

Overall, the IHC grant supports the goal shared by DMU and Drake’s pharmacy program – to educate students to be part of health care teams that provide the best possible patient care.

“We are both health care programs and educators. We are pushing the future for our students,” Bottenberg says. “The grant represents another way we are preparing them for that future.”

❱❱❱ DMU received Iowa’s 2019 Healthiest State Initiative Award in the large workplace category for its outstanding wellness program.

In addition, Partnership for a Healthier America (PHA), which works to ensure that all children and young adults have the opportunity to live healthy, active lives, announced in April that the University has completed its three-year commitment to expanding healthier options across campus. DMU is one of 32 institutions of higher learning to successfully do so. ❱❱❱ Martin Schmidt, Ph.D., professor of biochemistry and nutrition, and Lisa Streyffeler, Ph.D., chair of behavioral medicine and medical humanities, were appointed Fellows of the National Academy of Osteopathic Medical Educators (NAOME), effective through April

news from around campus

DMU faculty win AACOM Innovation Education Award

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doctor of Korean heritage who grew up in Oregon becomes uncomfortable when a patient asks her about “the medicine of your people.” A Brazilian immigrant who doesn’t speak English struggles to communicate with the doctor who’s treating her nine-year-old asthmatic son. A physician suspects his Mexican-American patient’s failure to get regular blood glucose levels for his type 2 diabetes and hypertension is due to his ethnic background.

These are situations that require health care providers to have more than scientific knowledge about health conditions and treatment options. They call for providers to adhere to the American Osteopathic Association’s code of ethics, which specifies they should not only “provide necessary care without regard to gender, race, color, religion,...” but that they also “conduct themselves with appropriate respect for their patients’ social and cultural needs.”

Fostering that adherence is the goal of the DMU course Foundations of Physicianship: Culturally Responsive Care, developed two years ago

by Jeritt Tucker, Ph.D., former assistant professor of behavioral medicine, and Rich Salas, Ph.D., DMU’s chief diversity officer. They note the course’s outcomes “represent strong foundational knowledge, skills and attitudes essential to the delivery of quality health care in the 21st century.”

The American Association of Colleges of Osteopathic Medicine

THE pulse

school, since our medical society is for the Des Moines metro area. It is important to show students why involvement in their local medical societies is important for their personal and professional support,” Olesen says. “We also felt it was important to include our podiatric colleagues, since they are our partners in . Tim Yoho, D.P.M., M.S., FACFAS, dean of clinics, hospitals and operating rooms.” the College of Podiatric Medicine and Surgery PCMS also created an annual scholarship for a (CPMS), is an unabashed advocate for podiatric medipodiatric student, similar to the scholarships it awards cine, rightfully so. After all, the admissions process to every year to a student in DMU’s osteopathic program the nation’s nine podiatric medical schools is similar to and to one in the University of Iowa Carver College that for allopathic and osteopathic schools, including of Medicine. The inaugural podiatric scholarship required prerequisites and submitted MCAT scores. was awarded this spring to Edee Wildman Renier, The basic science content of podiatric curricula is D.P.M.’20. comparable to that taught at many medical schools.

Greater collaboration with PCMS and among the At DMU, podiatric students professions is an “upside,” Yoho take preclinical courses with says. osteopathic students.

“A lot of the medical society’s Yoho shared this and other programming would beninformation in an article he efit podiatric physicians and recently wrote for the Polk students,” he says. “That allows County Medical Society (PCMS) all of us to learn from and about Bulletin, the publication of the each other. In addition, there central Iowa association of phyare legislative issues on a regusicians. He also was invited this lar basis that affect the medical spring to become an ex officio professions, so this provides a member of the 14-member forum at the local level for indiPCMS Executive Council. He is viduals to discuss why a piece of the first podiatric physician to legislation would be helpful.” serve in that role.

A recent example is the Veter“Part of CPMS’s 2019-2022 CPMS Dean R. Tim Yoho ans Affairs (VA) Provider Equity strategic plan is to develop Act, passed by Congress and more collaborative relationships with medical associasigned by President Donald Trump, that grants physitions beyond our own professional organization,” cian status in the Veterans Administration to doctors he says. He met with PCMS Executive Director Paula of podiatric medicine. That creates leadership opporNoonan to discuss how the organization and the coltunities in the VA system much like those available at lege could work together to benefit students and the public and private health systems, Yoho says. professions. Kaaren Olesen, D.O.’97, M.S., owner “We probably have more in common than we do of Women’s Care Clinic PLC in Urbandale, IA, assistant differences,” he says of podiatric and osteopathic/alprofessor of specialty medicine at DMU and immedilopathic physicians. “The support of PCMS in terms of ate past PCMS president, endorsed the collaboration my role on the executive council and the new scholarand Yoho’s position on the society’s executive council. ship for CPMS students send a powerful message that “It was important to me and the organization to the society members are interested in the success of build better relationships with our local medical our profession and our students.”

CPMS dean joins local medical society’s executive council

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2024. Other DMU faculty serving terms as NAOME Fellows are Craig Canby, Ph.D., associate dean of academic curriculum and medical programs, College of Osteopathic Medicine; Matthew Henry, Ph.D., chair of physiology and pharmacology; Drew Lewis, D.O.’03, FAOCPMR, associate professor of osteopathic manual medicine; Wayne Wilson, Ph.D., chair of biochemistry and nutrition; and Leslie Wimsatt, Ph.D., associate dean of academic assessment quality and development, College of Osteopathic Medicine. Streyffeler also was reappointed by Governor Kim Reynolds to continue serving on the Iowa Board of Psychology through April 2022. ❱❱❱ Laura Delaney, PA-C, M.P.A.S., B.S.P.A.’99, director of clinical education for DMU’s physician assistant studies program, was appointed by Governor Kim Reyn-

olds to a three-year term on the Iowa Board of Physician Assistants.

AROUND CAMPUS ❱❱❱ On May 17, the University recognized 111 students – more than twice the number last year – with DMU Student Service Awards, given to students in all programs for their volunteerism. ❱❱❱ Approximately 90 international educators, exhibitors and students attended the seventh annual Iowa International Education Conference on campus April 25, hosted by DMU’s global health department. Its keynote speaker was Joshua Barr, J.D., director of the Civil and Human Rights Commission of Des Moines. ❱❱❱ During “One Day for DMU,” from noon to noon April 15-16, 249

University alumni, employees and friends contributed a total of $261,303 to 24 different funds at the University. The average gift size was $1,040, and the farthest gift came from a donor 1,653 miles from campus. Of that total giving, 73 percent of DMU faculty and staff contributed $165,114 during the 2019 DMU Employee Campaign in April.

PUBLICATIONS ❱❱❱ James Mahoney, D.P.M., FACFAS, a professor in the College of Podiatric Medicine and Surgery, authored the neurology chapter in the third edition of Review Text in Podiatric Orthopedics and Medicine published by the American College of Foot and Ankle Orthopedics and Medicine. Its co-editor was CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE

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(AACOM) agrees. During its annual conference, Educating Leaders 2019, held April 10-12 in Washington, DC, AACOM’s Society of Osteopathic Medical Educators (SOME) honored Tucker and Salas with its Innovation in the Development of Enduring Educational Materials Award for developing the course.

“We’re the only school among the 35 osteopathic schools to embed this in the curriculum,” Salas says. A member of the AACOM Council on Diversity and Equity (CODE), he was bombarded with questions from members from other institutions in a recent CODE meeting after he shared DMU’s multi-pronged efforts to foster students’ cultural competency.

The one-credit Foundations of Physicianship course is required of all osteopathic medical students at DMU in the spring semester of their first year. Its goals are to extend students’ awareness of their cultural identity, values and assumptions; their knowledge of existing health care disparities and how culture shapes experience; and their skills in transferring this awareness and knowledge to patient care. It is facilitated by students who participated the previous fall semester in the Diversity Health Series, which includes films and frank discussions on aspects of difference.

“The Diversity Health Series started the conversation about this course,” Salas says. “It includes components of cultural identity, self-reflection and team-based learning. Students are required to understand how implicit bias has an impact on health care. The

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course can include moments of discomfort and feelings that challenge students to have an open mind and an open heart, as they’re going to be working with patients who are very different from themselves.”

Roughly 20 percent of the AOA’s 240 sub-competencies use the word “culture” or include aspects of culturally responsive care. The Foundations of Physicianship course emphasizes these AOA core competencies to help students recognize how culturally responsive care is consistent with their emerging professional identities as osteopathic physicians.

Students described the benefits of the course in letters supporting the application for the SOME Innovation Award.

“Foundations of Physicianship was vital to my personal and professional growth as a firstyear medical student, and I am excited to take what I’ve learned into my clinical clerkships next year when I begin to interact with patients,” stated one.

Another student said she hadn’t experienced much diversity growing up in a small, rural Midwestern town. “I had never thought about how these differences may affect my future profession. The Foundations class opened my eyes to the importance of awareness of diversity and the complications that can come with these differences,” she wrote.

V. Kathleen Satterfield, D.P.M.’91, FACFAOM, MAPWCA. See page 34 for more of her accomplishments. Mahoney, Vassilios Vardaxis, Ph.D., professor of physical therapy, and David Stapleton, a research assistant in DMU’s Human Performance Lab, also had published the article, “Evaluation of the subtalar joint during gait using 3D motion analysis: does the STJ achieve neutral position?” in the May edition of Foot and Ankle Online Journal. ❱❱❱ Shannon Petersen, D.Sc.P.T., OCS, FAAOMPT, CMT, professor of physical therapy, was lead author of “Self-reported sinus headaches are associated with neck pain and cervical musculoskeletal dysfunction: a preliminary observational case control study,” published in the Journal of Manual and Manipulative Therapy

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Conference raises awareness of cancer among young adults

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t age 16, Jordan Little was from disease among females in this pushing himself physically in age group and is second only to swimming, soccer and track when heart disease among males. Survival his knee began to hurt. A local rates for cancer in young adults orthopedic surgeon performed an have not changed much in recent MRI to confirm his suspicion that decades, unlike the improvements Jordan had a torn meniscus. Instead, seen in many cancers in children the test revealed abnormal spots on and older adults. That’s because too his bones that led to a very different often, symptoms or warning signs diagnosis: The teenager had acute are ignored or dismissed due to the lymphoblastic leukemia. age of the patient.

“It was one of those moments “Cancer is never expected, but that was almost like a dream,” he it’s particularly surprising and says. “It didn’t kick in until I had my unexpected among young adults,” first chemo treatment. Then it really said keynote speaker Heather Soyer, hit me, watching that fluid drain into Psy.D., a psychologist with Blank my body.”

Children’s PsychoNow three years logical Services Jordan Little is an into remission in Des Moines. and a second-year “Cancer is not alexample of how the osteopathic medical ways detected as student at DMU, quickly as in other symptoms of cancer Little and his mother, age groups.”

Carina Little, were The conferamong young adults among the panelence, sponsored ists at the Univerby DMU’s continuoften are ignored. sity’s Katie Miller ing medical eduYoung Adult Cancer cation program, Conference on May is named in mem1. Themed “Mental Health and ory of Katherine Miller, known Survivorship,” the conference was as “Katie” by her DMU classmates, attended by more than 130 health who was beloved for her kindness, care providers, students and care determination and compassion. She givers who explored the challenges succumbed to colon cancer in 2005 of cancer among people ages 15 at age 26, just six months after being to 39. diagnosed. Her family generously More than 72,000 adolescents supports the conference to honor ages 15 to 19 and 60,000 people Katie and other young adult cancer ages 20 to 39 are diagnosed with victims and survivors as well as to cancer each year in the United generate awareness, discussions States. It’s the leading cause of death and research on the disease.

in February. ❱❱❱ Yujiang Fang, M.D., Ph.D., academic pathologist and assistant professor of microbiology and immunology, was among the authors of “The past, present and future of immunology for metastatic renal cell carcinoma,” published in UroToday in June. ❱❱❱ Briana Gebert-Oberle, D.P.M.’20, M.S.B.S.’15; Jennifer Giles, M.A., a research and instructional assistant in DMU’s physiology and pharmacology department; Sarah Clayton, Ph.D., assistant professor of physiology and pharmacology; and Kim Tran, M.D., Ph.D., professor of physiology and pharmacology, were authors of “Calcium/ calmodulin regulates signaling at the α1A adrenoceptor,” published in the European Journal of Pharmacology in April.

STUDENTS ❱❱❱ Alex Bischoff, D.P.M.’20, was selected by the American Podiatric Medical Students’ Association as the 2019 APMSA Student of the Year. A member of the Pi Delta National Honor Society and the recipient of several student awards at DMU, Bischoff has been a teaching assistant in clinical medicine, the lower limb vascular lab, the lower limb ultrasound lab and the lower limb cadaver lab. He also is an active volunteer in the community. See page 42 for more of his accomplishments. ❱❱❱ Robert Clements, D.P.M.’20, M.S.B.S.’19; Briana Gebert-Oberle, D.P.M.’20, M.S.B.S.’15; Jonathan Nigro, D.P.M.’21; Joseph Brown, D.P.M.’21; Michael Radcliffe, D.P.M.’21; and Ryan Larsen, D.P.M.’21, representatives of the student chapter of the American College of

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Jordan Little enjoys a happier day with his mother, Carina Little.

“The conference focuses on young adults, because so little is known about cancer in that population. It’s a problem for people Katie’s age in detecting it or having anybody believe you even have a problem,” says her father, Richard Miller, who attended this year’s conference. “As much of a huge loss [her death] was to us and to the medical profession, she’s helping bring attention to that.”

While cancer is never easy, it can be a particularly complicated experience for young people as they transition to adulthood. Its unique challenges for teens and young adults include reduced independence, self/body image issues, social isolation, dating and sexual health problems, and interruptions in college and career aspirations.

For Jordan Little, having cancer rattled his identity. Before his diagnosis, he was driven in sports and school. “Deep down I had this need to perform, the need to be the best,” he says.

“Then something came along that shook it all up. All those things that had built my identity up were gone.”

He turned to his family, his faith community and to others with cancer. “Having cancer was the lens through which I learned who I was and who I could be,” he says. “Cancer is why I chose a career in medicine. I saw what

was missing and wanted to be that advocate for the whole person. Moments were rare when the doctors could sit and ask me, ‘What are you learning in school?

How was your track meet?’ We need to understand the patient is a person outside the hospital.

“Being compassionate literally means to suffer with someone,” he adds. “I want to go on these journeys with my patients as a compassionate health care provider.”

Conference panelists were asked about the link between young adult cancer and burnout among health care providers who treat difficult cases.

“When I got my diagnosis, I didn’t want to feel anything, and that’s such a dangerous thing to do,” Little says. “That’s where burnout comes from. Let yourself feel something. If you need to cry, cry. If you need to laugh, laugh.”

He also suggested people change their mindset toward cancer.

“You often see people approach cancer as a battle. That has the connotation there will be a winner, and there will be a loser,” he says. “Instead, I imagined my cancer as a dance, with all this pushing and pulling.

When you look at it as a dance rather than a battle, there is no loser.”

Foot and Ankle Surgeons (ACFAS), received the second-place award in the college poster competition at the 2019 ACFAS annual scientific conference. Their poster was titled “Utilization of external fixation for the management of complicated soft tissue wounds around the foot and ankle.” Collin Pehde, D.P.M.’02, FACFAS, assistant professor in the College of Podiatric Medicine and Surgery, was their faculty mentor. ❱❱❱ The Polk County Medical Society (PCMS) awarded its first podiatric medical student scholarship to Edee Wildman Renier, D.P.M.’20.

PCMS has historically awarded scholarships to DMU D.O. and University of Iowa M.D. students and added the scholarship for a DMU D.P.M. student this year. In addition, PCMS awarded its Kathie J. Lyman Scholarship to Taylor Dreise,

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D.O.’19. ❱❱❱ Rachel Egdorf, D.P.M.’19, and Jake Eisenschink, D.P.M.’19, were among the authors of “Progression of healing on serial radiographs following first ray arthrodesis in the foot using a biplanar plating technique without compression,” published in the May 2019 edition of the Journal of Foot and Ankle Surgery. Other authors included Merrell Kauwe, D.P.M.’14, AACFAS, a surgeon in private practice in Billings, MT; Gary Gansen, D.P.M.’15, and Sean Harper, D.P.M.’16, both residents at UnityPoint Health, Trinity Regional Medical Center, Fort Dodge, IA; and Andrea Cifaldi, D.P.M.’18. ❱❱❱ Mariko Feuz, D.O.’21, was the winner of the April SOMA Research Spotlight of the Student Osteopathic Medical Association.

Her research project seeks to empower frail,

isolated adults to receive the care they want by holistically involving the diverse stakeholders in advanced care planning. ❱❱❱ During the winter meetings of the American Podiatric Medical Students’ Association (APMSA) in Nashville, Israel Bowers, D.P.M.’21, and Avery Mason, D.P.M.’21, were elected president-elect and chair, respectively, of the President’s Committee.

In addition, the College of Podiatric Medicine and Surgery’s men’s basketball team won the annual tournament, held during the meetings, among the nation’s nine colleges and schools of podiatric medicine.

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THE pulse news from around campus Keeler, Vermeer join DMU Board of Trustees

K

arl Keeler, M.H.S.A., president of MercyOne Central Iowa Medical Center, and Kevin Vermeer, M.Sc., president and chief executive officer of UnityPoint Health, began their terms on the Des Moines University Board of Trustees at its meeting in March. They continue the representation of both health systems on the University’s governing board. Past members include Eric Crowell, who retired as president and chief executive officer of UnityPoint Health – Des Moines in 2018, and Bob Ritz, Keeler’s predecessor who moved up in 2017 to serve as president and CEO of MercyOne, which includes MercyOne Central Iowa Medical Center and other clinics and hospitals across Iowa.

“The long-standing productive relationship and partnerships we have with Mercy and UnityPoint are vital to our overall success as an academic health center, given the strong ties we have for clinical training at their hospitals and clinics,”

says Angela L. Walker total of 875 beds Franklin, Ph.D., DMU and more than 20 president and CEO. “We additional facilities. benefit greatly from It is the longest their expertise and continually operatbusiness acumen.” ing hospital in Des Karl Keeler was Moines and one of named to his position the largest employwith MercyOne Central ers in the state, Iowa Medical Center in with more than November 2017 after 7,000 employees. serving as president of Karl Keeler, M.H.S.A. MercyOne Central St. Alphonsus Medical Iowa Medical Center Center in Nampa, ID. is a member of There, he improved the MercyOne and part organization’s perforof Catholic Health mance and led developInitiatives, which opment of a $180 million erates in 17 states. replacement facility.

Kevin Vermeer Prior to that, he held was named presiseveral leadership roles dent and CEO of at Mercy Medical Center UnityPoint Health in in Cedar Rapids, IA. January 2016 after Keeler earned his serving as its execubachelor’s degree in Kevin Vermeer, M.Sc. tive vice president health promotion from since 2009. He Brigham Young University and his took on additional appointments master’s degree in health administraas chief strategy officer in July 2012 tion from the University of Michigan. and accountable care organization MercyOne Central Iowa Medi(ACO) chief executive officer in 2013. cal Center operates four nonprofit His responsibilities include ACO Catholic hospital campuses with a governance, operations, network

development and alignment within the regions, payor strategies and contracting, growth strategies, analytics, information technology and marketing and communications.

Vermeer has more than two decades of experience managing financial operations for leading health care organizations, including Unity HealthCare in Muscatine, IA, Trinity Regional Health System in Rock Island, IL, and Allen Memorial Hospital in Waterloo, IA. He earned his bachelor’s degree in accounting from the University of Nebraska and his master’s degree in management from New England College in New Hampshire. He serves organizations including the Iowa Business Council, the American Hospital Association Regional Policy Board and Iowa’s Healthiest State Initiative Board.

UnityPoint Health is the nation’s 13th largest nonprofit health system and the fourth largest nondenominational health system in the U.S. With more than 34,000 team members and annual revenues of $4.4 billion, the physician-led organization spans hospitals, clinics and at-home settings across Iowa, Illinois and Wisconsin.

ALUMNI: get a DMU master’s degree online and at a discount DMU’s master of health care administration (M.H.A.) program prepares students to lead and succeed in the growing health care industry. Beginning this fall, they can learn how to do so with greater flexibility: Students will be able to complete the program entirely online.

Previously, the 48-credit-hour program included three on-campus professional development courses. That option continues, but students now can complete those courses online. Either way, students will be required to achieve the same competencies.

“The online option will create greater opportunities for people across the country to gain skills and knowledge and advance their careers in health care,” says Rachel Reimer, M.S., Ph.D., chair of DMU’s public health de-

10% ALUMNI DISCOUNT

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partment. “But whether they complete the program online or with the oncampus courses, they will have a faculty adviser and the same academic rigor, professional development opportunities and access to educational resources and student clubs.”

That’s already true for students in DMU’s 46-credit-hour master of public health degree, which also can be completed entirely online. The program offers three concentrations – public health practice, which offers broad training in all the core areas of public health practice; public health administration and policy, which focuses on the financing and administration of a wide variety of

public health and health services in public and private sectors; and health education and promotion, in which students learn to apply theory and research to plan, implement and evaluate efforts to enhance health, tackle chronic disease, and design and offer health education in interpersonal, organizational, community and policy-level settings.

In addition to the two programs’ online option, they are now more affordable for DMU alumni, members of the American Osteopathic Association, active members of the military and veterans, who receive a 10 percent tuition discount for either program.

