Yet another med center to offer open-heart
(Published 4-29-06, Philadelphia Business Journal) Brandywine Hospital is getting ready to join a growing list of suburban
Philadelphia medical centers with an open-heart surgery program, according to industry sources.
The five-county Philadelphia region now has 22 hospitals performing open-heart surgery. That's a 37 percent increase over
the 16 medical centers doing so prior to the end of the state's certificate-of-need program in 1996. That program kept the
number of hospitals performing the surgery in check.
Dr. David Nash, associate dean and director of the Office of Health Policy and Clinical Outcomes at Thomas Jefferson University
Hospital, has examined the proliferation of open-heart programs in Pennsylvania.
Last fall, Nash and three Jefferson colleagues (Jamie Robinson, Elizabeth Moxey and John P. O'Connor) published a study that
used data from the Pennsylvania Healthcare Cost Containment Council -- a state-funded agency that collects and analyzes data
from health-care providers -- to look at the quality of programs in the state before and after Pennsylvania's certificate-of-need
program ended.
Media Coverage:
Philadelphia Business Journal
Tiny Coils New Way To Fix Burst Aneurysm
(Published 4-28-06, NBC10) While most strokes -- or brain attacks -- happen when an artery to the brain gets blocked, 20 to
25 percent are due to bleeding when an abnormal blood vessel bursts.
Now, many people who survive a burst aneurysm can avoid having their skulls opened in a craniotomy because there is a unique,
safer way to fix the problem.
A few weeks ago Judy Goatley felt awful.
"I was just going back and forth like I had a few drinks too many or something," Goatley said.
Goatley burst an aneurysm -- just like 24-year-old Lauren Klein did one night in Harrisburg.
"I was getting into bed and I experienced a really sharp pain in my head and I said, 'I have to lie down. I have to lie down.'
And next thing I knew, I woke up in Thomas Jefferson University Hospital and I had had a brain aneurysm rupture," Goatley
said.
An aneurysm is a bubble on an artery that can burst and cause a subarachnoid hemorrhage -- otherwise known as a stroke.
"Once an aneurysm ruptures or bleeds, there is a 50 percent chance of dying or being disabled regardless of the treatment,"
said Dr. Robert Rosenwasser, chair of neurosurgeon at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital.
Department of Neurosurgery
Jefferson Hospital for Neuroscience
Media Coverage:
NBC10
KYW Newsradio
Simulator Allows Doctors to Experience Heart Failure
(Published 4-24-06, NBC10.com, ABC6.com) Doctors and nurses who treat heart-failure patients had an opportunity to experience
what heart failure is really like for their patients inside the Heart FXPod, which stopped at Thomas Jefferson University
Hospital recently.
After undergoing the experience, Jefferson Heart Failure specialist, Dr. Siva Srinivasan said he may now treat his patients
differently.
Dr. Paul Mather, Director of the Advanced Heart Failure Center at the Jefferson Heart Institute, explained "Everyone has sympathy
towards other human beings. I think that's part of our human element. But empathy, where you can actually feel what another
person is going through as opposed to just feeling sorry for them, is different. I think if we can marry that feeling to the
science of medicine, it will make for a better health care provider.”
Division of Cardiology
HeartCARE at Jefferson
Advanced Heart Failure Center
Media Coverage:
NBC10.com
ABC6.com
RNA test might reveal early cancer, offer drug target
(Published 4-22-06, Science News) By analyzing snippets of genetic material called microRNAs in the intestinal cells of people
with colorectal cancer, researchers have devised a technique that might reveal which cancers are at the highest risk of recurrence.
Bruce Boman, M.D., Ph.D., director of the Division of Genetic and Preventive Medicine at Jefferson Medical College, studied
the fast-growing cells that are embedded in tube-like crypts lining the colon, testing the activity of microRNAs in cells
in the crypts. Dr. Boman said that the test predicted whether cells were cancerous or healthy.
The results could also open the way for new drugs targeting aberrant microRNAs that contribute to the cancer. MicroRNAs, Dr.
Boman said, “are going to be excellent candidates for targeted therapeutics.”