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Oh, the places they’ll go as GEMS and BROS

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URING TWO SATURDAYS THIS SPRING, the majority of students on campus hadn’t taken the MCAT, weren’t college graduates and likely couldn’t tell a phalange from a fibula, but they had vast amounts of energy and eagerness to learn. Girls Exploring Medicine and Science (GEMS) on March 30 and the new Boys Reaching for Opportunities in Science (BROS) on March 2 drew approximately 450 young students to campus for hands-on experiences designed to expose them to careers in health care.

Organized by the DMU Pediatrics Club and the University’s community relations department, BROS was open to boys in grades 2-6. It was created in response to statistics regarding the high likelihood of disengagement that minority males can experience early in school if they are not exposed to creative learning opportunities. According to a report issued in 2018 by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 57 percent of African American medicalschool graduates were men in 1986, but by 2015 that share had dropped to just 35 percent, even as the total number of black graduates had increased.

“When I was growing up, I didn’t have the opportunity to take part in something like BROS,” says Ruffin Tchakounte, M.S.A.’21, D.O.’22. During the event, he led an interactive lunch on the possibility of becoming health care professionals versus NFL or NBA players. “I think it is important that we are providing this opportunity to these boys and exposing them to fields of medicine and science, to allow them to dream of what their future could look like as a doctor.”

GEMS, formerly Girls in Science Day, was organized by the DMU Women’s Medical Alliance and the University’s community relations office for girls in grades 4-7. As during BROS, participants experienced a variety of workshops, including handling real human organs, using a microscope, learning about osteopathic manual medicine, participating in casting and taping activities, scrubbing in for surgery and making smoothies using the University’s blender bike.

DMU President and CEO Angela Walker Franklin, Ph.D., says adding BROS was a no-brainer, so to speak.

“Our campus is proud to let girls experience the wonder of the sciences and see their own potential with our longstanding GEMS program. That led us naturally to expand our community engagement with an important parallel program for boys,” she says. “It is exciting to see these wonderful young people become inspired by their explorations in the health sciences.”

In addition to the two programs’ impact on the participants, they’ve inspired adults. Hanna de Geest, DMU’s community and public relations manager and the organizer of the events, was contacted by a clinical professor of medicine at Mercer University in Georgia who’d learned about GEMS via LinkedIn, the professional networking website, and who wanted to replicate it at her university. Three local television stations covered the inaugural BROS, and de Geest also received plenty of positive comments from parents.

“My son is not easy to impress and considers himself a pretty knowledgeable young scientist, and he LOVED his day with your doctor teachers and really learned a lot of great things,” wrote one parent in an email message. “He came away very excited to tell me all about it, and he said, ‘I want to be a doctor when I grow up!’ and ‘I wish BROS never ended.’ So you basically knocked it out of the park.”

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THE pulse news from around campus

“Study hard and don’t ever doubt yourself”

This spring, the DMU alumni relations staff asked 2019 graduates of the University’s four clinical programs to write cards to this year’s incoming students. Below are some excerpts.

PHYSICIAN ASSISTANT PROGRAM

“ Always remember, YOU GOT THIS! No matter how hard things get, there’s a light at the end of the tunnel. In the words of Dory from ‘Finding Nemo,’ just keep swimming.” “ Congrats on finally getting to this moment! I am so excited for you to start this journey…

Have so much fun and cherish every moment – it goes fast!” “ I wish you the best in this didactic year – they chose you for a reason! I hope you gain a lot of medical knowledge, but I also hope you meet some lifelong friends in the journey.”

What advice would you give to today’s DMU students?

PODIATRIC MEDICINE AND SURGERY PROGRAM

“ So you want to be a doctor?

Well, you are off to a GREAT start!

DMU is such an amazing school and really does deliver GREAT training…Make sure to sacrifice a few hours a week to do something you love and enjoy. Trust the system, trust DMU. Its reputation will take you places!”

“ Be proud of what you have accomplished so far and look forward to four exhilarating years.

Study hard, but remember, grades are NOT everything.” “ It seemed like yesterday I was just moving to Des Moines for the first time. It truly flies by!

Be confident and don’t be afraid to lean on your classmates for help…This is the start of a long road. It is a marathon so pace yourself – but have fun!” “ I cannot say that first year will be easy, but I promise that you can and will get through it!

Work hard, stay involved and make lifelong colleagues.”

The University’s alumni relations staff want to know – and they want to pass it on to students. Send your advice and encouragement with your name, DMU program and graduation year to alumni@dmu.edu.

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OSTEOPATHIC MEDICINE PROGRAM

PHYSICAL THERAPY PROGRAM

“ Medical school is a special time. You are going to have so many incredible experiences and meet so many amazing people. You are also going to be challenged. YOU WILL BE OKAY! You would not be where you are today if you could not handle it…I’m excited for you, and I’m rooting for you.”

“ Remember to take care of yourself, have fun and get a standing desk. Always, always take advantage of free coffee and food – these are some of the best days besides having various professors dance in class!”

“ Congratulations and welcome to DMU, future doctor!...Enjoy your time on campus, get involved in your class and let knowing your future patients are counting on you be your motivation for success.”

“ These next few years are going to fly by, so take the time to engage with your classmates and faculty, and get involved in as many ways as you can on campus. DMU is truly an amazing school, so take advantage of everything they offer you! When I started here, I felt like there was no way I’d ever become the doctor they said we would be, but at the end of the program, I now realize DMU has prepared me way more than expected for the profession. You’ll be there soon, too.”

“ I am so happy to be among the first to welcome you to the DMU community…If you are anything like me, you will be terrified at your first board exam and anxious about rotations and matching.

But always remember you are here for a reason, you belong here and everything will work out.”

“ As you start your career in medicine, you may be absorbed in keeping up with classes and activities, which can feel overwhelming at times. What helped me the most was to keep my most important goals in mind. Use them to guide you these next four years.”

“ My advice is to have fun, be yourself and work hard. Always be nice and kind to classmates and professors, because it means everything in PT school to have a great support system… P.S. Take advantage of the treadmill desk in the library – it saves lives :)”

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A unique and lasting legacy If Gregory Kolbinger had a motto, it could be “I’ll serve where I’m needed.” An early leader in DMU’s physician assistant program, he also pioneered the University’s simulation program and taught in all three colleges.

DMU asked Gregory Kolbinger to do respect. It was fun to a lot during his nearly three decades at the see.”

University. True to his nature, however, he sees There was also a lot it a different way. to do. He “had fingers in “What I love about DMU is that it’s given me everything over time,” the opportunity to try new things and fill difincluding as an assistant ferent niches,” he says. “The opportunities just professor, clinician, presented themselves, and DMU has always academic coordinator, been big on getting people the training and admissions coordinator skills they need to take them on.” and director. In 2007, Kolbinger retired in June as assistant profeswhen the University sor emeritus of family medicine, but his legacy opened a new human will continue for years to come. After serving simulation center – the Gregory Kolbinger, PA-C’85, is leaving a legacy of high quality and his country as a medical service specialist only one of its kind in positive changes through his service to DMU’s academic programs, with the U.S. Air Force during the late 1970s Iowa at the time – he fellow faculty and clinicians, and especially students. cold war, he was serving his community as a was asked to serve as its paramedic when a friend, Jerry Crane, told clinical coordinator. him he was going to apply for a new physician “Greg was a quiet doer. He taught just she enrolled in the PA program in 1987. “He’s assistant (PA) program at the University of Osabout everything, served on almost every a very good professor. He taught us physical teopathic Medicine and Health Sciences (now faculty committee and so many search comdiagnosis and the heart of what it means to be DMU); Kolbinger decided to join him. The two mittees,” says Wayne Terry, Ph.D., professor a PA,” she says. “It’s more than those technical were among the 12 members of the DMU PA emeritus of physiology and pharmacology. “He skills; it includes making sure you’re listening to Class of 1985, the University’s third PA class. never backed away from anyone – colleague, the patient, taking that holistic approach and In 1987, his former faculty, including Bill employee, student, anyone who had a need. also making sure you have a good relationship Case, PA-C, and Bill Dyche, Ph.D., asked His door was always open for nonjudgmental with your supervising doctor.” him to return as listening.”

Now dean of the College of Health Sciences, their colleague.

Kolbinger Cahalan greatly enjoyed working with her col“The man is the father, the brother, the friend, He became an was in the first league. “When I think of all the students he has instructor, cliniclass Terry impacted, it’s staggering,” she says. the colleague anyone would be proud to claim cian, academic taught at DMU Kolbinger and his wife of 43 years, Vicki, look because of the class, honor, dignity, empathy, coordinator and, Terry forward to spending more time with their three and admissions says, later was daughters and four grandchildren. He also has intelligence, thoughtfulness and warmth coordinator for pivotal in the begun his new role as an ordained deacon for he packed in his work bag every day.” the PA program.

PA program’s the Diocese of Des Moines, assigned to Our LaHe missed patient high qualdy’s Immaculate Heart in Ankeny, IA. Serving as Wayne Terry, Ph.D., professor emeritus, care so left in 1989 ity. “It was a deacon taps his ability to work with and serve physiology and pharmacology to join the Mercy always my a lot of different types of people, as he did at Occupational opinion that DMU. It also aligns with a lesson he learned in Medicine Clinic, Greg and his the Air Force while stationed in Turkey.

Pain Center, Mercy Clinics and Mercy Hospital friend and fellow PA, colleague Bill Case, were “One of the fun things we got to do was to in Des Moines. Five years later, though, Case responsible for elevating the curriculum of the visit little villages. The custom there was to sit lured him back.

PA program,” he says. “It was those two who down, talk and have tea before getting down “I was more seasoned and ready for it,” committed the PA program to an academic to business,” he recalls. “That taught me to slow Kolbinger says. “And there was exciting growth standard equal to the D.O. program.” down and talk to people and listen.” in the program and in the profession in terms Jodi Cahalan, Ph.D., M.P.H.’01, M.S.’93, of PAs’ scope of practice, responsibilities and PA-C’89, DFAAPA, first met Kolbinger when

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THE pulse news from around campus

It was a celebratory week as Des Moines University awarded 458 degrees at its 119th annual Commencement ceremony on May 24, while members of the classes of 1994, 1979, 1969 and earlier years gathered during the week for milestone reunions.

“ Always remember where you came from” “To the Class of 2019, congratulations on your magnificent accomplishment. Enjoy your few days, because your internship is coming and the hard days are going to come back really quickly,” said Kyle Petersen, D.O.’94, who was on campus to celebrate his 25-year reunion. “But you will get through residency. And when you finish that, always remember where you came from. Give back for everything you’ve gotten from this place, because DMU really is a jewel of medical education.”

Distinguished alumnus Arthur Angove, D.O.’62, a retired surgeon, served as grand marshal during the Commencement ceremony. Karen Nichols, D.O., M.A., MACOI, CS, former dean of Midwestern University’s Chicago College of Osteopathic Medicine and past president of the American Osteopathic Association, provided the keynote address.

“As Dr. Francis Peabody stated in the 1920s, the secret of the care of the patient is in caring for the patient,” said Nichols, whom the University granted an honorary doctor of science degree.

“I see the principle of caring as being more valued as the years go by in caring for the patient, building trust and using the physiology of the kind word. And that’s what osteopathic medicine has always been about.”

Dr. Karen Nichols encouraged graduates to apply the principles of osteopathic medicine.

Above, graduates who attended DMU on military scholarships take their oath as officers. At right: a selfie to celebrate a joyous day.

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news from around campus

THE pulse

Alumni meet one of the mannequins in DMU’s Simulation Center.

Above, Robert Lustig, Bradley Grant and Gregory Peterson, members of the Class of 1979, and Ramona Peterson relive a priceless yearbook memory.

At right, Jodi Cahalan, dean of the College of Health Sciences, gives a graduate what he worked for.

For more photos of the 2019 Commencement and reunion festivities, visit WWW.DMU.EDU/GRADPHOTOS For more photos, visit DMU.EDU/GRADPHOTOS and DMU.EDU/REUNIONPHOTOS

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THE pulse news from around campus

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N A RAINY EVENING THIS SPRING, at a large equestrian center just north of Ames, IA, a volunteer leads two women on horseback in a game of Simon Says.” Meanwhile, DMU physical therapy student Josh Harry engages two rambunctious six-year-old boys in races between the horse stalls while they wait their turn to ride. Later, a group of adults refine their horsemanship skills in a “mint julep race” in celebration of the upcoming Kentucky Derby.

This is no evening of horsing around, however. It’s serious physical therapy. And on six Tuesday evenings this spring, in a new academic elective, 20 DMU physical therapy students learned about these equestrian-assisted activities and therapies by serving as “walkers” alongside and behind riders, all individuals with disabilities.

“I’ve always had an interest in horses, but I didn’t know you could use them in therapy,” says Justin Wilder, D.P.T.’21.

“You can see how the patients react to riding. It’s helping me understand the mechanics of physical therapy and that it’s also emotional therapy.”

At the center of the evening’s activity is Kris Lager, M.S., co-founder with her husband, Kelly, of One Heart Equestrian Therapy Inc. She is certified by the Professional Association of Therapeutic Horsemanship (PATH) International as a therapeutic riding instructor, a Level 1 driving instructor and an equine specialist in mental health and learning. She grew up with horses, showed them in 4-H and studied animal science in college, but she was astonished when she first saw a quadriplegic man ride a horse during a therapy session in 2000.

“Everything about him changed when he was riding on the horse,” she recalls. Inspired to make that therapy available to more adults and children with disabilities, she connected with other “horse people,” a local certified therapeutic riding instructor, physical therapists and other volunteers and, in 2002, One Heart was born. In its first 16 years, the organization roamed from local fairgrounds, stables, an outdoor arena and a farm, all of which required transport of the horses –

which are donated and trained – and equipment.

Finally, thanks to many donors and significant community support, in 2018 One Heart found its current permanent home on 10 acres that feature a large indoor arena with a viewing area as well as outdoor riding spaces. Now, clients from nine Iowa counties, ages four to 80, come for classes designed to meet their needs. They include 38-year-old Lisa Mendell, who travels approximately 160 miles round trip from Pella, IA, to attend a Tuesday evening class.

“I have cerebral palsy and have used a wheelchair since I was five. The [equine] therapy helps my balance and eases my spasms,” she says. “I love being around horses.”

Classmate Kia Jordan, 24, also has cerebral palsy and uses a wheelchair. She and her brother, Tyler, were One Heart’s first riders; this summer marked her 18th year of riding.

“This therapy helps a lot. Kia’s muscles are unbelievably tight,” says her mother, Lisa Jordan. “Riding keeps her legs loosened up and helps her posture. Her physician can’t believe how strong her core is from having to sit up so straight on the horse.”

Equine-assisted therapy offers benefits beyond the physical. Tom Jordan, Kia’s grandfather and president of the One Heart Board, says watching his granddaughter ride “still takes my breath away.”

“A person in a wheelchair is always looking up at the whole world. Put them on a horse, and they’re looking down,” he says. “It changes everything.”

For the riders, the activity “is something parents and grandparents can watch them do. They come and cheer,” adds Tracy Porter, M.S.P.T.’97, D.P.T., assistant director of clinical education for the physical therapy program and a longtime One Heart volunteer who oversaw the elective course. “The therapists at One Heart emphasize that the rider is in control, which is important for individuals who usually don’t have control over other aspects of their lives.”

Like Lisa and Kia, 10-year-old Jayla, who has the neurological disorder Rett syndrome, is transferred to her horse as it stands beside a ramp. She uses buttons on her horse’s saddle to communicate whether she wants to halt or “walk on.”

Tonight, her stout Norwegian Fjord horse, Gjoi, is whinnying spiritedly, but Jayla is firm: walk on. At one point, the students turn her around so that she sits backward in the saddle, pushing herself up with her arms on the horse’s rump.

“Jayla was having trouble staying upright,” says Jill Harris, D.P.T.’20. “After we turned her around, you could just see her face brighten.”

Soon it’s time for the two six-year-old boys, who are on the autism spectrum, to ride. Harry, who also suffers from anxiety, uses a portable stairstep to mount Nellie.

“This program is amazing,” says his mother, Natalie Cruden, as she waves at the beaming boy. “The people here go above and beyond to make it a great experience.”

The boys are given cards with instructions on each to engage them in social interaction with the DMU students.

Last week, the students donned long ears so the boys could “herd cows.”

“This was too good of an opportunity to pass up,” physical therapy student Justin Wilder says of the course. “I like how the sessions integrate games with therapy, so I’m learning how to make therapy more fun. I also like the fact the parents are here, so that we can talk with them and figure out how to try different things with the kids.”

Tracy Porter and One Heart owner Kris Lager, above left; at right, Lisa Mendell and her father, Perry

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news from around campus

THE pulse

JOY RIDE

DMU physical therapy students expand their skills and impact on patients with equestrian-assisted therapy

Kia Jordan’s face says it all about the benefits of equestrian-assisted therapy. Helping stabilize her are Tracy Porter, M.S.P.T.’97, D.P.T., Jordan’s face says it all about the benefits of equestrianin the Rider whiteKia hat, and Alex Schmitt, D.P.T.’20, behind her. assisted therapy. She is supported by Tracy Porter, M.S.P.T.’97, D.P.T., in the white cap and Alex Schmitt, D.P.T.’20, behind her.

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T HE CA M PA IG N FOR DES M OIN ES U NI V ERSI T Y U PDAT E

Donors show passion for Purple

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n Dec. 8, 2018, DMU President and CEO Angela L. Walker Franklin, Ph.D., called upon the 300-plus people gathered on campus to “be bold in our plans and passions.”

She had a specific idea for how people could respond to that call – by supporting Purple & Proud: the Campaign for Des Moines University, the largest fundraising effort in the University’s history with a goal to raise $25 million by December 2020.

“We are impassioned to take Des Moines University to an entirely new level of academic excellence, service and leadership,” she told the audience. “Tonight I ask you all to join us as together we raise our vision of what our

University can be.”

Since that announcement of the campaign’s public phase, donors indeed have responded to her call. Overall, 3,767 individuals and organizations have contributed, including 2,857 alumni and 76 percent of DMU employees. Total giving to the campaign as of July 31, 2019, stood at $22,900,566, more than 91 percent of the goal.

“Our focus must be where we’re going as a medical and health sciences institution,” says Michael Witte, D.O.’77, a pulmonologist and CEO of CIC Associates in Des Moines and chair of the DMU Board of Trustees.

“This is our time to start something big.”

“ THE START OF SOMETHING BIG” – AND BEYOND: Purple & Proud inspires positive changes at DMU In the fiscal year that ended June 30, 2019, donors contributed $6,689,956 to the University.

Twenty-one new scholarship funds have been created by Purple & Proud donors. By the end of the 2019 fiscal year, DMU had awarded 2,004 scholarships totaling

$8,717,409 to students during the campaign.

During the 2019 fiscal year, the endowed Glanton Fund exceeded $3.1 million.

Students have received 55 Glanton Scholarships totaling

$0

Areas on campus that have been renovated and newly equipped in the past two years include the Osteopathic Manual Medicine Clinic; the Physical Therapy Clinic; academic offices of the College of Podiatric Medicine and Surgery and the Foot and Ankle Clinic; the Olsen Center; administrative offices and meeting spaces

$5M Good reasons to give:

POINTS OF DMU PRIDE • Members of the College of Podiatric Medicine and Surgery (CPMS) Class of 2019 had a 100 percent pass rate on both the clinical knowledge and clinical skills components of Part II of the podiatric national board exams.

All 52 members of the class were

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more than $2.2 million since the fund was created in 2004. It supports scholarships for minority students under-represented in health care and programs that enhance the

cultural competency of all DMU students.

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selected into residency programs during match week, March 11-15.

• Of the 220 members of the osteopathic medicine program’s Class of 2019, 219 landed residencies, for a match rate of 99.5 percent.

• The physician assistant Class of 2019 achieved a 100 percent first-time

on the first and fifth floors of the Academic Center; and areas in the Student Education Center.

Creation of a new Behavioral Health Clinic is under way in the clinic building, too.

During the campaign, 36 individuals have become

$10M pass rate on the Physician Assistant National Certifying Examination (PANCE). This is the second consecutive year that DMU’s PA program graduates achieved a perfect pass rate.

•E very year, the DMU Clinic serves approximately 40,000 patient visits and provides about 1,700 rotation weeks for students.

& Proud

Our three campaign priorities:

The campaign and DMU’s announcement this spring that it will move its campus to West Des Moines (see pages 24-25) are positioning the University for a cutting-edge future.

“We are setting the stage for strategic growth and prosperity of the University, and we are taking advantage of the evolutionary trends occurring worldwide in health sciences education and health care delivery,” President Franklin says.

“We are proud to educate tomorrow’s health sciences leaders and to provide exceptional care to the community, the state of Iowa and the nation. But we are equally proud of our greater vision for how we will prepare those leaders and serve patients and society.”

OPTIMIZE OUR FACILITIES to serve the community’s health needs Enhance the Osteopathic Manual Medicine Clinic Expand the Physical Therapy Clinic Develop a new Behavioral Health Clinic Build the DMU Fund

SUPPORT OUR STUDENTS by providing access to the finest education Broaden rural health initiatives Expand cultural competency programming Increase scholarship funding

new members of the Founders Society, which honors donors for cumulative lifetime gifts of $100,000 or more.

Paul Emmans Jr., D.O.’71, a family medicine physician in Selah, WA, and Karen and Steven Herwig, D.O.’76, a retired otolaryngologist in West Des Moines, made

campaign gifts that created the University’s first two faculty awards.

Grow mental health initiatives

ONEDAY FORDMU

Two study rooms on campus were named to honor W. Hal Hatchett, D.P.M.’00, FACFAS, and Nicki Nigro, D.P.M.’89, members of the DMU Board of Trustees, for their campaign gifts.

INVEST IN OUR FACULTY by fueling innovation

During the “One Day for DMU,” from noon to noon April 15-16, 2019, 249 alumni, employees and friends contributed a total of $261,303 to the University.

Create endowed faculty positions Establish faculty awards

JULY 2019

DEC 2018 CAMPAIGN LAUNCH

DEC 2020 GOAL

$22,900,566 $15M

$20M • DMU’s 125 faculty represent 894 years of service to the University and its students.

Creation of endowed faculty positions – a major priority of Purple & Proud – will help the University attract and retain these outstanding scholars.

• DMU has received the Institutional Excellence Award of the National Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education and the Friends of Iowa Civil Rights Award.

• With public and private funding, in December 2017 the University launched its DMU Provider Education Project, an effort to better equip clinical students to recognize mental illness among patients and counsel them on treatment.

DMU is the nation’s first university to partner with the National Alliance on Mental ºIllness to provide this training.

$25M

Learn more about the Campaign for Des Moines University, its priorities and ways you can show you are Purple & Proud:

VISIT CAMPAIGN.DMU.EDU OR CALL 515-271-1387.

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As in the human body, the anatomy department at DMU has ...

a lot of research entity. It is truly an honor working with and watching the department’s faculty and staff thrive professionally.”

In all the anatomy faculty do, whether it’s teaching, extracting fossils on paleontological digs or analyzing skeletal remains at a potential crime scene, their love of their field is as plain as the nose on your face.

“A lot of people think anatomy is a dead subject, no pun intended,” says Assistant Professor Lauren Butaric, Ph.D. “But there’s so much to learn about the variations in anatomy, how they happen and why it matters. There’s more to learn about the impact of lifestyles and environments on human anatomy. You will never find a human cadaver that is a textbook case.”

©ISTOCKPHOTO/CHRISCHRISW

Crazy about carnivores

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NATOMY FACULTY AT DMU have a significant teaching load, given they teach courses taken by all students in DMU’s four clinical programs and the master of science degree program in anatomy. Some faculty members have contributed to textbooks; Professor Maria Patestas, Ph.D., has coauthored the textbook on neuroanatomy.

The department’s newest member, Amy Beresheim, Ph.D., anatomy lab specialist, supports the teaching load, community programs and anatomy teaching assistants, while academic assistant Linda Jensen supports everyone in the department.

Members of the anatomy department conduct research on a variety of anatomical topics. They and their students are big on community outreach, hosting high

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school and undergraduate students for learning sessions on campus and taking human organs to middle and high schools in central Iowa.

“The department is really great because there’s such diversity in our interests, yet we have areas that cross over so we can collaborate,” says Associate Professor Julie Meachen, Ph.D. “We’re all very outspoken, but Dr. Matz is good at leading this band of cats.”

That’s Donald Matz, anatomy department chair, who has been a member of the DMU faculty since 1995.

“The one word that comes to mind about the anatomy department over the years is ‘evolution,’ he says. “This department continues its commitment to a strong teaching effort in all the colleges while evolving, the past several years, into a competitive

Julie Meachen’s unabashed fondness of carnivores is evident in her research, in the fact she’s a go-to source for journalists reporting on these meat-eaters and even the coyote painting that’s her computer’s screen-saver.

“I’ve just always liked carnivores. They’re so good at what they do,” she says.

Meachen, Ph.D., and Rachel Dunn, Ph.D., both associate professors of anatomy, were co-lead authors of “Locomotor correlates of the scapholunar of living and extinct carnivorans,” published in the Journal of Morphology, based on their analysis of 3D scans of five extinct animals extracted from the La Brea Tar Pits in California and Natural Trap Cave at the base of the Bighorn Mountains in Wyoming. Other authors of the article were Natalie Mironov, D.O.’20, and Joshua Lemert, D.O.’22, M.S.A.’22. It’s one of several published works by Meachen, Dunn and research colleagues from around the world that examine the effect of ecology, habitat and climate change on species evolution, adaptation and immigration.

In 2014, Meachen secured the first National Science Foundation grant awarded to a DMU faculty member to support her research in Natural Trap Cave, an 85-foot-

MOVING PARTS deep sinkhole that trapped prehistoric animals during the Pleistocene Epoch – commonly referred to as the Ice Age – and amazingly preserved their fossils in its cool and clammy cavern. She also has several papers in review or revision, including on cheetahs and dire wolves. And last year, Canadian paleontologist Grant Zazula invited her to join a team of scientists studying an entirely preserved mummified Ice Age wolf pup, which still has skin and hair.

“When Grant sent me the pictures and asked me to participate in the research, I was really, really excited. I was sort of beside myself,” she told a reporter at the time. “We want to do an ancient DNA test to see who it’s related to and look wat its microbiome to see if there are gut bacteria still there.”

Different angles on examining life Sarah Werning, Ph.D., focuses her research on the evolution of growth, metabolism and life history of vertebrates, using the evolution of bone tissue as a proxy. One of her goals is to reconstruct the physiology and life history of living and extinct species.

“I explore the processes of life, the processes of decay and what remains preserved,” she says.

An assistant professor of anatomy, Werning observed those processes in a different context as a faculty member accompanying DMU students on a global health service trip to rural Kentucky over spring break in 2018 and 2019. One of the two clinics where they saw patients is in Beattyville, one of the nation’s poorest communities in an area lacking jobs and suffering from the opioid epidemic. According to the 2013 U.S. Census Bureau, the median household income in the town, $14,871, is $38,000 less than the U.S. average.

“If you didn’t grow up in that environment, it’s easy to forget that we have aspects of the third world in our own country,” she says.

produce 3D models.

During the trip, Werning helped “Some museums have scanners instudents get comfortable asking questions house; others I have to lug to local hospitals of people in the clinics and during home to scan,” says the assistant professor of visits with local community health staff. anatomy. “I had to hire a taxi cab to haul She also managed logistics and provided 50 skulls across Central Park. Only in New transportation.

York would a taxi driver not be disturbed “I run field crews for paleontology digs, that he’s loading human skulls in his van.” so that’s a skill I have,” she says.

The 2019 recipient of the DMU Faculty Among her other projects is digitizing Organization’s inaugural Paul E. Ema collection of microscope slides found at Creighton University approximately The study of anatomy began as early as 15 years ago. In 1909, J.S. Foote, 1600 B.C., but there’s still so much to learn M.D., professor from and about the body, from the evolution of pathology at of organisms to the impact of climate change Creighton, undertook a study of on species adaption. cross-sections of the femurs of 600 mans Outstanding Faculty Teacher Award, animals, including humans, other mamButaric focuses her research on craniomals, amphibians, reptiles and birds of facial variation, particularly the internal various ages, eras and parts of the world. structures of the skull and ways they vary.

Like Werning, he wanted to analyze and understand the significance of variations in She compares the nasal cavity and sinuses bone structure. Because microscopes weren’t among skulls of individuals from different geographic locations. For example, people able to photograph slides at the time, he from hot-wet climates tend to have wide hand-drew them. A Contribution to the Comparative Histology of the Femur includes nasal cavities; those of people from cold-dry climates are tall and narrow to warm and 467 drawings, but Foote’s collection numhumidify inhaled air to protect the lungs. bers more than 1,500 slides.

There’s so much more to learn about the “He wound up creating a really intereststructure and development of the nasal caviing, thorough sample set with a modern ties, however. “We don’t know that much understanding of relationships. It was a major contribution but then it kind of went about how the shape of the nasal cavity is affected by climate, temperature, dust and by the wayside,” says Werning, who used pollen, or about the variation in those strucsome of Foote’s slides in her dissertation tures among males and females in different for her Ph.D. in integrative biology at the environments,” she says.

University of California-Berkeley.

Nor has much research been done on the facial/nasal structures of children. Butaric Deconstructing the is working with an anatomy professor at the “fingerprint of the skull” University of North Texas to create digital Lauren Butaric, Ph.D., has spent a fair amount models of children’s air spaces; she’s working of time hunting through dusty bins of skulls also with an aerospace engineer there in using airflow dynamics to understand how air at museums and universities, searching for flows through models of differently shaped ones that aren’t broken so she can take CT CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE scans of their nasal sinuses and use them to nasal passages.

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English physician William Harvey, the first to recognize the full circulation of blood in the human body, said, “I learn anatomy not from books but from dissections, not from the tenets of philosophers but from the fabric of nature.”

CONTINUED FROM PREVIOUS PAGE In addition, Butaric and Heather Garvin, Ph.D., associate professor of anatomy, obtained an internal DMU research grant related to assessing error rates in using the frontal sinuses of the skull to identify deceased individuals, given the high level of precision required in a court of law.

“The frontal sinuses are so variable among people. They’re the fingerprint of the skull,” Butaric says.

Understanding more about craniofacial structure, variation and the purposes of that variation is important to life and health in a changing environment, she says.

“Coming from an anthropological background, I look at how and why our physical structures vary,” she says. “Now that I’m at a medical school, I can also ask, ‘Why should we care?’”

Solving skeletal mysteries Heather Garvin, Ph.D., D-ABFA, knows: The dead do tell tales.

The associate professor of anatomy is among approximately 90 board-certified forensic anthropologists in the nation and the only one in Iowa. She assists the state medical examiner’s office in scene recoveries, skeletal identifications, interpretation of skeletal trauma and testifying in court as necessary.

“Forensic anthropologists are experts in the human skeleton. Medical examiners call us in any time an analysis of skeletal remains could provide information about the circumstances of death,” she says. “That can be anything from skeletonized remains found in the woods to child abuse cases to airplane crashes.”

In 2014, she joined an investigation on a much older skeletal mystery – the identification of a new human ancestor, Homo naledi, discovered in a remote chamber of the Rising Star cave system near Johannesburg, South Africa. The hominin species, thought to have survived until between 226,000 and 335,000 years ago, had a tiny brain and humanlike features. As part of a team of scientists from around the globe, 22

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Garvin is responsible for estimating the “new species’ body and brain size. Discover Magazine named the finding the numbertwo top science story of 2015, second only to a NASA space probe’s photos of the surface of Pluto.

Garvin was among the authors of ““Endocast morphology of Homo naledi from the Dinaledi Chamber, South Africa,” published last year in the journal PNAS. “It’s a hot topic of debate and was all over the international press, as some believe this hominin species that had a brain one-third the size of ours was intentionally depositing their dead in this cave system,” she notes.

Garvin has two ongoing federallyfunded research grants through the National Institute of Justice. A $186,605 grant is allowing her, Rachel Dunn, Ph.D., associate professor of anatomy, and a collaborator at the Smithsonian Institution to create “OSTEOID,” a new online resource for criminal investigators, medical examiners and others to identify the species of skeletal remains. Garvin also has a $510,574 grant, with collaborators at the University of Nevada-Reno, to use postmortem CT scans of juveniles to create new standards for sex and age estimation from skeletal remains. DMU students are working on both projects.

“I came to DMU because teaching is emphasized here,” Garvin says, “but the University also supports faculty research.”

Putting together puzzles of paleontology, teaching Associate Professor Rachel Dunn, Ph.D., has excavated and analyzed ancient skeletal specimens in several states, Egypt and India. This past summer alone, she hauled 500 pounds of matrix from a dig at Sand Wash Basin in northwestern Colorado, from which she extracted 14 pounds of material to comb through. Her mission: to uncover how patterns in mammalian morphology and diversity reflect changing climates during the Eocene Epoch, 55 million to 34 million years ago, a time in which

most modern mammal groups evolved.

“I’m interested in how we can predict the behavior of animals from their hard tissue, the bones, and how the environment changed them,” she says.

In 2015, Dunn was on a team of researchers that found in Gujarat, India, 25 exquisitely preserved bones from the most primitive primate yet discovered in terms of evolutionary development, a tree-dwelling creature that could sit on the palm of your hand. She was lead author of a paper on the discovery published that year in the Journal of Human Evolution. It was named number 65 in Discover Magazine’s top science 100 stories of 2016.

“These fossils give us the best picture of what that very first primate looked like,” she told the magazine.

Fascinated by natural history since preschool, Dunn had her sights set on a career as an anthropologist/paleontologist. When she was a graduate student at Washington University, her adviser encouraged her to hone a more “marketable skill” – teaching.

“As I taught, I began to find my own joy in the process of teaching,” she says. She’s very good at it: In 2018, she received the College of Osteopathic Medicine Dean’s Award for Outstanding Teaching and the DMU Faculty Organization’s Outstanding Teaching Award; in 2019, the College of Podiatric Medicine and Surgery Student Government Association recognized her for outstanding teaching in the basic sciences.

She consistently earns high student evaluations for her teaching clarity, organization, enthusiasm and ability to incorporate fun in her lecture style.

“I love puzzles. That’s why I love paleontology,” she says. “Teaching is like that, too.

I want to convey information, so I work on how to put facts together in an intelligible manner that expresses their relevance for the students.”

A behind-the-scenes hero Because of its many courses and labs, research endeavors and community outreach that DMU’s anatomy department manages, every day is different for Kathleen Bitterman, the department’s lone research assistant.

One week she may be preparing tissues of canine brains for the comparative anatomy investigations of Associate Professor Muhammad Spocter, Ph.D.; the next, curating the 4,000-plus specimens of Ice Age-era mammals, reptiles and birds excavated by Associ-

More than a sum of parts ate Professor Julie Meachen, Ph.D., and others from Wyoming’s Natural Trap Cave.

Yet another week she might be researching, purchasing and setting up new lab equipment or creating 3D anatomical models using laser scanning technology and other software.

“Every day changes. I need to be nimble and creative depending on what our researchers’ projects are,” she says. “I love anatomy and the research is fascinating, so it’s really a blast.”

Bitterman plays a role in teaching, too, on campus and in community outreach.

“The students I’ve encountered through our programs love science, and I want to open new doors for them,” she says. “When we explore the comparative anatomy of the brain or skeleton, you can see the light bulbs come on.”

She’s also helping develop a collection of human brain stem slides to be used in the new edition of the neuroanatomy dissection guide and online laboratory. She uses sectioning tools and different kinds of tissue stains to produce the slides.

“Each stain we use has a specific target.

In the brain stem project, we’ll visualize the white matter and the gray matter using different recipes and techniques depending on the specimens and goals,” she explains.

“I love helping solve the mysteries of anatomy and using new technology to answer scientific questions. I have a dream job.”

Faculty and staff of the DMU anatomy department, from left: Maria Patestas, Julie Meachen, Heather Garvin, Muhammad Spocter, Rachel Dunn, Edward Christopherson (in back), Donald Matz, Kathleen Bitterman, Linda Jensen, Lauren Butaric, Amy Beresheim and Sarah Werning

or interred at Chapel Hill Gardens in Des Moines. If a donor is a veteran, his or her remains can be interred, at no cost to the Some of the most important people in an donors or their families, at the Iowa Veteracademic anatomy department aren’t even ans Cemetery in Van Meter. alive. People who choose to donate their “I think that’s very important for veterbodies to DMU and other medical institutions are clinical students’ silent but crucial ans as their final dignified service,” Christopherson says. “I arrange for the chaplain, teachers. the military funeral honors and students to “If an average of 10 medical students learn from one body donor, that donor and attend the burial with the permission of the family.” the students will have impacted more than He and the department work to ensure 1.1 million patients in a 30-year career,” says students understand and appreciate the Edward Christopherson, a licensed embalmer great gift body donors make. Beginning in and former funeral director who’s served as DMU’s anatomical coordinator since 2014. 2018, DMU’s Body Donor Memorial SerCourses and labs for clinical students and vice offered families the option of wearing a lanyard identifying their donor’s family, those in the master of science in anatomy a signal to students they want to talk about program require 55 body donors per year. their loved one during the post-service Every year, 120-125 people register to reception. donate to the program, and approximately “It’s meaningful when we can connect 2,900 individuals are currently registered.

“Body donation is becoming more preva- families, if they want, with our students,” lent. People want their bodies to be used for he says. “It wraps up everything for the stueducational purposes,” Christopherson says. dents. They want to thank the families, and it lets them learn about the donor in life.”

Arrangements are made for donors’ remains to be returned to the families, sent to a funeral home for memorial services

Thanking the silent teachers

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DES MOINES UNIVERSITY IS SEIZING A RARE OPPORTUNITY: creating a brand ne

IMAGINING A UNIVER FROM PARKING PROPOSAL TO BOLD ADVENTURE What began in December 2018 as a modest proposal to the city of Des Moines to add 45 parking spaces and an electricity generator with ample landscaping turned into dramatic debate and ultimately a transformative decision to move the campus of Des Moines University to an 88-acre parcel of land in West Des Moines. If all goes according to plan, the new campus will be open in 2023 – the year marking DMU’s 125th anniversary.

The site for the new campus sits on the north side of Grand Avenue between South Jordan Creek Parkway and South 88th Street. It is bounded on the north by Booneville Road.

DMU has occupied its current location at 3200 Grand Avenue since moving in 1972 from Sixth Avenue in downtown Des Moines.

“This property will permit us to realize our vision for the development of an exciting new campus that will ensure DMU remains a premier medicine and health sciences university serving the community and the world,” says Angela L. Walker Franklin, Ph.D., University president and CEO. “It would be impossible to expand our educational offerings and other programs at our current location with the restrictions in place. Now, the entire campus can truly dream big and explore exciting innovations in all dimensions.”

DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION TIMELINE DMU’s timeline provides for planning and design to continue through November of this year, with

GRAPHICS: ©ISTOCKPHOTO/IMRSQUID

It’s official: Members of the McKinney family, previous owners of the site for the new campus, joined DMU leaders as they signed the purchase agreement.

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excavation and construction to start in spring 2020.

The master planning process began in April with representatives of all campus constituents. The information gathering, which will continue through fall, is being facilitated by the joint team of local specialty consulting organizations RDG Planning and Design and GTG Companies.

“We are setting the stage for strategic growth and prosperity of the University, and we are taking advantage of the evolutionary trends occurring worldwide in health sciences education and health care delivery,” says President Franklin. “I am also proud to share that we have been having energetic discussions on campus and across the community, as people think about the opportunities this change presents for our region.”

The RDG/GTG team will deliver campus design concepts by the end of 2019.

FULL SUPPORT OF THE DMU BOARD OF TRUSTEES “President Franklin has again demonstrated the commitment of her leadership team to pursue a transformative process in realizing a vision for building a new campus that will deliver innovations in health sciences teaching, research and community service,” says DMU Board of Trustees Chair Michael C. Witte, D.O.’77. “I smile as I remember the very moment she first shared this big, bold vision with the full board: it was a prideful moment when, in a nanosecond, the room burst into cheers and applause. Quite simply, this opportunity makes perfect sense for all involved.”

ew medical and health sciences campus on a blank slate of central Iowa farmland.

SITY FOR THE FUTURE DMU President Angela Walker Franklin, Ph.D., at the June press conference at the site of the new West Des Moines campus.

ENVIRONMENTALLY CONSCIOUS With “wellness” as one of its guiding principles, DMU will benefit from the city of West Des Moines’ walking and biking pathways near the new campus.

Environmental planning and sustainability will be important aspects in determining the best use of the 88 acres as the campus is integrated into the surrounding neighborhood.

“We have an opportunity to design and build a creative, connected campus with all of the latest environmentally friendly operations possible,” says Mark Peiffer, M.B.A., CPA, DMU’s senior vice president and chief financial officer. “We want to be as efficient as possible, have a minimal carbon footprint and be the model for others to follow.”

A NEW PARTNERSHIP WITH WEST DES MOINES President Franklin adds, “We are very grateful to have been warmly received by the city of West Des Moines, which has demonstrated an eager partnership with us to meet our needs for a successful

development process.”

In the words of West Des Moines Mayor Steven Gaer during a June news conference, during which a temporary sign at the new campus site was unveiled, DMU will design the campus and its education model to be “the envy of medical schools nationwide.”

“The city of West Des Moines is extremely excited to welcome DMU to our community,” he said. “Their move here helps us accelerate our economic development plans that will add exponential value to our city and benefit our residents in many ways.”

He noted the nearby locations of Microsoft and the Des Moines Area Community College’s West Des Moines campus.

“Together with [these] and other progressive organizations, DMU’s presence will constitute what we are calling the ‘Innovation Corridor’ of West Des Moines,” he added.

Amid all the changes, what should remain constant?

Throughout Des Moines University’s history, evolution and change have been ongoing, and not just in the ways medicine and the health sciences are taught. Seven different names. From one program – osteopathic medicine – to its current eight, with corresponding increases in enrollment. Two different campuses, with now a third in the planning stages, which could represent the most epic transformation of the institution yet.

Alumni, amid all these changes – most of which have been positive and beneficial to students – what about your medical/health sciences alma mater should never change? What elements of its character, people and place in American medical education are worthy of protecting into perpetuity? DMU Magazine wants to know: Please share your answers with Editor Barbara Dietrich Boose via barbara.boose@dmu.edu, 515-2711599 or by mail at DMU, 3200 Grand Ave., Des Moines, IA 50312.

To stay informed about DMU’s progress in building the new campus, please visit this dedicated website:

www.dmu.edu/new-campus/

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DMU profile

A story of resilience, inner strength and

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nyone who lands a seat in medical school in this highly competitive era is, numerically speaking, a rarity. That Stephanie Zobel did that after serving five years in the U.S. Marine Corps, graduating from Ohio State University and then giving birth to twins, now two and a half, puts her in an even more exclusive category. But the second-year DMU osteopathic medical student is truly remarkable – incredibly so – because she accomplished all that after surviving years of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), the cruel realities for kids that have been scientifically linked to the likelihood of risky health behaviors and disease in adulthood.

Not that Zobel sees it that way. The soft-spoken student radiates calm while being open about her path to DMU. When she was a baby, her biological father was a recent leg amputee who felt he couldn’t provide for her and her brother, Richard – so he didn’t. Their biological mother’s paranoid schizophrenia led to their being adopted by a maternal uncle and aunt – whom Zobel considers “Mom” and “Dad”* and who are referred to as such in this article – when she was nine months old and Richard was two and a half years old. The family lived on five acres in an isolated rural area of southern Illinois.

“We always had food on the table. We had cherry trees, a little vineyard, a strawberry patch and a very large garden that me and my brother would help out with,” she says. “Dad would hunt, too. He had been an orphan in West Virginia and grew up knowing what it was like to be hungry.”

Zobel has positive memories of shelling peas and watching the sunrise with her mother and walking in the woods with her dad. But there were stretches where the plumbing in the trailer they lived in didn’t work, so the two children collected rainwater for bathing, cooking and flushing the toilet.

“When it didn’t rain, we would drive into town for groceries and steal water from the laundromat in recycled milk jugs,” she says.

The forecast calls for pain

Mental illness took a greater toll on the family. Zobel’s biological mother sometimes drove to the family’s home to angrily demand to get her children back. She tried kidnapping Richard and once shot a gun at the trailer.

“I just remember feeling not safe because the trailer was very old and fragile. My brother and I had to hide in the closet,” Zobel recalls.

“Dad had guns, so he went out to calm her down and tell her to leave. A protection order was eventually put in place.”

But not “protection” against other crises. The children’s adoptive father was an alcoholic who increasingly had paranoid delusions and was at times violent to his wife. One night, when he was out of the home, she told the children to pack up their things.

“I was so excited because we were finally leaving, but she started crying and said we had to go back. She’d had a difficult childhood and had been completely dependent on him her entire adult life,” Zobel says. “I threatened to call social services many times, but my mother scared me away from it by saying I’d probably be separated from my brother, whom she knew I loved a lot, and molested. So naturally I never called social services.”

The “worst thing,” Zobel says, was her father’s unpredictability. “A lot of events got ruined because of Dad’s temper. The holidays were always bad because they seemed to trigger him,” she says. “After those things happened, I had trouble making friends and having fun like my peers. I was scared of saying something that would set off someone like my Dad. I withdrew into myself.”

*DMU Magazine is not using these family members’ names to respect Zobel’s wishes and their privacy.

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the U.S. Marine Corps Rural + poor = trouble

Zobel met her husband, Fred, in the Marine Corps. After they completed their service, they married and moved to Ohio, where she The violence escalated. The father increasingly believed people were became a psychology major at Ohio State University. “I wanted to find plotting to kill him. One night, he was so threatening to his wife that out what makes people tick,” she says. “My whole goal was to go to Zobel was convinced he would kill her. medical school.”

“After that, I remember crying every night. I asked my mom if I could When she was unsuccessful in being admitted, she and Fred see a psychiatrist. She couldn’t find one and told me to talk with the decided the timing was right for parenthood. It wasn’t a light decione teacher at school I didn’t like,” she says. “That did not help at all.” sion. “There was so much mental illness in my family, and some in my It wasn’t until years later, after two tours of Iraq as a U.S. Marine, that husband’s, too. That combination of genes did not bode well for my she realized that violent evening was the “exact moment” she acquired kids,” she says. post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

Countering that concern was the Despite all the adversities of her childhood, Poverty, inaccessible health care, domestic couple’s relationship. “Fred and I are though, and the fact she rarely communiviolence and post-traumatic stress could amazing at conflict resolution – amazcates with her adoptive parents now, she have set Stephanie Zobel up for a lifetime ing,” she says. “We just talk to each other doesn’t harbor resentment toward them. of misery, but she found a different path. without being nasty or yelling or taking She is sympathetic toward them and the Her resilience, self-awareness and service little digs at each other.” harsh realities that shaped their lives.

That was a saving grace during the “We were poor and lived in a rural area, in the Marine Corps were key. first year after their twins, Freddy and Jo, so access to health care was limited; mental were born. “By the time we got one down and settled, the other was health services, even more so,” she reflects. “This meant that my father crying. They were preemies so struggled to latch,” she recalls. “That could not get care, my mother could not get domestic abuse support first year was terrible.” services and I could not find a psychiatrist who would have diagnosed Zobel has a huge capacity for hanging tough, however. She was me with PTSD from having witnessed the domestic violence.” accepted at DMU and went from being a stay-at-home mom to being a Zobel moved out of the house after Richard, then 18, got an apartfull-time medical student with another saving grace – having a stay-atment, and their parents announced they were moving. (Years before, home husband. the family had moved out of the trailer.) They said Zobel could come “Fred does it all – taking care of the kids, the laundry, groceries, with them, but she had her senior year of high school to complete and shopping,” she says. had enlisted in the Marine Corps, in part because she “no idea how to Zobel was accepted at three medical schools after her next set of apply for college.” applications. “The first time I applied, I didn’t do a good job of sell“I’d done junior ROTC in high school and always liked the military. ing myself. The second time around, I parsed out everything I did in Hollywood played a big role in that,” she says. “But the biggest thing the Marine Corps,” she says. “I chose DMU because of the interview the recruiter sold me on was its feeling of family, of belonging. That process. The people were nice and were interested in me. I touched on really appealed to me.” aspects of my childhood, but not in a ‘woe is me’ kind of way.”

For the first time, Zobel had leaders, a sense of purpose and no worZobel shared her story this spring during DMU’s inaugural Human ries about “keeping everyone safe” as she had to at home. She taught Library event, in which individuals who have experienced some form of herself to make friends. She discovered she loved being physically acbeing different served as “books” to be “checked out” for one-on-one tive – “I got out a lot of aggression” – and that she was capable of much conversations. more than she previously believed.

“When I’ve shared my story, people may get something out of it that “I felt valued in the Marine Corps. They trust you with a lot of responhelps them,” she says. “Growing up, a lot of the time I felt so isolated, sibility at an early rank,” she says. but this stuff does happen, and I know other people have had similar She also worked to hone conflict resolution skills. “I recognized that experiences. It’s truly wonderful to hear that my story is resonating was a big problem for my family,” she says. “I read book after book on with people.” the topic.”

Realities and resilience Stephanie Zobel’s childhood was shaped in part by some grim realities that directly affect the health and wellness of millions of Americans: poverty, lack of access to physical and mental health care and the potential lifelong negative impact of adverse childhood experiences.

According to the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, in 2017 poor people – defined as at or below 100 percent of the Federal Poverty Level (FPL) – experienced worse access to care on 18 of 20 access measures compared with people at 400 percent or more of FPL. Where a person lives influences his or her health. Compared with their urban counterparts, residents of rural counties are older, poorer,

sicker and more likely to be overweight or obese. The National Center for Health Statistics of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that rural residents also have higher rates of injury, smoking, uninsurance, suicide and opioid misuse.

The CDC-Kaiser Permanente Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) Study, originally conducted from 1995 to 1997, looked at seven ACEs categories: psychological, physical or sexual abuse; violence against the mother; or living with household members who were substance abusers, mentally ill or suicidal, or ever imprisoned. The number of categories of ACEs was then compared to measures of adult risk behavior, health status, and disease.

The study found that persons who had

experienced four or more categories of ACEs, compared to those who had experienced none, had four- to 12-fold increased health risks for alcoholism, drug abuse, depression and suicide attempt. The study also linked higher numbers of ACEs to an increased presence of adult diseases including ischemic heart disease and cancer.

Despite all these strikes against her, Zobel managed to survive and thrive thanks in part to her resilience. According to the American Psychological Association, resilience isn’t a trait that people either have or don’t have; rather, it’s a process of adapting well in the face of adversity, trauma, tragedy or threats. Ways to build resilience include making positive connections with other people, moving toward one’s goals and taking care of oneself.

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DMU profile

ALUMNA UNITES GENERATIONS to advance her specialty, serve patients

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s a board-certified neurologist, Wynde Cheek, D.O.’03, FACN, learned from mentor Robert Simkins, D.O.’75, how to have “difficult conversations with patients with devastating conditions.” She manages that challenge by keeping up in her profession and walking patients through their diagnoses, her factual findings and options for treatment.

“I come from a long line of educators and health care providers. As a physician I’m both,” says the Montana-based physician. “My philosophy is that patients should leave with not only knowledge about their conditions, but also a sense of responsibility for what they can control as the central focus of the health care team.”

That education orientation has also been valuable to Cheek in her role as national president of the American College of Neuropsychiatrists (ACN)/ American College of Osteopathic Neurologists and Psychiatrists (ACONP). Inaugurated last October for a one-year term, she is one of a handful of women and one of the youngest in the college’s 83-year history to accept the gavel. She quickly realized that to be effective in the role, she needed to help millennials in the profession – individuals born in the early 1980s – and its baby boomers – people born from 1946 to 1964 – better understand each other.

“Boomers are hierarchical. They believe everyone should climb the ladder just like they were required to do. Millennials look at other people as equals, that everyone is on the same level regardless of age, training or experience. It’s critical to understand and respect both perspectives,” she says. “I’m a young Generation X’er” – the demographic cohort between the two – “so I became an interpreter between the generations. I’m a catalyst for taking the best each generation has to offer to advance our college. By creating bridges built on experience, creativity and passion for our profession, the three generations can come together and be brilliant.”

Cheek had served on the ACN executive board for two years and, before that, on its board of governors for six years; last year, as ACN’s national program director, she coordinated educational conferences in neurology and psychiatry throughout the U.S. “It was a challenge I was eager to embark on,” she says. “I met so many people – it was like talking with the ‘George Clooney’s’ of neuroscience, major researchers presenting breaking information and textbook authors I read in training. Now I can call them my friends and colleagues. What a privilege!”

It has also been rewarding how other female

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members of ACN have responded to her presidency. “One woman in her 60s came up to me and gave me a hug,” she recalls. “She said, ‘I have been part of the college for years and have never felt as inspired.’ I try to be very inclusive, to make sure no one is intimidated by my leadership and everyone is being listened to.”

Cheek migrated toward leadership activities as a student and member of the last class to matriculate into the University of Osteopathic Medicine and Health Sciences, before it was renamed DMU. She was president of the Student Osteopathic Medical Association chapter and later a national student representative to the American Osteopathic Association. She and her classmate-nowspouse, Nick Ford, D.O.’03, an anesthesiologist, were of like minds on the importance of professional engagement.

“I’m grateful to have attended a medical school that promotes professional leadership development,” Cheek says. “Whether I’m at state or national events, I’m proud to see so many DMU alumni in leadership roles. DMU grads are well represented and continue to use our talents to ensure osteopathic physicians have a voice in the

health care process.”

As a medical intern and neurology resident through Kettering Health Network and Grandview Hospital Medical Center in Dayton, OH, she pressed senior colleagues for ways she could become involved in the ACN, prompting early leadership opportunities. Now an ACN Fellow with additional Certification of Qualifications in neurophysiology, she is a local, regional and national speaker and educator in neurology, neuropsychiatry, neuroscience and professional development.

For her broad efforts, she was awarded the 2018 Rising Star Award by the Northwest Osteopathic Medical Foundation.

“I always say neurology chose me,” she says.

“Neurology was, and continues to be, very intriguing to me. You need to be comfortable with the complex material and curious about the unknown.”

Given her current extensive leadership obligations, Cheek has pulled back from full-time direct patient care, but she is cognizant of the need to get back. “Montana is a large state with few physicians. It is 92 percent federally designated medically underserved. However, from firsthand knowledge, I educate legislators on rural and unserved health needs and ways to address them at the state and national levels.”

Working in a high-demand profession in a state with great unmet needs can contribute to burnout, she acknowledges, but advancements in her specialty keep her excited.

“Research in the field is exploding. The amount of material coming out provides a ‘wow’ factor and really makes the practice rewarding,” she says. “It never bores me, and it keeps me on my toes.”

Cheek recalls an attending during her residency who became “emotional” when then-new injectable medications for multiple sclerosis were available. “He said that when he got out of residency, the only treatment was aspirin – nothing to directly affect the disease process or patient quality of life,” she says. “We have options now. We know more about using different medicinal modalities that really have had a positive impact on our patients, their outlook on life and functionality.”

“ Neurology was, and continues to be, very intriguing to me.

You need to be comfortable with the complex material and curious about the unknown.”

DMU profile

Alumnus crushes the Iditarod – on foot – for the sixth time Eric Johnson’s idea of a good time is no walk in the park. It’s a 1,000mile slog that he does on foot with Old Man Winter up wind-whipped mountain passes, over rivers, across desolate tundras and through dense forests in Alaska. In March, he became only the sixth person ever to have completed the northern and southern routes of the Iditarod Trail Invitational (ITI) on foot in less than 30 days.

A physician assistant in family practice with Ogden Clinic in Ogden, UT, since he graduated from DMU in 1998, Johnson is a veteran of cross-country ultramarathons. In 2014, for example, he achieved his goal of finishing the Utah Extreme Seven Series, the seven 100-mile ultra endurance runs in the state, within the year; he even added an eighth race, the Grand Canyon 100-mile, just over the Utah border. But the ITI holds a special place in his heart as well as his soles.

“I love, really love, Arctic ultramarathons, but the Iditarod Trail Invitational hosts, to me, the greatest of events,” he says.

The historic Iditarod Trail, widely known for its annual sled dog race, spans approximately 1,000 miles from Anchorage to Nome, which sits on the coast of the Bering Sea. While people have tackled the trail on foot, bicycles and skis for decades, the ITI was officially founded in 2002 and offers both 350- and 1,000mile options. Each year the race accepts 75 athletes who have qualified by completing the 350-mile event. It alternates southern and northern routes.

“Both routes are approximately 1,000 miles, give or take a few depending on how the winter freeze has affected the various rivers, especially the Yukon,” Johnson says. “The Yukon is almost as wide in places as the Mississippi, so it is big, bad and always very dangerous.”

Unlike in other Arctic ultramarathons, ITI racers are allowed to make their own gear choices and to decide when to rest and when to travel. It has no designated or marked route, only mandatory checkpoints participants must pass through. Johnson hauls all his gear in a duffel bag attached to a sled. Racers are allowed to mail themselves food and other expendables via post offices along the trail.

“I love that I’m allowed to make my own gear choices,” he says. “But that’s also a major source of stress, since you’re trying to anticipate what you might need while being keenly aware of your sled’s weight. When you get to decide on everything and you can’t pick up any extra survival gear along the way, the burden weighs much heavier, which is what I “ I love, really love, Arctic prefer anyway.” ultramarathons, but the It stands to reason that Johnson would prefer Iditarod Trail Invitational the heavier burden, the hosts, to me, the greatest tougher trail and the of events,” he says. longer event.

“In 2016, I did the [ITI’s] northern route in 25 days, then returned for another suffer-fest on the southern route this year,” he says. “Honestly, those are some of the most cherished of days! I love the trail, I love the grind – the fight, the mental struggle, the gear – all of it! Secretly, I want to go back and do the southern route again.”

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: Eric Johnson says “the fun was just getting started” at mile 98 of the Iditarod, when the temperature was 15 degrees below zero; at mile 675, his right foot punched through the Yukon River; with his sled at Rohn, an isolated checkpoint on the Kuskokwim River; at the race’s end; sunset at the ghost town Iditarod; all smiles with his wife, Melanie.

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Once a doctor, always MEDICAL SCHOOL PERMANENTLY CHANGES YOU. It changes not only how you think, but also how you see people and, in turn, how they see and think about you. This has been most evident to me over the past several years, when after practicing full-time emergency and family medicine for more than

Kevin Ware, D.O.’73, AAFP, resides in Mount Vernon, WA. In 2018 he was appointed by Governor Jay Inslee to the Washington State Osteopathic Medical Board, which oversees the licensure process for D.O.s in the state and also handles disciplinary matters. He had served as a pro-tem member of the board for several years.

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Fellow corporate jet pilot Doug and I leave the Regional Airport north of Seattle in the Lear jet just before dawn. It is a cold winter morning, and we have seven passengers on board the business jet with the plan to leave three in Ketchikan, two in Juneau and then take the remaining two to Valdez. We are to wait there for a couple of hours, then reverse the whole procedure, ideally getting everyone back to Seattle by dinner time.

A small arc of the sun is visible on the eastern horizon as we start down out of 36,000 feet near Annette Island, about 70 nautical miles southeast of Ketchikan. The weather report says it is snowing in Ketchikan with visibility of one to two miles, scattered clouds at 2,000 feet, broken at 2,500 and overcast at 3,000. The wind is from the west gusting 12–20 knots. Anchorage Center clears us for the instrument approach to runway 29 and hands us off to the local frequency. Ketchikan Flight Service tells us there is snow on the runway, and braking action is unknown. We break out of the clouds at 2,500 feet about two miles from the runway to see that at 144 knots we are a bit high and fast, which is not where we want to be given the runway conditions.

The power comes all the way back, full flaps go down and pretty soon we are nicely established on the glide path and doing the calculated correct speed of 132 knots. We make a smooth landing in blowing snow, the thrust reversers are deployed and I tentatively test the brakes – they seem okay, although hard to tell with all the deceleration generated by the jet engines. An Alaska Airlines 737 crew behind us on the same approach asks about braking. We are nearing

the end of the runway and nail the brakes to see what happens. Good braking, we tell them. It is pretty clear their concern, like ours, was not the instrument approach as much as what was going to happen once the airplane was on the ground.

When we exit the taxiway and enter Aero Service’s ramp, the Lear jet nearly comes to a crunching stop.

No one has plowed the ramp, and the Lear’s high-pressure, smalldiameter tires have trouble getting through six to eight inches of thick, wet snow. We power way up just to keep the airplane rolling and with some difficulty reach the lineman who is energetically waving us forward.

Doug and I are working our way through the airplane’s 14-item shut-down checklist, when one of the passengers pokes his head in the cockpit and asks if he can open the door. With my headset still on, I nod “yes” and return to the checklist.

Through the pilot’s window, however, I see that as the first man out the door reaches the ground at the bottom of the stairs, his feet slide forward and he loses his balance. He starts a slow-motion fall on what is a sheet of ice covered with snow.

As his right arm moves backward to break his fall, my pilot brain goes quiet, and the doctor one kicks in with an unsolicited stream of diagnostic considerations. I first think, “He must be right-handed”; I then see his right hand extend at the wrist, and I think,”Young guy – his protective reflexes are working pretty good.” But I also think, “Hmm…right hand extended at the wrist, probable Colles fracture or a fractured scaphoid (a small bone in the wrist) coming up here…or both…and on the dominant side…this guy does construction work… not good…I hope his arm

BACKGROUND IMAGE: ©ISTOCKPHOTO/ PHATTHANIT_R

two decades, I returned to working part-time in my former job of flying airplanes professionally.

DMU profile

a doctor

BY KEVIN E. WARE, D.O.’73, AAFP

takes the damage, not his head… lots’ lounge, making respectful and anxious and frightened facial appearwhat would we do about a subarachgrateful gestures. ance, pink fingernails and lips, and a noid hemorrhage here in Ketchikan A couple months go by and in berespiratory rate I estimate to be about anyway? That would be bad…a tween a series of shifts at the urgent 20. As my right hand shakes her shoulsubdural hematoma would be better; care center, I am on another trip, der and I ask in a loud voice, “Are you we would have him back in Seattle by this time over the Eastern Atlantic OK?”, my left hand finds her wrist and the time that showed up.” between Iceland and the Outer Heba pulse of 90 or so and regular. She He catches the worst of the fall rides at 41,000 feet. I am working as mumbles she cannot feel her fingers with his right arm, bends at the waist the co-pilot on a flight that started and her lips are tingling. I think, and as his gluteal muscles suffer a in Vancouver the day before and will “Not hypoxia…more likely too much pretty good impact with the ground, end in London in the evening. The oxygen and not enough CO2, probI think, “I hope the snow gives enough airplane is an almost new Citation ably with some respiratory alkalosis cushion so he does not fracture his jet, and we have an hour or so to thrown in…looks like hyperventilation coccyx…those really hurt.” Now in full go at 400 knots before reaching syndrome to me…” and I wish for a ER doctor mode, I am loosening my landfall. pulse oximeter to confirm my workfive-point pilot seat belt harness and Fred, the pilot in the left seat, ing diagnosis. heading for the airplane’s door. But and I are making small talk between As the other passengers look on before I can get there, he gets up, position reports to the Oceanic conwith worried expressions, with some beneath us the patchwork of green shakes his wrist a bit, rubs the snow troller back in Reykjavik, when one difficulty I get my passenger (now fields and stone fences so typical of off his pants and heads into the of the passengers comes forward patient) in a recovery position in the England. We land without a problem terminal. and with slightly slurred speech says narrow space between seats, put and taxi to Harrod’s, the business Twenty minutes later I have my she is dizzy and doesn’t feel well. I aside the oxygen bottle and rattle aviation terminal. As the two jet “pilot” hat back on and am getting check the cabin altitude gauge just through the galley looking for a paengines spool down with their charsome coffee in the pilots’ lounge above my right knee on the instruper bag. I finally find one containing acteristic whine, I head back to open when one of our fall guy’s budment panel. It says 8,000 feet, which candy bars. Dumping those out I rethe door, and our lady passenger/padies, having heard somehow that is normal when the airplane is this turn to my passenger (now patient) tient gives me an appreciative look their jet pilot is also a doctor, asks high, and well tolerated by most and in my best authoritative ER docand silently mouths, “Thank you, if I wouldn’t mind looking at his healthy passengers. I tell her the tor’s voice say, “I want her to breathe Doc.” In contrast, Her Majesty’s cusarm. With seven of his friends lookcabin altitude is just fine, and Fred into the bag for five minutes, at toms agent standing on the ramp by ing on, I have him take off his shirt tells her to return to her seat. We which time I am confident she will the open door sees my uniform shirt and conduct an exam specific to the both watch as she then gets about feel much better.” The time goes by, with four stripes and says, “Welcome arm. I see his distal circulation to England, Captain.” is good, the radius and ulna are Fred and I are finishing our both anatomically aligned, there post-flight pilot duties when As his right hand moves backward to break his fall, is no point tenderness over the he suddenly stops and says, anatomical snuff box or over “You know, Kevin, once you my pilot brain goes quiet, and the doctor one kicks in the distal radius and ulna. But I are a doctor, you’re really with an unsolicited stream of diagnostic considerations. always a doctor, aren’t you?” I also think, “Sometimes you can get an elbow injury or shoulder reply, “I guess so, Fred…there dislocation with that type of are some experiences in life that perfall,” and so now in full-on doctor halfway back into the cabin, falls in and then in a somewhat surprised manently change how you think and mode, I say “hmm” and, nodding the aisle and stops moving. voice she smiles a little and says her who you are, and going to medical my head slightly, extend my exam Since, regardless of other fingers and lips now feel okay. Ten school is definitely one of them.” proximally all the way to his chest qualifications, it is the custom for minutes later I have her belted into Once you are a doctor, you will wall, much to the confusion of my flight crews to have the pilot in the her seat, and between tears she always be a doctor. seven-man audience. When finished right seat take care of this type of starts telling me how stressful the I nod a bit more, then say, “His exam problem, Fred asks that I get out the previous several days had been and appears normal, but I would recomspare portable oxygen bottle and how anxious she had been feeling. I mend a follow-up x-ray as, based then put the mask on her. I release leave her with a couple Kleenexes upon exam alone, I cannot exclude my seat belt and take off my headset and return to my day job in the right a wrist fracture.” Yes, corporate jet to do this, but as I approach her on front seat of the airplane. pilot or not, it is unavoidable: I am the floor with oxygen bottle in hand, Shortly thereafter we cross over indeed still a doctor, and apparthe doctor part of my mind starts the Hebrides and are cleared directly ently acting just like they expect waking up and I get another stream to Manchester, England. A half hour one to. My passenger/patient says, of diagnostic observations and later we descend out of the clouds “Thanks, Doc,” and the entourage thoughts. I see a normal height and on an instrument approach into files out of my examining room/piweight female in her 40s, who has an London’s Stansted Airport and see

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DMU profile

TAKING AN ENTREPRENEURIAL VIEW of global health problems

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aniel Sipple, D.O.’03, FABPMR, DABPM, believes that thinking and acting like an entrepreneur is an effective way for physicians to avoid burnout. One way he practices that belief is in his role as co-founder and medical adviser for the St. Paul, MN-based biotechnology company InSitu Biologics LLC. The company is using its Matrix™ BioHydrogel to develop long-lasting and long-acting non-opiate painkillers, AnestaGel-P™ for humans and AniGel SR™ for animals.

Research funded by the company in 2016 and subsequent research published in the Journal of Pain Research in 2017 showed that AnestaGel-P delivered a statistically greater analgesic effect on rats at 24 and 48 hours post-surgical incision than Exparel, a leading non-opiate analgesic used to treat post-operative pain. Both drugs contain the anesthetic bupivacaine, but AnestaGel-P’s peanut butter-like viscosity keeps it from migrating from the injection site, making it more precise. Its molecular structure also dissolves bupivacaine in a way so the drug is “tunable” in its delivery rate, duration and stability. InSitu Biologics is now preparing phase one of a clinical study.

“AnestaGel improves upon what’s already on the market for post-operative pain and has numerous other clinical applications,” Sipple says. “Pain is a huge issue, and the conditions that cause it can be very expensive to treat.”

According to the National Institutes of Health, pain affects more Americans than diabetes, heart disease and cancer combined. Opioid use has increased to a crisis level since the late 1990s. Opioid overdoses killed more than 47,000 people in 2017.

“Industry estimates the number of pills that patients go home with post-surgery amounts to over one billion annually,” he says. “Sustained-release anesthetics have the potential to reduce that by 300 million. Those are pills that can’t be abused or contribute to overdose.”

A physiatrist who is board-certified in physical medicine and rehabilitation and pain management, Sipple describes InSitu’s product developments as “a tangible example of what can be done on a relative shoestring by repurposing existing technologies.” Its new drugs utilize hydrogel technology developed by the Cleveland Clinic to produce artificial cartilage but that wasn’t applied to other purposes.

“It’s like the 3M Post-it Note,” he says, referencing the ubiquitous squares of sticky paper. A 3M Corp. scientist developed the light adhesive in 1974, but it wasn’t until years later that a colleague found a purpose for it.

Sipple’s interests go beyond patient care and pain management. He serves on the board of the Society for Brain Mapping and Therapeutics (SBMT), a nonprofit alliance of physicians, scientists, engineers, government and non-governmental agencies seeking rapid introduction of therapeutics for brain and spine disorders. In May he participated in discussions at the White House advocating for SBMT’s proposed Brain Technology and Innovation Park Initiative, which would generate public and private funding for the society’s efforts.

Last November, Sipple was among the speakers at the fifth annual conference in Buenos Aires, Argentina, of the Neuroscience-20 Group. SBMT and the Brain Mapping Foundation established N-20 as the world’s first think tank for basic, translational and clinical discoveries in the field.

He spoke again at N-20 in Osaka, Japan, this past June.

“It’s very humanizing to see that people all over the world unified by the common human experience of someone they love with Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease and other neurological conditions,” he says. “They take a significant emotional toll and cost $13 trillion worldwide.”

Sipple may have inherited his entrepreneurial bent from his father, Ralph Sipple, who held several patents, including relating to video on demand services. Daniel Sipple also has a patent pending for a “smart” needle that injects directly into the spinal cord, reducing the inflammatory damage from spinal cord injury.

“I hope to have an impact and leave a legacy in the treatment of spinal cord injury,” he says. “The humanistic and social cost of this condition is begging for innovation.”

helping s i e l p p i S l e i Dan a group of new develop painkillers that non-opiateto the Post-it Note he likens ng technology for utilizi used for a previously different purpose. completely

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alumniNEWS

doings by former DMU students

Alumnus named ACOFP’s 2019 Physician of the Year

K

evin de Regnier, D.O.’85, FACOFP, dist., may practice in a small town, but he’s been a big name in osteopathic family medicine. President of Madison County Medical Associates in Winterset, IA, he has served numerous osteopathic associations and medical organizations as well as his community during his 30-plus years of practice.

The American College of Osteopathic Family Physicians (ACOFP) honored him as its 2019 Osteopathic Family Physician of the Year at its 56th annual convention and scientific seminars in Chicago.

De Regnier epitomizes the concept of physician as leader, servant and educator.

He is a Distinguished Fellow of the ACOFP, which he served as president in 2015-2016 and as a member and chair of numerous ACOFP committees throughout his career.

In 2017, he was elected speaker of the house of the Iowa Osteopathic Medical Association (IOMA), which named him its Physician of the Year in 2000.

Certified by the National Board of Examiners for Osteopathic Physicians, de Regnier has stayed involved with DMU over the years as an adjunct faculty member in family medicine and as a preceptor for students in his practice. He also has been appointed to state entities on health policy and related areas, including the Iowa Medical Home Advisory Council, Iowa Health Systems and Plans Committee of the Iowa Health Regulation Task Force and the Data Committee of the Community Health Management Information System.

In addition to his practice and professional leadership, de Regnier supports his community by helping with causes such as suicide prevention, hospice care, first responders support, the Drug Abuse Resistance Education (DARE) program and more. Here, he shares his motivations for serving patients and his profession.

What has motivated you to serve in member and leadership roles for professional organizations on top of your very busy practice?

I fell into my first leadership role when I was invited to fill an unexpired term on the IOMA board. I quickly found that I really enjoyed having the opportunity to support my fellow physicians in their practices, having a hand in directing the future of the profession and ensuring that patients were able to access osteopathic medical care.

Why is such physician engagement important?

Whether it’s advocating for our patients or for our profession, nobody knows the issues better than the one who is doing the work. Physicians are in a unique position to speak for those who can’t speak for themselves to ensure patients receive highquality, cost-effective care. There are many voices out there advocating their own agenda. If we fail to speak up, it is our patients and our profession that suffer.

What benefits do you glean from activities outside your practice?

The biggest reward I have received from my involvement in osteopathic medical organizations, in my community and in working with students is that these activities have made me a better physician. Knowing the latest payment trends, influencing the direction of medical practice or answering the “Why did you treat that patient the way you did?” all help me to provide the most up-to-date care to my patients. The personal reward is hard to overstate. Meeting so many great people from all over the country in all different specialties has been a true blessing.

What would you say to other physicians and medical students to encourage them to get involved in professional organizations?

I remember my very first day at DMU. Norm Rose, D.O.’63, FACOS, a member of the board and a well-known osteopathic surgeon, stood at the podium and surveyed the 220 fresh-faced students of my class. Slowly, he leaned into the microphone and said, “Relax, you made it. You’re here, and we’re going to make sure you succeed.” Then he pointed to the parking lot and said, “I’ve got a very nice Lincoln out there. If you take care of this profession, it will take care of you.” That has stuck with me. I have always felt an obligation to “take care of the profession”; it has certainly taken care of me.

Is there any one (or two) professional activities that have been most meaningful and/or enjoyable to you? If so, which one/s and why?

Without question, having the honor of being ACOFP president will stand out as the highlight of my career. It gave me the opportunity to travel across the country and visit many of our colleges and visit with the students. I met so many wonderful docs as I traveled and learned about all the things different physicians and organizations are doing to advance patient care and our profession. I also enjoy being involved in my community. I have been a member of our county board of health for 30 years. Being able to improve the health of a whole community is very rewarding.

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alumni alumniNEWS Satterfield named podiatric dean at WesternU

V

. Kathleen Satterfield, D.P.M.’91, FACFAOM, MAPWCA, has had many accomplishments in her career as well as at least two failures: She’s twice failed at retirement.

She had planned to retire this spring as associate dean of the College of Podiatric Medicine (CPM) at Western University of Health Sciences in Pomona, CA, when university leaders asked her to step up to the deanship of the college. The primary reason she agreed to do so: CPM students.

“I consider it a real privilege to work with them,” she says. “My husband and I were never blessed with children, but I feel as though I’ve had hundreds.”

Another reason: CPM is moving toward having its students earn the physicians and surgeons certificate that’s granted in California. Toward that end, the college has undertaken a multi-year process with the American Podiatric Medical Association in which its students will take the comprehensive basic science examination to test their readiness to sit for the U.S. Medical Licensing Examination steps 1, 2 and 3.

“Once we prove our students are passing the same tests that their D.O. and M.D. colleagues do with success, we have a good argument that we have reached parity,” she says. “I want to leave the profession better than it is, and I think it’s pretty wonderful now.”

So wonderful, in fact, that Satterfield gave up her first career as an investigative journalist for the El Paso (TX) Times to pursue podiatric medicine. As a reporter, she met a group of podiatrists who specialized in diabetic limb salvage and wound care. Intrigued, she attended night school to complete her prerequisites for podiatric school. When she interviewed at the College of Podiatric Medicine and Surgery (CPMS) at the University of Osteopathic Medicine and Health Sciences, now DMU, she met the college’s then-dean, Leonard Levy, D.P.M. “I really liked his vision,” she says. “We were in the former chapel, which had bats that would fly across the classroom. But I made the best friends of my life there. They’re my ‘2 a.m. friends’ – the ones I could call at 2 a.m. if I needed help.”

After practicing in Vermont, Satterfield was recruited by CPMS to join the faculty and later served as associate dean for academic affairs. Eventually, she was recruited by Lawrence Harkless, D.P.M., to join the orthopedic department/podiatry service at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio. The two had met at a meeting of the American Podiatric Medical Students’ Association (APMSA) when Satterfield was a CPMS student and her class’s APMSA representative.

The 2019 Des Moines University Alumni of the Year have made impressive contributions to patients, their professions and the world of scientific knowledge.

V. Kathleen Satterfield, D.P.M.’91, FACFAOM, MAPWCA

“Dr. Harkless has just figured so significantly in my career,” she says. “In Texas, I worked with patients with diabetes, which gave me the opportunity to specialize.

Pretty soon I was lecturing around the world – in London, Cairo, Paris – on the use of different technologies to provide wound care.”

Harkless left Texas to become founding dean of CPM at WesternU. He again recruited Satterfield – her second retirement “failure” – to consult the college on curriculum design.

She went on to join the faculty, rising to associate professor and associate dean.

“There’s something about me and retirement that doesn’t work,” she says.

Satterfield is grateful for her profession, this new phase in her career and for her own medical alma mater.

“I wouldn’t be where I am today were it not for CPMS and Dean [R. Tim] Yoho,” she says.

“ I want to leave the profession better than it is, and I think it’s pretty wonderful now.”

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Kudos

Alumni of the Year honorees are nominated for the University’s three colleges – Health Sciences, Osteopathic Medicine and Podiatric Medicine and Surgery – and selected by the DMU Alumni Association Board of Directors and past Alumni of the Year award winners.

Recipients of this distinctive honor must be a member in good standing of their respective professional state or national organization and the DMU Alumni Association. These individuals demonstrate excellent service to DMU, its students and their professions.

alumniNEWS

to the 2019 Alumni of the Year COLLEGE OF OSTEOPATHIC MEDICINE

Kenneth Anderson Jr., D.O.’78, M.S., CPE

Kenneth Anderson has been a nephrology and transplant physician, health organization leader, medical educator and, from Oct. 15 to June 28, 2019, interim dean of DMU’s College of Osteopathic Medicine.

Anderson was a transplant physician and administrator with Mercy Hospital Medical Center from 1986 to 1996. He later joined NorthShore University HealthSystem in Evanston, IL, where he served as chief medical quality officer and co-director of its Center for Clinical and Research Informatics. He was curriculum director of its Quality Fellowship Program as well as a clinical assistant professor at the Pritzker School of Medicine, University of Chicago.

As chief operating officer, acting president and CEO of the American Hospital Association’s Health Research and Educational Trust from 2014 to 2017, Anderson had an impact on hundreds of thousands of lives through the association’s nearly 5,000 member hospitals, health care systems, networks and other providers.

Anderson has held numerous professional appointments, including with the Global Scientific Committee of the International Hospital Federation, Geneva, Switzerland; the Coalition for Quality in Geriatric Surgery, the American College of Surgeons; and the National Colorectal Cancer Roundtable Advisory Council. He also served as a Baldrige Award senior alumni examiner for the Baldrige National Quality Program.

Anderson is an active lecturer and widely published author on topics ranging from innovation in health care quality and population health improvement to patient safety, communitydriven health care reform and health insurance.

In his 2018 book, Saving the Heart of American Health Care: How Patients and Their Doctors Can Mend a Broken System, he explores the factors that have eroded the doctor-patient relationship and proposes ways it can be restored.

A certified physician executive, Anderson earned a master’s degree in administrative medicine at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a certificate in health policy and management from the Harvard University School of Public Health. He completed an internship and was chief resident in family practice at Iowa Lutheran Hospital in Des Moines as well as chief resident in internal medicine at Yale University-Norwalk Hospital. He completed his clinical training in nephrology at the University of Southern California-Los Angeles County Hospital.

COLLEGE OF PODIATRIC MEDICINE AND SURGERY

Erik Eglite, D.P.M.’91, J.D., M.B.A., M.Sc.

Erik Eglite is a life sciences/pharmaceutical executive officer, podiatric physician/surgeon and attorney with extensive management and business experiences. He is senior vice president, general counsel and chief compliance officer of Aurinia Pharmaceuticals, a company focused on developing therapies in disease areas of high unmet medical need. Prior to joining Aurinia in 2017, he was vice president, corporate counsel and chief compliance officer for Marathon Pharmaceuticals in Northbrook, IL; prior to that, he held those titles at Lundbeck Pharmaceuticals in Deerfield, IL. He also has served as vice president, chief compliance officer and corporate counsel for Ovation Pharmaceuticals and global chief compliance officer and corporate counsel for Aspreva Pharmaceuticals.

A licensed podiatric physician and nationally recognized expert on pharmaceutical law, Eglite has been involved with the clinical development, launch and commercialization of 14 drugs and drug programs. Before entering the pharmaceutical industry, he worked as assistant general counsel for the Department of Human Services and as an attorney practicing in medical malpractice, product liability, defense litigation, intellectual property and patent law for Querry & Harrow in Chicago.

Eglite has an M.B.A. from the University of Notre Dame and a law degree from Loyola University of Chicago. He also has a B.S. in biology and a B.A. in history from Loyola University of Chicago. He completed his residency training at Michigan Health Medical Center Hospital. He also completed medical/surgical externships at the University of Chicago, department of surgery, division of vascular surgery, Great Lakes Naval Hospital department of podiatric surgery and Northwestern University Columbus Cabrini Hospital, department of orthopedic/podiatric surgery. He has a graduate certificate in pharmaceutical and medical device law from Seton Hall School of Law, an executive certificate in corporate governance from Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management and an executive certificate in business administration from the University of Notre Dame. Currently, he is completing a master of science degree in clinical research regulatory compliance at Northwestern University.

COLLEGE OF HEALTH SCIENCES

Gayle Breutzman, PA-C’86

Gayle Breutzman has served DMU, its physician assistant students, her profession and her country through her career with the Minneapolis Veterans Administration Medical Center (VAMC). In addition to treating patients, she served as coordinator of physician assistant students, in which she coordinated rotations at the center and taught students who were on rotation in cardiothoracic surgery.

Breutzman began teaching and coordinating physician assistant students on rotation, including from DMU, in 1995. In addition, at the VAMC she developed connections that enabled DMU students to obtain important and difficult-to-find rotations in areas such as general surgery and emergency medicine.

Breutzman received a nursing assistant certificate at the Rochester Area VocationalTechnical Institute before earning her bachelor’s degree in biology and chemistry at the University of Minnesota. After graduating from DMU, she completed the didactic portion of the surgical physician assistant residency at Montefiore Medical Center in Bronx, NY. She remained in the Bronx to work at St. Barnabus Hospital, where she covered all of the hospital’s surgical services.

She went on to practice cardiovascular surgery at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN. She then completed her career at the Minneapolis VAMC as a physician assistant in cardiothoracic surgery.

In 2009 Breutzman was honored with two awards, the Civil Servant of the Year Award and an award as Outstanding Civil Servant of the Year in Leadership.

Want to nominate a DMU grad – including yourself – for a 2020 Alumni of the Year honor?

Find the form at www.dmu.edu/ alumni/alumni-of-the-year/ alumni-year-nominations.

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CLASS notes 1963

Norman Rose, D.O., FACOS, FICS, will receive the 2019 Guy D. Beaumont Jr., FACOS, Award for Academic Excellence at this year’s annual clinical assembly of the American College of Osteopathic Surgeons (ACOS) Oct. 19-23 in Colorado Springs, CO. The award is bestowed upon an individual who has demonstrated outstanding organizational leadership and excellence in improving the quality of osteopathic surgical education in accredited surgical training programs and/or continuing medical education programs of the American Osteopathic Association (AOA) and the ACOS. Rose is clinical professor of surgery at Nova Southeastern University College of Osteopathic Medicine; academic director of the general surgery residency at Larkin Community Hospital; clinical professor in the department of biomedical sciences at Larkin University; and an adjunct professor of specialty medicine at DMU. Past president of the ACOS, he has also been a leader and volunteer in the AOA, the AOA Commission on Osteopathic College Accreditation, the American Cancer Society and the Journal of the AOA. The AOA recognized his service to the profession by naming him a “Guardian of the Profession.”

1964

Charles Pigneri, D.O., retired on June 30 after a 53year career in family practice in Oakland, IA. Very active in the community, he served as the medical director for Oakland Manor Nursing Home and Avoca Nursing and Rehab in addition to his role as associate adviser

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for AseraCare Hospice. He donated to the Alegent Creighton Clinic in Oakland for a new physical therapy department; chaired the Oakland Pool renovation capital campaign; and was team physician for nearby Riverside Community Schools’ sports teams. The Riverside Event Complex was dedicated in his honor.

He has received awards from the Alegent Creighton Health Mercy Hospital, the Iowa High School Athletic Association, the Oakland Fire Department and the Riverside Sports Association, to name a few.

1973

Dale Andres, D.O., this spring accepted an appointment to serve as U.S. Army Reserve ambassador to Iowa. The Reserve operates 22 facilities in Iowa with 169 units and detachments and more than 2,100 soldiers utilizing the facilities. Andres is a former brigadier general and the former chief pathologist and chief medical officer at Mercy Medical Center in Des Moines.

1974

David L. Wolf, D.O., M.S.W., FACOOG (dist.), received the 2019 Gold Humanism in Medicine Award from the American College of Osteopathic Obstetricians and Gynecologists. He is the associate director of the obstetrics and gynecology residency program at Henry Ford Wyandotte Hospital in Wyandotte, MI, and a volunteer physician for the hospital’s free medical clinic for the working uninsured.

He had served as program director for more than 20 years and was in private practice from 1979 to 2010.

Tell us about yourself! We’ll post news of marriages, births, career changes, retirements and other achievements. Either fill out the attached card or e-mail Class Note information to alumni@dmu.edu.

Wolf is clinical professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Michigan State University College of Osteopathic Medicine; clinical associate professor at A.T. Still University Kirksville College of Osteopathic Medicine; and assistant professor at Ohio University Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine.

He also is founder and chair of the Center for Women’s and Children’s Health, serves on the board of trustees of the Detroit Medical Center’s Rehabilitation Institute of Michigan, and is a physician volunteer at the Downriver Community Clinic, which provides free primary care and nutrition and weight-loss services to uninsured and underinsured working women. After a 2001 go-kart accident almost killed him and left him paralyzed from the waist down, Wolf authored Hope – the Gift is You, an inspirational book about faith, hope and resilience.

He is past president of the American College of Osteopathic Obstetricians and Gynecologists and an emeritus member of the American Osteopathic Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology. He and his wife, Anita, reside in Trenton, MI, and have two children and six grandchildren.

1975

Thomas Cavalieri, D.O., MACOI, FACP, in June was awarded the 2019 Santucci Award by the National Board of Osteopathic Medical Examiners in recognition of his sustained outstanding contributions to the board’s mission of protecting the public by providing the means to assess competencies for osteopathic medicine and related health care professions. First recruited by the NBOME in the late

1980s as an exam item writer, Cavalieri became board president in 2001 and board chair in 2002 when the NBOME first hired a full-time physician president and CEO. During this time, he oversaw the launch of the COMLEXUSA Level 2-Performance Evaluation. He also has led various NBOME committees.

Immediate past chair of the American Association of Colleges of Osteopathic Medicine, Cavalieri is dean of the Rowan University School of Osteopathic Medicine in Stratford, NJ. James G. Kantor, D.O., FAAP, is a pediatrician who serves patients at Tri-County Pediatrics in Bucks, Montgomery and Philadelphia counties in Pennsylvania. He is also affiliated with Abington Hospital-Jefferson Health in Abington, PA. Board-certified by the American Osteopathic Board of Pediatrics (AOBP) and a Fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics, he has a special interest in training future health care providers. He has mentored more than 2,000 medical, nurse practitioner and physician assistant students in his career and has won several awards for teaching. Kantor completed his pediatric residency at Botsford Hospital in Farmington Hills, MI.

surgery at McLaren Port Huron Hospital, and past president of the Michigan Hand Surgery Association, Michigan Osteopathic Academy of Orthopedics and American Osteopathic Academy of Orthopedics.

Heithoff is board-certified by the American Osteopathic Board of Orthopedic Surgery with subspecialty certification in hand surgery.

Alan Netzman, D.O., specializes in general surgery, hyperbaric medicine and oxygen therapy in Marathon, FL. He is affiliated with Fishermen’s Community Hospital and Mariners Hospital.

1983

Kenneth Adams, D.O., was elected to the Board of Governors of the American College of Gastroenterology. Boardcertified in gastroenterology and internal medicine, he is a gastroenterologist with UnityPoint in Fort Dodge, IA.

Gary Stuck, D.O., FAAFP, is chief medical officer for Advocate Aurora Health, the 10th largest nonprofit integrated health system in the U.S. With more than 8,100 physicians on staff and 27 hospitals, Advocate Aurora Health was formed when Advocate Health Care and Aurora Health Care merged in 2018. Stuck is also chief executive officer for Advocate Physician Partners Steven Heithoff, D.O., and its clinically integrated FAOAO, on Jan. 1, 2019, network, which includes began a three-year term on 5,000 physicians. A family the American Osteopathic medicine physician for 32 Foundation Board of Directors. He is an orthopedic years, he most recently hand surgeon at Orthopedic served as president of Lawn Medical Center, a primary Associates of Port Huron, care physician group in Oak MI, which he joined in Lawn, IL. He is a founding 1988. He is past chair of member of the Advocate the American Osteopathic Board of Orthopedic Surgery, Physician Partners Board of Directors, which he served past section chief of the as chair for 13 years. He also department of orthopedic

1980

CLASS notes

held the role of president of the Advocate Christ Medical Center physicianhospital organization for 22 years and was a member of its governing council for more than two decades.

Additionally, he provided clinical insight as a member of the Advocate Health Care Board of Directors for six years. In 2014, Stuck was recognized by the Illinois Academy of Family Physicians as the Illinois Family Physician of the Year. A Fellow of the American Academy of Family Physicians, he completed his family medicine residency at Rush-Presbyterian-St. Luke’s Medical Center in Chicago.

1986

Scott Steingard, D.O., became chair of the Federation of State Medical Boards (FSMB), the national nonprofit organization representing all 70 medical boards within the United States and its territories that license and discipline osteopathic and allopathic physicians. He recently chaired an FSMB workgroup to study regenerative and stem cell therapy and also served on a workgroup on physician wellness and burnout, which developed influential policy recommendations on the epidemic of physician burnout. Steingard was a longtime member of the Arizona Board of Osteopathic Medical Examiners in Medicine and Surgery, including serving as that board’s president from 2009 to 2016. He also was the longtime medical coordinator for the Fiesta Bowl and was team physician for various high school, college and professional organizations.

Karen Randall, D.O., was featured three times in 2019 on “Spotlight,” a podcast

1987 alumnus receives AAO top honor “Nobody knew anything about obert Orenstein, D.O.’87, this disease. My partner and I beis a professor of medicine at came the experts,” he says. “It drove the Mayo Clinic College of Mediyou to become a clinical educator cine and Science in Phoenix, and and passionate care giver. The ‘90s he chairs the division of infectious were a big time for clinical trials for diseases at Mayo Clinic Arizona. the management of HIV. All of us He has been editor-in-chief of the became clinical trial managers and Journal of the American Osteopathic developed mechanisms for treating Association since January 2013 and patients, especially those in the is a reviewer for a number of other inner city who didn’t have access to medical journals and publications in university-based trial groups.” his area of expertise. He’s been on Orenstein says treating those the forefront in research on infecpatients and, sadly, attending their tious disease. But among all those funerals grounded him. hats, one stands tallest.

“As an osteopathic physician who tions,” he says. “One of the ways to “I am a clinician. I do research bethinks about the whole patient, remain resilient in medicine is to cause it helps my patients,” he says. that disease and its psychological change with the times. That led me “That’s the source of my energy.” and social aspects train one well as to the next thing, the big epidemic For all the hats he wears, in 2019 a humanistic physician. I used to of the bacteria clostridium difficile.

Orenstein was honored by the have more patients in hospice than We did one of the first studies in a American Academy of Osteopathy the oncologists,” he says. “I got to hospital setting that showed you (AAO) with the highest award it beknow people from very different could reduce the bacteria by wiping stows on a non-member. The award backgrounds. It opened my eyes to surfaces with bleach twice a day.” recognizes individuals who have have compassion toward people In 2010 Orenstein joined the Mayo demonstrated their commitment who lived in poverty.”

Clinic in Arizona, where he continues to osteopathic principles and to the He served for a decade as the to see complex inpatient and outpaosteopathic profession; exhibited director of the HIV/AIDS program at tient cases of infectious diseases. He outstanding efforts and special Hunter Holmes McGuire Veterans was appointed chair contributions to promote for infectious diseases osteopathy; continuously “ One of the ways to remain resilient in in 2012 and chair of the shown support of and colmedicine is to change with the times.”

Mayo Clinic Enterprise laboration with osteopathic Infectious Diseases organizations; and have a Specialty Council in 2017. A Fellow of vision that is complementary to the Medical Center and as medical direcboth the Infectious Diseases Society academy’s mission. tor of the Virginia Commonwealth of America and the American ColHe was honored as the 18th University HIV/AIDS clinic before lege of Physicians, he has lectured recipient of the award at the AAO’s moving to the Mayo Clinic in Rochextensively on topics of infectious annual business meeting in March. ester, MN, in 2002. He served there diseases and has won several awards Orenstein started his medical as the internal medicine residency for undergraduate, graduate and career in rural practice but realized coordinator for infectious diseases continuing medical education that wasn’t his calling. Instead, he and practiced inpatient and outpateaching at Mayo. Through it all, he’s followed the lead of “outstanding tient medicine as a member of both enjoyed his specialty through the role models” in infectious disthe divisions of infectious diseases lens of osteopathic medicine. ease whom he worked with in an and general internal medicine. His “Infectious disease, to me, is one internship at Botsford Hospital in focus moved from HIV to the preof the most exciting specialties to be Farmington Hills, MI. There and in vention of hospital infections. in. The field has evolved so much,” his residency in internal medicine at “That area took off nationally. he says. “I went into it because I love Geisinger Medical Center in central There were incentives to undertake the detective stuff, the epidemiolPennsylvania, he witnessed the early initiatives to reduce hospital infecogy.” days of the AIDS epidemic.

R

of the nonprofit lobbying organization Illinois Family Action, as a marijuana expert in her field to discuss why Illinois should slow down on marijuana legalization and her personal experience and observations. An emergency medicine physician in Pueblo, CO, affiliated with

Parkview Medical Center, Randall trained in emergency medicine, pediatrics and family practice and holds a certificate in cannabis science and medicine from the University of Vermont.

1988

Thomas Haas, D.O., joined North Shore Pathology in Milwaukee on March 18, 2019. He works as a staff pathologist with St. Francis Hospital.

Christopher Unrein, D.O., FACOI, FACP, CMD, was recognized as a leader in osteopathic medical education at the annual conference of the American Association of Colleges of Osteopathic Medicine (AACOM) held April 10-12 in CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE SUMMER/FALL 2019

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CLASS notes

Alumni among IOMA officers and honorees

E

LECTIONS WERE HELD THIS SPRING for trustees to the board of the Iowa Osteopathic Medical Association (IOMA). DMU graduates serving as trustees include Dustin Arnold, D.O.’96, who was re-elected for a two-year term. He practices with UnityPoint Clinic Hospitalists in Cedar Rapids. Randall Messerly, D.O.’81, who operates Messerly Surgical Care in Manchester, was elected to a one-year term. Elected to a two-year term was Kaaren Olesen, D.O.’97, M.S., owner of Women’s Care Clinic PLC in Urbandale, assistant professor of specialty medicine at DMU and immediate past president of the Polk County Medical Society. Noreen O’Shea, D.O.’84, assistant professor of behavioral medicine, medical humanities and ethics at DMU and a family physician in Des Moines, was reelected for a two-year term.

Also elected to the position of speaker of the House was Kevin de Regnier, D.O.’85, FACOFP, dist., president of Madison County Medical Associates in Winterset. In March, the American College of Osteopathic Family Physicians (ACOFP) named de Regnier its 2019 Osteopathic Family Physician of the Year (see article on page 33).

Other alumni representatives on the IOMA board who were not up for election this year are Brian Meeker, D.O.’84, trustee, with the Vinton Family Medical Clinic; and Dan Arnold, D.O.’99, immediate past president, with UnityPoint Express Care in Rock Island.

Four alumni were granted life membership in the association, given to regular or honorary members who have reached the age of 70 and have been IOMA members in good standing for 25 years immediately preceding. These members retain all membership benefits.

• Don Anderson, D.O.’75, was a general surgeon in Des Moines for many years. Upon retirement from surgery, he continued doing consulting. He joined IOMA in 1997.

• Mark Bickley, D.O.’80, is a family physician who practices at Covenant Medical Center in Waterloo.

He joined IOMA in 1981.

• David Friedgood, D.O.’76, practices at Mercy Ruan Neurology Clinic and Research Center in Des Moines.

He is board-certified in neurology by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology. He joined IOMA in 1980.

• Linda Robinson, D.O.’80, practices family medicine in Carlisle until her recent retirement to Florida. She joined IOMA in 1982.

IOMA officers and trustees selected Greg Cohen, D.O.’91, FACOFP, dist., as the 2019 Physician of the Year. The award is given to a member who has exhibited a notable commitment to his or her profession, patients and colleagues. Cohen completed his rotating internship and family medicine residency at Long Beach Memorial Hospital in Long Beach, NY. He is board-certified by the American Osteopathic Board of Family Physicians and is a Fellow with distinction of the American College of Osteopathic Family Physicians.

In a nomination for the award, one of Cohen’s colleagues wrote, “He practices osteopathic medicine as it was meant to be practiced every day. He is a genuine advocate for his profession. He cares deeply for his patients and works tirelessly for this profession at the local and national levels.”

Founded in 1898 and headquartered in Des Moines, IOMA represents the more than 1,000 osteopathic physicians practicing in Iowa.

CONT’D FROM PREVIOUS PAGE

Washington, DC. He received the Assembly of Osteopathic Graduate Medical Educators (AOGME) Collegium of Fellows Award for his long and meritorious service to the osteopathic profession and AOGME. Unrein is the chief academic officer at the Rocky Mountain Osteopathic Postdoctoral Training Institution and professor of internal medicine at the medical colleges of Rocky Vista University and the University of Colorado. He also is a team physician leader at the Denver Hospice.

His many leadership roles in organized medicine include past president of the Colorado Medical Society,

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the Colorado Society of Osteopathic Medicine and the Colorado Society of Internal Medicine. He continues to be involved in groups engaged in several medical research efforts.

1989

Brigadier General Marco Coppola, D.O.’89, FACEP, commander, Texas State Guard Medical Brigade, Texas State Guard, received a promotion during a ceremony held at Camp Mabry, Austin, TX, on March 23, 2019. Following his promotion, he assumed command of the Texas Medical Brigade. Coppola

began his military career as an ROTC cadet at La Salle University in Philadelphia.

After graduating from DMU, he served as chief resident and graduated from his emergency medicine residency at Carl R. Darnall Army Medical Center, Fort Hood Army Base, in Texas.

After serving as the research director and emergency medicine residency program director at Darnall, he left active duty and transitioned into the Texas Army National Guard in 1998. During his federal service, he served in Operation Iraqi Freedom at Camp Bucca and was the longest running commander (47 months) of the Texas Medical Command, Texas

Army National Guard. He retired from federal service as a colonel in 2011 and transitioned into the Texas State Guard. Coppola holds the Surgeon General’s “A” Proficiency Designation in Emergency Medicine and is a member of the Order of Military Medical Merit.

His numerous decorations include the Legion of Merit, the Meritorious Service Award, six Army Commendation medals and the Texas Lone Star Distinguished Service Medal.

Jesse Plasencia, D.P.M., has been a board-certified podiatric physician with VNA Health Care in Aurora and Elgin, IL, since 2013.

VNA Health Care operates 10 clinics in suburban Chicago and serves more than 72,000 patients. In 2018 the VNA Board of Directors presented him with the Helen A. Cearlock Award of Merit, VNA’s highest level of employee recognition, for exemplifying spirit, loyalty, truth, high standards, a love for learning and a commitment to the purpose of the organization.

Award recipients are nominated by their peers.

1990

John Christiansen, M.S.P.T., OCS, ATC, is owner of the ARC Physical Therapy Clinics in Westmont and Orland Park, IL. He is a licensed physical therapist and athletic trainer in Illinois and a clinical specialist in orthopedic physical therapy certified by the American Board of Physical Therapy Specialists.

Peter Cohen, D.O., joined Jaffrey Family Medicine and Monadnock Community Hospital in Jaffrey, NH. He completed his residency at Good Samaritan Hospital and Medical Center in Portland, OR. Board-certified in family medicine, Cohen previously was a primary care physician at Glenwood Medical Associates in Glenwood, CO.

1991

Brent Peterson, D.O., joined Washington Regional’s Northwest Arkansas Neuroscience Institute in Fayetteville.

He has more than 20 years of experience as a neurosurgeon, most recently at Mosaic Life Care health system in St. Joseph, MO. Peterson completed a general medicine internship and neurological surgery residency at Garden City Osteopathic Hospital in Garden City, MI. He is boardcertified in neurological surgery by the American Osteopathic Board of

CLASS notes Surgery and is a member of the American Osteopathic Association, American College of Osteopathic Surgeons and Congress of Neurological Surgeons.

1992

Bart Barber, D.O., is a physician with Wing Medical in Fort Payne, AL. He did his residency at the Medical College of Georgia in Augusta. Barber and his wife, Ellen, maintain a blackberry farm, which is also home to goats, chickens and Haflinger draft horses. He also is a longtime aviator who enjoys flying private aircraft.

Pamela Harrison Chambers, BSPA, M.H.A.’01, DFAAPA, joined Skin Iowa PC in West Des Moines, IA, as a health and wellness specialist.

A member of the DMU physician assistant faculty since 1994, she became associate professor emerita after retiring in July, 2018.

She also continues to serve as a member of the DMU Alumni Board of Directors.

Kevin Klauer, D.O.’92, EJD, FACEP, this spring became chief executive officer of the American Osteopathic Association (AOA). The first osteopathic physician to lead AOA operations since 1981, he has primary responsibility for strategy, operating results, continued organizational growth and advocacy for the osteopathic profession. Klauer joined the AOA from TeamHealth, a leading clinician services organization, where he most recently served as chief medical officer for hospital-based services, chief risk officer and executive director for the patient safety organization. He also is an assistant clinical professor at Michigan State University College of Osteopathic Medicine and a clinical assistant professor at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center

Graduate’s invention saved lives worldwide

S

used in cricothyrotomy, an emergency procedure for airway ol Weiss, B.S.Ph., D.O.’59, was a family medicine obstruction that cannot be treated by oral or nasal intubaphysician who sometimes covered the emergency tion. The incision for the airway is placed through the cricoroom at a time when “few physicians wanted to get near thyroid membrane instead of through the trachea itself. On one.” He was particularly troubled by the possibility of Oct. 1, 1971, he gave a presentation on the procedure at a having to perform an emergency tracheotomy on someone national emergency medical conference in Dallas. with a blocked airway, given the risks of the procedure.

“I thought I would be presenting to 15 doctors, but I had “It was a horrendous procedure, very bloody,” he says. “If to present in an auditorium. The place was packed – people the doctors in the ER didn’t want to do a tracheotomy, they were lining the walls,” he says. “After my presentation, the had to get a surgeon, but often by the time the surgeon got whole slew came up to talk to me.” there, the patient was dead.”

Weiss worked diligently through the arduous process He recalls staffing the emergency room in a Canoga of obtaining FDA approval. An attorney friend helped him Park, CA, hospital when a boy was rushed in, choking on acquire patents. By 1980, Nu-Trake a bite-size chunk of hot dog. was ready for market; a few years Weiss decided a tracheotomy later, he created “Pedia-Trake,” was needed, but he was wora similar device to be used on ried about his ability to do the Troubled by the risks of children. The instruments went procedure. Done improperly, it worldwide. A group of doctors in could kill or permanently injure performing a tracheotomy on Munchen, Germany, even made a patient. Fortunately, just as he a video about it that showed a was about to make the incision, a patient, Sol Weiss decided physician using Nu-Trake to restore the boy coughed up the food. a patient’s breathing in just nine Shaken, Weiss knew he had to to do something about it. seconds. take action.

“Everyone who was using my de“I had to do something about vice loved it. Word got out,” he says. the situation because I’m not a Now 89 and retired in Los Angeles, Weiss went on to trained surgeon. I had to change the scene,” he says. invent 17 medically related devices, including a pocket-sized He began researching medical literature and sketchtool to keep doctors from exposing themselves to the AIDS ing ideas. He found a designer and a tooling specialist to virus when treating patients with traumatic injuries. Even produce a prototype. After the instrument was tested on though the patents on Nu-Trake and Pedia-Trake expired animals, a neurosurgeon friend agreed to try it on patients. years ago, he treasures their impact.

“He was always getting called in on emergencies. He “Today I can be proud of my work, because of all the wound up having four cases in which he used my instruchildren and adults [needing tracheotomies] who might ment,” Weiss says. “We had the instrument, we had testing have died otherwise,” he says. “The previous procedure by a valid neurosurgeon who faced these emergencies and was so clumsy, and people were dying from it. It was a real we had good results.” dilemma, and I got it solved.”

He called the device “Nu-Trake.” It was designed to be

College of Medicine. He is board-certified in emergency medicine and holds an executive juris doctorate from Concord Law School. He is a member of the American College of Emergency Physicians board of directors, where he is also medical editor in chief for ACEP Now. Kelly Reed, D.O., a family medicine physician with the Iowa Clinic in Urbandale, IA, was featured as the cover story of the Nov. 23

Des Moines-based Business Record. The story, about the use of telemedicine, featured her for overseeing a team of three Iowa Clinic physicians who currently provide telemedicine care through its eClinic platform.

1993

George Anadiotis, D.O., was among the authors who in January 2019 had published an

article titled “GGC repeat expansion and exon 1 methylation of XYLT1 is a common pathogenic variant of Baratela-Scott syndrome” in the American Journal of Human Genetics.

One of fewer than a handful of D.O.s in this field, Anadiotis is medical director of clinical and biochemical genetics at Randall Children’s Hospital in Portland, OR.

1994

Laurie Ballew, D.O., is a psychiatrist and addiction medicine physician who serves patients at Holistic Psychiatry and Healthcare in Paducah, KY. A Distinguished Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association, she is boardcertified in both psychiatry and psychosomatic medicine by the American Board of Psychiatry and CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE SUMMER/FALL 2019

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CLASS notes CONT’D FROM PREVIOUS PAGE

Neurology. She specializes in several areas of medicine, including geriatrics and psychosomatic medicine, and provides her services mainly to adults dealing with mental health issues.

Gordon Crozier, D.O., is medical director of the Excellent Living Medical Center in Lake Mary, FL, and an expert in integrative and genetics-based medicine. He is the author of Healing One Cell at a Time: Unlock Your Genetic Imprint to Prevent Disease and Live Healthy, which describes the illness he experienced through much of his life and how he recovered his health.

John “Jack” Devine, D.O., FACP, earned the certified physician executive (CPE) designation from the American Association for Physician Leadership, indicating he has the necessary leadership, management and communication skills required to effectively create change and effectively improve quality and efficiency of a health care organization. Devine has been vice president of medical affairs at Evangelical Community Hospital in Lewisburg, PA, since 2016. In that role he is responsible for coordinating medical staff resources and activities with a focus on quality and patient safety initiatives. Certified by the American Board of Internal Medicine, he is a Fellow of the American College of Physicians and an associate of the American College of Physician Executives.

John Dowd, D.O., joined Concord Gastroenterology Associates in Concord, MA. He is board-certified in gastroenterology. His clinical interests include esophageal disorders, inflammatory bowel disease, colorectal cancer screening and prevention, biliary

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C ALENDAR OF ALUMNI EVENTS OCT. 16

OCT. 31

Glanton Dinner – reception, 5:30 p.m.; dinner, 6:30 p.m.; Meadows Event and Conference Center, Altoona, IA (see article on page 45)

Alumni reception in conjunction with the American College of Osteopathic Internists’ annual convention, JW Marriott Desert Ridge Resort, Phoenix, 5:30-7:30 p.m.

OCT. 27, 2019 Alumni reception in conjunction with the American Osteopathic Association’s OMED event, Hyatt RegencyBaltimore, Inner Harbor, 6:30-8:30 p.m.

MAY 20-22, 2020 DMU Alumni Reunion honoring the classes of 1995, 1980, 1970 and earlier years, DMU campus and Des Moines (visit www.dmu.edu/reunion for more information)

David Yablonsky, D.O., joined Marshall Browning Hospital in Du Quoin, IL, to see patients in its two rural health clinics. A board-certified internist, he focuses on disease Melody Byram, D.O., is a prevention and health pediatric hospitalist who cares for seriously ill pediatric optimization. He completed patients at North Mississippi a three-year residency in internal medicine at the Medical Center (NMMC) University of Rochester in Tupelo. She acts as a School of Medicine in direct liaison with NMMC’s Rochester, NY. He has emergency department been a clinic physician at and Batson Children’s Southern Illinois University at Hospital at the University of Edwardsville and has owned Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson. Byram previously and operated non-invasive cardiovascular diagnostic practiced at Anderson labs. Yablonsky also is an Regional Medical Center expert in the business and and Anderson Children’s clinical aspects of Medicare Medical Clinic in Meridian, Advantage and sits on the MS, and with Pioneer board of the Southern Illinois Health Services in Newton, Healthcare Association.

Rush Health Systems in Union and East Central Mississippi Healthcare Inc. in Sebastopol.

and pancreatic disorders and clinical nutrition.

1996

2000

1998

Travis Venner, D.P.M., M.S.-HCA’97, joined the podiatry department at the Essentia Health-Duluth Clinic in Duluth, MN. He also cares for patients at Essentia Health’s clinics in Virginia and Grand Rapids.

Venner is certified by the American Board of Foot and Ankle Surgery in Podiatry.

Scott Nelson, D.P.M., FACFAS, on Feb. 15 took office as president-elect of the 7,600-member American College of Foot and Ankle Surgeons (ACFAS) during the college’s 77th annual scientific conference in New Orleans. He is a foot and ankle surgeon with Catholic Health Initiative Orthopedics Foot and Ankle in the greater Omaha, NE, area. He is board-certified in both foot

surgery and reconstructive rearfoot and ankle surgery by the American Board of Foot and Ankle Surgery and is a Fellow of the American College of Foot and Ankle Surgeons. Nelson completed residencies at the Western Pennsylvania Hospital in Pittsburgh and the Joint Township District Memorial Hospital in St. Mary’s, OH. He frequently lectures on foot and ankle surgery, and his research has been published in numerous journals and textbooks.

Jonathon Strong, D.P.M., FACFAS, was named Employees’ Choice Physician of the Year for 2019 at Capital Region Medical Center.

Board-certified in foot and reconstructive rearfoot and ankle surgery by the American Board of Foot and Ankle Surgery, Strong is a member of the Capital Region Physicians Group in Jefferson City, MO.

2001

Erik Schulte, D.O., joined Clarinda Regional Health Center’s Specialty Clinic in Clarinda, IA. He is a board-certified obstetrician/ gynecologist who had practiced for nine years at the Metro OB-GYN Clinic in

Omaha, NE. He completed an internship at the University of Nebraska Medical Center and finished his residency at the University of Illinois-Chicago.

2002

R. Jeffrey Doyle, D.P.M., FACFAS, practices at North Star Foot and Ankle Associates in Garland, TX. He is dual board-certified by the American Board of Foot and Ankle Surgery and the American Board of Podiatric Medicine. He completed a three-year residency in podiatric medicine and surgery at the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio.

Lesa Maring, M.H.A., B.S.N., was appointed director of wound care and hyperbaric medicine at Pella (IA) Regional Health Center.

She most recently worked at Boone County (IA) Hospital, where she successfully opened and managed its wound care initiative.

Elizabeth Williamson McMurtry, D.O., FACEP, was elected to the National Board of Osteopathic Medical Examiners (NBOME).

A specialist in emergency medicine, she is assistant dean for clinical education and faculty development for Pacific Northwest University (PNWU) of Health Sciences in Yakima, WA, where she is devoted to improving community-based education and enhancing the clinical learning experience. Boardcertified by the American Board of Emergency Medicine and a Fellow of the American College of Emergency Physicians, McMurtry has supported medical students as a regional dean and adjunct clinical faculty member for PNWU at Walla Walla, WA, General Hospital. Her colleagues there nominated her as Physician of the Year in 2016 in honor of her commitment to excellence in patient care and

CLASS notes education. A past recipient of the Excellence in Emergency Medicine Award given by the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine, she has served on hospital committees in ambulatory care, disaster preparedness, pharmacy and therapeutics, quality assurance and on examination committees for NBOME COMLEX-USA and the Comprehensive Osteopathic Medical Achievement Test.

Michael Schoenwalder, D.O., became a founding member of the International Society for Environmentally Acquired Illness (ISEAI). He has been a practicing boardcertified internal medicine physician since 2005. He completed his internal medicine residency at Mercy Hospital in St. Louis in 2005.

After 10 years of practicing traditional internal medicine, he became frustrated with the current health care system and decided to further his education by attending the University of Southern Florida for functional/preventative medicine in 2012-2013.

2003

Bryan Broadbent, D.P.M., joined Animas Foot and Ankle in Durango, CO. He is board-certified by the American Board of Foot and Ankle Surgery and the American Board of Podiatric Medicine. He is an active staff member at Providence Portland, Adventist Medical Center, Legacy Good Samaritan and Emanuel Hospitals. Broadbent joined the Oregon Foot Clinic in 2006 after completing a comprehensive podiatric medical and surgical residency program at the Legacy/Kaiser Portland Hospitals in Portland, OR. He now is on the clinical faculty for the hospitals’ podiatry surgical residency program.

Winston “Pete” N. Petersen, PA-C, reported that his son, Ross Peterson,

M.D., was appointed to a fellowship in rheumatology at the University of California-Davis. Petersen is a physician assistant with Crossroads Family Medicine in Saratoga Springs, UT. Gregg Schellack, D.O., is an orthopedic surgeon affiliated with Sutter Coast Hospital in Crescent City, CA. He completed his residency at Loma Linda University and an internship at the Naval Medical Center - San Diego.

2004

Nader Ailabouni, D.O., began seeing family medicine patients at Genesis Health Group’s newest clinic, located at the Woodlands in Bettendorf, IA. Most recently, he had been practicing at Genesis Health Group’s clinic in LeClaire, IA. He graduated from the Genesis Quad Cities family residency program in 2007 and practiced for several years in Minnesota.

Tara Andersen, D.O., FAAP, was appointed physician dyad leader for women’s services and MercyOne Children’s Hospital in Des Moines.

She joined the hospital in 2008 as a pediatric hospitalist. She has served as medical director of the pediatric inpatient unit and pediatric hospitalists and was chair of the pediatrics department. She also was medical director of the newborn nursery.

2005

David Dickinson, D.P.M., is a longtime podiatrist in the podiatry clinic of Marshall Browning Hospital in Du Quoin, IL. He recently moved his clinic from the hospital’s specialty clinic to its rural health clinic, Marshall Browning Medical Clinic, located across the

Karl “Fritz” Disque, second from left in the back row, and a Disque Foundation team

Training millions to save millions more

W

hen Karl “Fritz” Disque, D.O.’07, R.Ph., was in Haiti to help provide relief after the island nation’s catastrophic earthquake in 2010, he and his team encountered a woman who went into labor while digging her family out of the rubble. The team delivered the baby by C-section and then realized a local nurse who was assisting didn’t understand the blue baby in her arms was in danger.

The realization that the nurse lacked basic training to treat the baby was a turning point for Disque, a board-certified anesthesiologist. He established the Disque Foundation in 2012 to provide free cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and advanced life support training through its Save a Life Initiative. His goal: train one million people in medically underserved areas by the end of 2019.

In January 2019, the foundation announced it had reached that goal one year early. Now it is working toward a new goal: train 10 million by 2020.

“This is the culmination of a dream and a lifelong goal, but it is by no means an end,” he says. “If anything, I am now even more inspired to teach the next 10 million. I’m just getting started.”

The Disque Foundation is the only entity that both trains and certifies people completely free of charge. Its Save a Life Initiative is a partnership between the foundation and National Health Care Provider Solutions, which Disque An alumnus and his also founded to offer online medical certification. colleagues are on a tear Disque Foundation teams have to “teach a man to fish,” traveled across North America, Africa, Malaysia and the Philippines. In admedically speaking. dition to providing CPR instruction, the foundation partners with groups across the country and around the world to train health care professionals in pediatric advanced life support and advanced cardiac life support. It also offers training to the public via free webinars on the foundation’s website.

A key part of the Disque Foundation’s success and mission is training what it calls “super-users.” These highly trained individuals are equipped with advanced skills and go on to train others in their home communities. The super-user model expands the Disque Foundation’s impact exponentially.

Alphipany Roque, a Disque Foundation super-user in Navotas, Philippines, has used his super-user status to train more than 800 people in his community.

“The CPR training I got from the Disque team is a whole new avenue for helping people here. My new skills have multiplied many times over,” he says.

“We needed to improve our standard of emergency care here,” says Sheila Muchiri, a Disque Foundation super-user and medical officer at Thika Level 5 Hospital in Thika, Kenya. “Thanks to the Disque team’s training, we are now better able to recognize specific emergencies and can administer more effective treatments. Lives have been saved.”

CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE SUMMER/FALL 2019

41

CLASS notes

DMU alumni continue to lead Iowa Chapter ACOFP

J

ason Sheffler, D.O.’08, and Shannon Remington, D.O.’07, were elected president and president-elect, respectively, of the Iowa Chapter of the American College of Osteopathic Family Physicians (ACOFP) at the Midwinter Osteopathic Family Practice Conference in January in Des Moines.

Sheffler is a physician at Boone County Hospital. He completed his rotating internship at Michigan State University and his family practice residency at the University of Minnesota.

Remington, a primary care provider at the Knoxville Hospital and Clinics, completed her family medicine residency at Mercy Medical Center-Des Moines.

Noreen O’Shea, D.O.’84, FAAFP, was elected to a one-year term on the Iowa Chapter Board. She is an assistant professor of behavioral medicine, medical humanities and ethics at DMU and a family physician in Des Moines.

Continuing to serve on the chapter’s board are Jennifer Olson, D.O.’95, as past president and Joshua Tessier, D.O.’08, as immediate past president. Olson practices at Mercy Clinics Family Medicine in Carlisle. Tessier practices at UnityPoint Clinic Family Medicine and Iowa Lutheran Hospital in Des Moines.

The Iowa Chapter of the American College of Osteopathic Family Physicians, headquartered in Des Moines, is a professional association for osteopathic family medicine physicians in Iowa. Its mission is to promote excellence in the practice and education of osteopathic family physicians and students.

CONT’D FROM PREVIOUS PAGE

street from the hospital.

Dickinson completed a three-year residency at Jewish Hospital of Cincinnati, where he was chief resident. Boardcertified by the American Board of Foot and Ankle Surgery, he offers both office procedures and surgical podiatry services.

Melanie GieslerSpellman, D.O., was named to the Mount Mercy University Board of Trustees in June 2019.

The university is located in Cedar Rapids, IA. She is an otolaryngologist at Physicians’ Clinic of Iowa P.C. in Cedar Rapids. Previously, she was a physician at Medical Associates in Clinton, IA. Giesler-Spellman has experience serving on boards and committees such as Doctors Hospital of Stark County Trauma Committee, the Ohio Osteopathic Association, American Academy of Otolaryngologic Allergy, American Academy of Osteopathic Otolaryngology and the Gateway Surgery Center Board of Trustees.

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Kelley Gillroy, D.P.M., is an assistant professor at the Arizona School of Podiatric Medicine and a clinician at the Foot and Ankle Clinic at Midwestern University.

She is also director of continuing medical education for the podiatry department at Midwestern University. Previously, she was an associate in private podiatric practice in Sun City West, AZ. Nicholas Kuiper, D.O., joined St. Anthony Surgical Group in Carroll, IA. He specializes in robotic surgery, having completed more than 600 procedures.

He completed an internship and general surgery residency at Mercy Medical Center in Des Moines. Prior to joining St. Anthony Surgical Group, Kuiper was a partner of Surgical Associates in Grinnell, IA, and a general surgeon in Waterloo, IA. He was trauma director and served on the hospital board of directors at Grinnell Regional Medical Center and was director of surgery at Marengo, IA, Memorial Hospital. He has also been an adjunct instructor of general surgery at Des Moines University since 2010.

Stephanie Puffer, D.P.T., received the 2019 Rick Perkins Instructor of the Year Award at Chattahoochee Technical College (CTC) in Marietta, GA. She directs the physical therapist assistant program at the college and will compete as its representative at the regional and possibly state level in Georgia’s technical college system.

Puffer began teaching full-time at CTC in 2009.

2006

Cameron Acor, D.P.M., is a podiatrist at the Northern Montana Specialty Medical Center in Havre. He is involved with wound care; general podiatry work of heel pain, orthotics, ingrown nails and callous care; and surgical procedures such as forefoot bunions, hammertoes, metatarsal and digital fractures, endoscopic plantar fasciotomy and midfoot fusions. He also works with diabetic foot infections and vacuum therapy.

Matthew Reetz, D.O., joined University of Maryland Community Medical Group (UM CMG) as a primary care provider in Chestertown. He specializes

in family medicine, disease prevention and diagnosis and treatment of long-term and short-term illnesses.

Reetz completed his residency in family medicine at Franklin Square Hospital Center in Baltimore.

UM CMG consists of community-based provider practices affiliated with UM Shore Regional Health, UM Baltimore Washington Medical Center, UM Charles Regional Medical Center and the University of Maryland Medical Center Midtown Campus.

Lisa Rollison, D.O., is a general surgeon at Scotland County Hospital Surgery Center in Memphis, TN.

2007

Jaclyn “Jackie” Bormann, D.P.T., was featured in the Clayton County (IA) Register on Jan. 8, 2019, for participating in a weeklong medical service trip in Guatemala, one of the poorest countries in Latin America. The trip was sponsored by her employer, Northern Iowa Therapy, which provides therapy services to Central Community Hospital, where she works. She and her colleagues saw patients in San Lucas Toliman, a city of 17,000 located about 60 miles west of Guatemala City, the country’s capital.

They also treated patients in several less populated villages. Bormann lives in Elkader, IA, with her husband, Jarod, and their three children.

2009

Dale Colorado, D.O., is assistant professor of orthopedic surgery and neurology at Washington University Orthopedics in St. Louis. He also serves as medical director of the orthopedic regenerative medicine program, medical director of electromyography and

co-director of ultrasound.

He is a workforce doctor for Washington University Athletics, Francis Howell Central High School and St. Joseph’s Academy.

Colorado’s clinical interests include the evaluation and nonoperative management of all musculoskeletal injuries, with special interests in sports and spine-related injuries, therapeutic spine and peripheral joint injections, regenerative medicine treatments, sports-related concussions, musculoskeletal and neuromuscular ultrasound, and electrodiagnostics.

He is a member of the American Academy of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Association of Academic Physiatrists, American Medical Society for Sports Medicine, American Association of Neuromuscular and Electrodiagnostic Medicine, and the North American Spine Society.

Brock Cookman, D.O., joined Bryan Heart in Lincoln, NE. He completed a residency in internal medicine at Iowa Methodist Medical Center in Des Moines, an interventional cardiology fellowship at St. Luke’s Medical Center in Milwaukee and a cardiology fellowship at the University of Nebraska Medical Center.

He is board-certified in interventional cardiology, cardiovascular disease and internal medicine.

Eric Palmer, D.P.T., is the director of physical therapy at Wayne County Hospital and Clinic System in Corydon, IA.

2010

Michelle Cassabaum, M.H.A., was elected to the Ames National Board of Directors, an affiliation of several central Iowa banks. She has served on the board of directors of State Bank and Trust Co. in Nevada since 2004.

CLASS notes Cassabaum is chief operating and financial officer and cofounder of 21st Century Rehab PC, which serves communities throughout central Iowa with clinics in Altoona, Carlisle, Grimes, Indianola and Madrid. The organization also provides therapy services to Dallas County Hospital in Perry, Franklin General Hospital in Hampton, Story County Medical Center in Nevada and Van Diest Medical Center in Webster City.

Sarah Lundin, D.O., a board-certified obstetricsgynecology specialist at Crawford County Memorial Hospital (CCMH) in Denison, IA, was admitted as a Fellow of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. She began her practice at CCMH in May 2016. She completed her residency in obstetrics and gynecology at Aultman Hospital in Canton, OH, and the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha.

During her residency, Lundin received clinical and surgical experience in general gynecology and obstetrics as well as urogynecology, reproductive endocrinology, high-risk obstetrics and gynecologic malignancies.

Ben Riegle, PA-C, D.O., practiced as a physician assistant for five years before earning his doctor of osteopathic medicine degree from the Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine. He now is an emergency medicine resident at UPMC Hamot, a hospital and tertiary care medical facility in Erie, PA.

2011

Kandice Beenken, D.O., joined Essentia Health Duluth, MN, Clinic, where she specializes in orthopedic trauma and adult joint reconstruction. She also serves as a flight surgeon in the U.S. Air National Guard.

Beenken completed adult reconstruction surgery

fellowship training at Las Vegas-based Desert Orthopaedic Center as well as orthopedic trauma fellowship training at University of CaliforniaSan Diego School of Medicine and John Hunter Hospital in New Lambton Heights, Australia.

Ashley McClain, D.P.M., joined the Foot and Ankle Clinic of Broadlawns Medical Center in Des Moines. She completed her residency at Truman Medical Center Lakewood in Kansas City, MO. She completed her fellowship in trauma and reconstruction through the Broadlawns foot and ankle fellowship program.

Tea Nguyen, D.P.M., AACFAS, was lead author of the article “Healing heel ulcers in high-risk patients: distally based peroneus brevis muscle flap case series,” published in the March 2019 issue of the Journal of Foot and Ankle Surgery. She is a podiatrist in the department of surgery at Watsonville Community Hospital in Watsonville, CA.

2012

Kathy Goetz, M.H.A., was appointed market vice president of Women’s Services and MercyOne Children’s Hospital, part of MercyOne Des

Moines Medical Center.

She is responsible for the leadership and direction of MercyOne Children’s Hospital and MercyOne Maternity and Infants’ Care.

She develops and guides strategies to encourage efficiency and future growth.

Previously, Goetz was appointed vice president of perioperative and specialty services in 2013. From 2014 through July 2018, she was the administrator of MercyOne West Des Moines Medical Center. Goetz has also served as interim chief nursing officer.

Erin Hoversten-Majewski, D.P.T., M.H.A.’13, became director of rehabilitative services at Bethany Life, a facility in Story City, IA, that offers a variety of care options for older adults including assisted living, independent living and long-term care. Previously, she worked in skilled nursing and long-term care and was involved in program restructuring and systems management. She also participated in opening an outpatient therapy clinic.

Leslie Kremer, D.P.T., is a birth healing specialist at Statera Integrated Health and Wellness Solutions in Dubuque, IA. She has more than 15 years of experience as a physical therapist and specializes in women’s

health physical therapy and visceral manipulation.

Cadence Kuklinski, D.O., is assistant professor of pediatrics at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. She completed her pediatrics residency at St. Louis University, followed by a fellowship in pediatric pulmonology at Washington University. She then joined the faculty of the division of allergy, immunology and pulmonary medicine.

Kuklinski is a member of the American Thoracic Society and the American Society for Transplantation.

She has an interest in aerodigestive disorders, lung transplant medicine and multidisciplinary care.

Matthew Lewin, D.P.M., joined Lea Regional Medical Center at its Southeast New Mexico Podiatry location in Hobbs, NM. He focuses on surgery and has extensive experience with wound care, basic diabetic limb salvage, foot surgery, and diagnosis and treatment of general foot conditions.

Lewin specialized in surgery in his residency at Health Alliance Hospital in Kingston, NY, and then worked as a private practice physician in Michigan.

John Vogel, D.O., a family medicine and obstetrics physician, joined Winneshiek

Make plans now to gather with your classmates, and join us in honoring our 25, 40, 50 and 50+ milestones

may 20-22, 2020

Visit www.dmu.edu/reunion for more information.

Contact Development & Alumni Relations at 515-271-1463 or alumni@dmu.edu if you have questions or want to assist in reaching out to your classmates.

Medical Center Decorah (IA) Clinic in August. His special interests include obstetrics, lifestyle medicine, diabetes, hypertension and high cholesterol. He had been serving in the U.S. military as assistant professor of family medicine at the Uniformed Services University and as a family medicine faculty physician on the Travis Air Force Base in Fairfield, CA.

2013

Christian Grindberg, D.O., joined Hancock County Health System as a member of the Britt, IA, Medical Clinic staff. He is board-certified by the American Board of Family Medicine and specializes in obstetrics and family medicine. He and his wife, Ashley, have three children.

Eric Holton, D.P.T., has practiced for six years at 21st Century Rehab, which serves several communities in central Iowa with clinics in Altoona, Carlisle, Grimes, Indianola and Madrid. He and his wife, Maggie, have a son, Jake.

Jill Threewits Hemmelgarn, D.O., became board-certified in nephrology by the American Board of Internal Medicine.

She practices at Mercy Health-St. Rita’s Kidney and Hypertension in Lima, OH. She completed a residency and fellowship at Beaumont Hospital in Farmington Hills, MI. She was previously board-certified in internal medicine by the American Board of Internal Medicine.

2014

Joshua Baker, D.O., FAAP, was awarded the 2019 Takeda Next Generation Medical Biochemical Subspecialty Fellowship, announced during the American College of Medical Genetics and Genomics annual clinical genetics meeting in Seattle in April.

CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE SUMMER/FALL 2019

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CLASS notes

SAVE THE DATE

CONT’D FROM PREVIOUS PAGE

Baker is a clinical genetics fellow in the Harvard Medical School genetics training program. Topics of his research at Boston Children’s Hospital include the effect of socioeconomic influence on phenylalanine levels in patients with phenylketonuria. He plans to expand his research to help assess and improve health care outcomes for patients with genetic and metabolic disease. His goal is to assess the barriers to diagnose and treat individuals to lead to improved morbidity and mortality of this population.

Kelly Bowen, D.O., is a physician with Milford Regional Medical Center in Milford, MA. Her specialties are obstetrics/ gynecology and robotic surgery. She completed her residency at Jersey Shore University Medical Center in Neptune City, NJ.

Michael Braunsky, D.O., is a family medicine physician at the Prevea Menomonie Health Center in Menomonie, WI. Certified by the American

Board of Family Medicine, he completed his residency at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health in Eau Claire.

He has worked with Prevea since 2017 at Prevea Urgent Care locations in Chippewa Falls and Altoona, WI. P. Andrew Crisologo, D.P.M., AACFAS, was among the authors of the research article, “Are we misdiagnosing diabetic foot osteomyelitis? Is the gold standard gold?” published in the July 2019 issue of the Journal of Foot and Ankle Surgery. He is a fellow in the department of plastic surgery at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas.

Wellness Program and the Farmers Market Advisory Committee at SACHS (FQHC) Clinic in San Bernardino, CA, and a Family Preventive Medicine Livin’ It Program at Loma University and the Loma Linda Osteopathic Group. Board-eligible by the American Board of Family Medicine and Preventive Medicine, Ishihara holds certification in Lifestyle Medicine Core Competency and the Suboxone Waiver.

Her clinical interests include palliative and hospice care, employee wellness programs, HIV/ AIDS management, weight management and diabetes prevention, osteopathic manipulation and acupuncture.

Emiko Ishihara, D.O., M.P.H., joined Southcoast Health as a primary care physician at its Pequot Building in Dartmouth, MA. She completed her residency in family and preventive medicine at Loma University in Loma Linda, CA. While in residency training, she founded several programs, including an Employee

Merrell Kauwe, D.P.M., AACFAS, a surgeon in private practice in Billings, MT; Gary Gansen, D.P.M.’15, and Sean Harper, D.P.M.’16, both residents at UnityPoint Health, Trinity Regional Medical Center, Fort Dodge, IA; and Andrea Cifaldi, D.P.M.’18, were among the authors of “Progression of

Embrace the DMU community › S HARE YOUR NEWS FOR THE CLASS NOTES SECTION OF DMU MAGAZINE. Use the enclosed card, send an e-mail message to alumni@dmu.edu, call the friendly DMU alumni staff at 515-271-1463, or visit www.dmu.edu/alumni.

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news, upcoming events on campus and in your community, and updates from fellow alumni. Just send your e-mail address to alumni@dmu.edu.

› LET US KNOW WHERE LIFE TAKES YOU: Use any of the options above to share a change of address, phone number, employer, office location and/or e-mail address.

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DMU

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healing on serial radiographs following first ray arthrodesis in the foot using a biplanar plating technique without compression,” published in the May 2019 edition of the Journal of Foot and Ankle Surgery. Other authors included Rachel Egdorf, D.P.M.’19, and Jake Eisenschink, D.P.M.’19.

2015

Chelsea Graham, D.O., joined Thundermist Health Center in West Warwick, RI, as a family medicine provider. She sees family medicine, women’s health and trans patients. She has a background in LGBTQ health care and global health.

Bilingual in Spanish, she works collaboratively with Partners in Health in Mexico.

She completed her residency in family medicine at Brown University. Prior to working at Thundermist, Graham worked in a variety of health care settings internationally.

She is currently a global health fellow at Brown University and is also completing a fellowship with

Brown Advocates for Social Change and Equity (BASCE) at Alpert Medical School.

Eric So, D.P.M., AACFAS, was the lead author of “Structures at risk from an intermetatarsal screw for Lapidus bunionectomy: a cadaravic study,” published in the January 2019 edition of the Journal of Foot and Ankle Surgery. He also was among the authors of another article in that edition of the journal, titled “Ankle fracture fixation: medial or lateral first?” In addition, he was the lead author of “Osteochondral defect of the calcaneocuboid joint: a case study,” and he was among the authors of “The incidence of nonunion of the naviculocuneiform joint arthrodesis: a systematic review,” both published in the journal’s May 2019 edition. He was lead author on the case report, “Achilles tendon reconstruction with bone block allograft: long-term follow-up of two cases,” published in the July 2019 issue of the Journal of Foot and Ankle Surgery. So completed his

You worked hard as a DMU student – now reap the benefits of your membership in a great alumni community.

D.O. program, call 515-271-1053; D.P.M., 515-271-1489; PA, 515-271-1569. ›A TTEND DMU ALUMNI EVENTS in your area. Check out the events page on the alumni website. You’ll also find a link there to upcoming DMU continuing medical education programs, many of which are free and available online. ›T UNE IN ONLINE AND VIA SOCIAL NETWORKS: Find Des Moines University videos on YouTube, become a fan on Facebook, tag your friends in photos, post comments and follow us on Twitter.

Keep in touch!

Glanton

CLASS notes

residency at Grant Medical Center in Columbus, OH, and now is a fellow at the CORE Institute in Phoenix.

2016

Jenna Wexter Bush, D.P.T., is a physical therapist for Rock Valley Physical Therapy at its clinics in Davenport and Cedar Rapids, IA. Vestibular rehabilitation is a large portion of her current practice. She was the speaker at a May 18 continuing education session titled “Evaluation of the Vestibular Patient,” offered by the Iowa Physical Therapy Association Southeast Iowa District at the University of Iowa Sports Medicine Clinic.

Heather Cain Paris, M.H.A., was named chief administrative officer and chief financial officer at Greene County Medical Center in Jefferson, IA, effective June 3. She had been associate vice president for finance and support services at Iowa State University. Prior to that, she was chief executive officer at Stewart Memorial Community Hospital, a rural affiliate of UnityPoint Health in Lake City, IA, from 2014 to 2016 and chief financial/information officer at Monroe County Hospital and Clinics in Albia from 1997 to 2013.

2018

Austin Hill, M.H.A., in December became director of managed care at North Kansas City Hospital, where he administers and coordinates all managed care contract negotiation, analysis and compliance activities in support of the managed care strategies, business and financial plans of the hospital and Meritas Health. Previously, he was manager of payor relations at Children’s Mercy Hospital in Kansas City, MO.

16th ANNIVERSARY Presented by B A N K E R S T R U S T

DMU to honor Shahbaz Ahmed Merchant at Glanton Dinner Des Moines University established the Glanton Fund to address two important needs in health care: to diversify its workforce by generating scholarships for minority students, who are under-represented in the field, and to enhance all students’ cultural competency.

The Glanton Dinner, the annual fundSandwiches and Java Lava Coffee Inc. raising event for the fund, will mark its A Glanton Fund contributor for 16th anniversary this year on Oct. 16. many years, Merchant has long demThis year’s presenting sponsor is Bankonstrated his commitment to opening ers Trust, Iowa’s largest privately owned doors for others through education. bank, headquartered in Des Moines.

Currently he is a member of the Des “Inclusion and commitment to the Moines University Board of Trustees communities we serve have been and the Des Moines Area Community among our core values since we were College Board Foundation. He also has founded in 1917. We also know our served as president of the board of outstanding and diverse employees directors of the Miami-Dade Comwho are dedicated to customer service munity College Alumni Foundation; set us apart,” says Don Coffin, the as a member of the board of William company’s president and CEO. “Those Rainey Harper College Foundation in qualities align well with DMU and Chicago; and as a member of an adviShahbaz Ahmed Merchant the Glanton Fund, which benefit our sory council of Buena Vista University increasingly diverse society and seek to build highly in Storm Lake, Iowa. skilled health care teams committed to compassionate “I want to help underprivileged and minority people patient care. We’re proud to invest in those goals as this to get an education that will help them be active memyear’s presenting sponsor.” bers of the community,” he says.

In addition to promoting cultural competency A business graduate of Barry University in Miami, FL, among tomorrow’s health care professionals, the GlanMerchant has received the National Business Council ton Dinner also allows the University to honor individuLeadership Award from Congress and the Passport to als who have promoted opportunity and inclusion in Prosperity Award from the Iowa International Center. the community. This year’s Glanton honoree is Shahbaz The Glanton Fund is named in honor of the late WilAhmed Merchant, chairman and CEO of Merchant Inlie Stevenson Glanton and Luther T. Glanton Jr., both vestment Trust, which operates Jimmy John’s Gourmet lawyers and civic leaders in central Iowa.

For more information on the fund and the 2019 Glanton Dinner, visit campaign.dmu.edu/glanton, call 515-271-1387 or email glanton@dmu.edu.

Deaths ’54 – Victor J. Rerucha, D.O., Hilton Head Island, SC, May 30, 2019 ’57 – Louis J. Radnothy, D.O., FACOFP, Mount Dora, FL, June 20, 2019 ’58 – George W. Koss, D.O., Normandy Park, WA, March 9, 2019

’63 – Sanford S. Berlin, D.O., Tucson, AZ, April 6, 2019

’76 – R. Keith Pattison, D.O., FACOI, Cambridge, OH, Jan. 3, 2019

’93 – Charles “Chuck” E. Goodhue, M.S.P.T., Altoona, IA, July 11, 2019

’68 – Bernard Alper, D.O., West Bloomfield, MI, April 12, 2019

’76 – Dennis J. Straubinger, D.O., Cape Girardeau, MO, Feb. 27, 2019

’05 – Suzanne M. Gassman, D.P.T., Platteville, WI, June 4, 2019

’72 – James R. White, D.O., Riverton, WY, March 17, 2019

’79 – Roger G. Michaud, D.O., Foster, RI, March 11, 2019

’15 – Andrew J. Malone, D.P.T., Waukee, IA, July 7, 2019

’75 – Paul A. Haberer, D.O., Euless, TX, May 6, 2019

’91 – Nancy J. Zega, D.O., Salt Lake City, Jan. 12, 2019 SUMMER/FALL 2019

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MYturn

another point of view

“AN ATTITUDE OF SERVICE AND COMPETENCE” Syeda “Zehra” Kazmi, D.P.M.’20, and Robert De Los Santos, D.P.M., share a passion for podiatric medicine and promoting the profession to students and the public. They began working together in 2018, when Kazmi became promotions manager for Hallux Magazine, an online publication De Los Santos founded. They even co-authored a book, titled 101 Ways to Flop in Podiatry School, a first-year podiatry school self-help guide.

More recently, the two initiated the first annual Hallux Magazine Writing Competition. Students from the nation’s nine podiatry schools were invited to submit 1,000- to 2,000-word responses to these questions: Why is it important for podiatry medical students to be involved in community service/medical mission? How has your organization had an impact in the local community?

“We wanted to showcase what podiatry does for a community,” says De Los Santos, a 2018 graduate of the California School of Podiatric Medicine who’s now a resident at Kingwood Medical Center in Texas.

Students in DMU’s College of Podiatric Medicine and Surgery (CPMS) did well in the competition. Alex Bischoff and Stephen Rockhill, members of the Class of 2020, took second place, while Mary Brandt, Ersta Ferryanto, Li-Yuan Derek Lee and Katherine Ternent, members of the Class of 2021, and Megan Kingston and Devon Niewohner, members of the Class of 2022, were finalists. Their essays are excerpted here with the students’ and Hallux’s permission.

Stephen Rockhill, Syeda “Zehra” The competition submissions were Kazmi and Alex Bischoff, reviewed by four individuals who members of the CPMS didn’t know the authors’ names or Class of 2020 institutions. Bischoff and Rockhill each received $200 for their second-place finish; the other students received $100 as finalists.

Hallux Magazine, which features journalistic articles, poetry, essays and short stories, is the latest among four websites De Los Santos created to promote the podiatric profession. Prepodiatrylife.com went “live” in 2015 and is intended to educate high school and college students about podiatric medicine and the admissions process for podiatric school. Prepodiatryclinic101.com offers clinical examples, study materials and videos for first- and second-year podiatric students looking ahead to clinical rotations, and Prepodiatrystudy.com is a free online study guide for fourth-year podiatric students preparing for externships, exams and interviews. De Los Santos and podiatry students from across the country provide content for the sites.

“They’re great resources for students both in the information and connections they provide. For example, if we hear questions from pre-med students, we can put them in touch with first-, second- or third-year podiatry students,” Kazmi says. “Hallux Magazine promotes all the good sides of podiatry and the positive impact it has. It’s connecting students at all nine podiatric schools, so we can share ideas and keep each other updated on what’s going on.”

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“OFF TO THE RACES”

D

uring our time as students at Des Moines University College of Podiatric Medicine and Surgery, we volunteer as leaders in the Boy Scouts of America organization. This requires multiple hours each week of planning and running activities for young men.

It also requires that we are competent in scouting principles and live them ourselves. As such, we felt that it was important to volunteer our time to help the youth in the community learn important lessons through scouting.

Scouting was a great experience for both of us. We appreciate what we have learned from our time spent with scouts, families and fellow leaders. As future podiatric physicians, we feel it’s important to reach out and serve those in our community.

Soon, we will develop a competency to diagnose and treat foot and ankle pathology. As such, we now have a higher capacity to serve and help others because when we are treating the foot and ankle, we are treating an individual. If we show our patients that we have an attitude of service, trust and respect will be developed.

In their second-place-winning essay, Alex Bischoff and Stephen Rockhill – both Eagle Scouts – shared their experiences as volunteers in the community and advocates for podiatric medicine. Bischoff was selected by the American Podiatric Medical Students’ Association as the 2019 APMSA Student of the Year. A member of the Pi Delta National Honor Society, he served as vice president of DMU’s American Academy of Podiatric Sports Medicine chapter and as a teaching assistant in several lab courses.

H A L LU X M AG A Z I N E W R I T I N G CO M PE T I T I O N

“LESSONS IN SERVICE”

T

he environment I am trying to create is all about grasping any opportunities that cross my path and learning from them to further myself personally and intellectually. This was my train of thought as I applied to travel to Breathitt County, KY, for a service trip over spring break. I had many feelings and emotions about what to expect on the trip but wanted to use it as an opportunity to put myself in situations that I do not normally find myself. I was raised in a rural community of 500 in northeastern Nebraska, so I had some ideas for what it meant to live and work in a rural environment.

Traveling to Breathitt County blew the doors off any expectations or preconceived notions I had coming into the trip. The differences in where I grew up and where I was during the service trip were stark in comparison.

The number of challenges (poor economy, high number of foster children, geographic isolation, etc.) Breathitt County faces day to day make growing up in rural Nebraska seem much easier.

Devon Niewohner

A

responsibility that comes along with this role [as president of the American Academy of Podiatric Sports Medicine] is to direct the planning of a foot and ankle first aid tent at the IMT Des Moines Marathon. The tent is located near the finish line so that runners are able to have their feet examined after finish-

ing the race. The runners present with a variety of complaints ranging from blisters to pain that has presented from an existing pathology. With the assistance of podiatry faculty at DMU, students can examine and treat the runners as they come through.

It is extremely rewarding to see these athletes walk away in less pain or discomfort than they had initially presented with. As first- and second-year students, getting hands-on experiences with patients is very slim. The marathon is many times a student’s first encounter to not only interact but also treat a real patient. It has taught me how to further take my knowledge from the classroom and apply it to a real situation that isn’t just black and white. Volunteering at the marathon presents an opportunity to gain more experience communicating with patients while simultaneously promoting the podiatry field to the community around us.

Mary Brandt

P

ing pong is a popular hobby at Des Moines University for students of all health professions, so as a sports medicine club we decided to set up a tournament. It will be a fun opportunity for the students to show off their skills and meet others who also like playing the game. The tournament will be a canned food drive so we can donate to a local food pantry that feeds the homeless in Des Moines and surrounding areas. I hope for this tournament to continue and grow in numbers in the follow-

ing years so that AAPSM can keep giving back. It is important to be involved in volunteer work because as health professionals in training, our goal is to help people and make lives better, so while we cannot quite do that yet medically, we can help through other types of service.

Katherine Ternent

T

wo community events that our [AAPSM] members participate in include Boys Reaching for Opportunities in Science (BROS) and Girls Exploring Medicine and Science (GEMS).

BROS and GEMS are free events offered to over 400 middle school-aged students, where they are invited to come to DMU for a day of medical-related workshops led by DMU students. The events offer a variety of activities including orthotics casting, ankle taping, stretching and sports preparation, nutrition education, anatomy demonstrations, surgery labs and injury treatment. The BROS and GEMS events provide the perfect setting for community outreach…

Serving and providing education for a diverse group of individuals now will help me better understand my future patients so that I can provide the highest quality of patient-centered care.

Megan Kingston

“UNCOVERING A HIDDEN GEM”

T

alking to many of our podiatry peers, we often hear the term “hidden gem” used to describe the profession. Why is it that this field remains absent in the thoughts of many students aspiring to be a physician? In fact, application numbers have generally been declining for the past 10 years.

Podiatric Medicine Advocacy group was founded on this question. PMA’s mission is to inform the community of the role and value of podiatric medicine, promote parity with other health care fields, and educate students on the benefits of becoming a foot and ankle specialist. We are encouraging young people to be knowledgeable about foot health and those who take care of it.

We are working in the realm of high school education but have aspirations to follow in the footsteps of organizations such as Happy Feet that cater toward a broader undergraduate student population while helping underserved local communities. We are using our model of service to advocate for our profession while bettering our community. Someday, we hope that the students we mentored follow in our footsteps and lead the next generation through service.

Li-Yuan Derek Lee and Ersta Ferryanto

SUMMER/FALL 2019

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Non-Profit Org. US POSTAGE PAID Des Moines, Iowa Permit No. 584 3200 Grand Avenue, Des Moines, IA 50312-4198

they are THE END OF AN ERA SPARKS NEW BEGINNINGS

Learn how you can have an impact on the medical and health sciences education of DMU students. Contact us at 515-271-1387 or via campaign.dmu.edu.

Gene Holst of Bettendorf, IA, always appreciated the care he received from his osteopathic physician, Dr. Jack Hannum, who became a good friend.

Recognizing that Holst, then a banker, had valuable financial skills, the physician asked him to join the board of the Davenport (IA) Osteopathic Hospital.

When the hospital was sold in 1984, the proceeds established the Quad City Osteopathic Foundation, and Holst became its board president. He continued in that role through 2019, but health issues and his 80th birthday prompted him to propose a “plan of succession” to his fellow board members.

That plan, unanimously approved by the foundation board and its members in March, will dissolve the entity but leave a lasting legacy: Among the benefactors of the disbursements of its fund will be osteopathic students at Des Moines University. The new Davenport Osteopathic Hospital Scholarship also will honor Arthur Abramson, D.O.’43; George Boston, D.O.’38; and Donald McDonough, D.O.’33, three of the 10 founders of the hospital.

Holst is proud that the Quad City Osteopathic Foundation gave nearly $6 million in scholarships, grants and physician loan forgiveness in the past 33 years. “We still have $2.3 million to give, so we wanted it to have an impact,” he says.

Arthur Abramson, D.O.’43

George Boston, D.O.’38

Donald McDonough, D.O.’33