Department of Medicine
Media Coverage:
Science News
Simple Test at Birth Can Catch Potentially Deadly Metabolic Diseases
(Published 4-20-06, NBC 10) NBC 10 News medical reporter, Cherie Bank told the story of baby Bailey, who was not given genetic
testing at birth and is now suffering the consequences.
A few days after Bailey was born, she became very sick. She was lethargic, had difficulty waking up, and was not eating well.
Her pediatrician said Bailey was just a passive child and that there was nothing to worry about. Yet, when Bailey was only
21 days old, she began having seizures and slipped into a coma.
Gerald Berry, M.D., department of Pediatrics, at Thomas Jefferson University was on-call that day. "Thank God Dr. Berry was
on call and pretty much right away he knew that it was a metabolic disease," Bailey’s mother Michelle told Channel 10.
Department of Pediatrics
Media Coverage:
NBC10.com
Officials Turn to Israel for a Security Primer
(Published 4-20-06, Jewish Exponent) How do you administer a vaccine if you're wearing a chemical suit?
That's the kind of question heard in Israel as its citizens grapple with constant terror. To understand such issues, a group
of security, medical, government and law-enforcement professionals from Pennsylvania recently went to Israel to learn about
the country's security methods, and see how its officials prepare for, handle and prevent attacks.
"The challenges Israel faces are more than I first realized," said participant Dr. Edward Jasper, director of the Center for
Bio-Terrorism and Disaster Preparedness at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia. "Here, we're supposed to
get the scene declared safe before we go in. But in Israel, they get people to hospitals immediately rather than wait for
the bomb squad."
Department of Emergency Medicine
Center for Bioterrorism and Emergency Preparedness
Media Coverage:
Jewish Exponent
Minority Cancer Week: Leading Women’s Health Organizations Challenge African American Women to Confront Deadly Disease
(4-19-06, CBS 46 Atlanta) Ninety-six percent of African American women do not consider themselves to be at high risk for colorectal
cancer (CRC), according to a new Harris poll that was recently released. This misperception has resulted in deadly inaction,
with 70 percent of African American women over the age of 45 not getting life-saving screenings for CRC.
“African American women face many barriers to screening, detection and treatment of colorectal cancer, but getting beyond
our own fear and learning the facts can go a long way in improving our survival and quality of life,” said Edith Mitchell,
M.D., clinical professor of medicine at Jefferson Medical College and Program Leader in Gastrointestinal Oncology at Thomas
Jefferson University Hospital and at Jefferson's Kimmel Cancer Center.
Department of Medicine
Media Coverage:
CBS 46 Atlanta
KPHO-TV CBS 5 Phoenix
KTRE.com
Seattlepi.com
Eye cells that don't see, but regulate
(Published 4-16-2006, The Philadelphia Inquirer) As any good high school biology student can tell you, the human eye sees
light with special cells called rods and cones.
But when George C. Brainard Ph.D., director of the Light Research Program at Thomas Jefferson University, experimented with
shining various colors of light into people's eyes, something odd happened:
A specific shade of blue light was most effective at shutting down the body's production of melatonin - the "hormone of darkness"
that helps regulate sleep and the body's internal clock. Yet that shade of blue is not one of the colors best detected by
rods and cones.
Department of Neurology
Jefferson Hospital for Neuroscience
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Philadelphia Inquirer
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Philadelphia Daily News
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The State
Columbus Ledger-Enquirer
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Grand Forks Herald
The Kansas City Star
The Miami Herald
Saint Paul Pioneer Press
Contra Costa Times
Lexington Herald-Leader
The News-Sentinel
The Sun Herald
The Charlotte Observer
Alzheimer’s May Have Link to Obesity, Study Says
(Published 4-5-06, The Charlotte Observer) According to the latest study linking obesity and dementia, people in their early
40s who had a high amount of flab in two different body locations were much more likely to develop Alzheimer’s disease more
than 25 years later than those with smaller amounts.
The study, which was presented at the American Academy of Neurology annual meeting involved 8,776 people ages 40 to 45. Between
1964 and 1973, the participants all underwent skin-fold testing in which caliper devices were used to measure the thickness
of the skin on the triceps and the back of the shoulders.
Those who had the thickest skin folds in the back of the shoulder were 2.9 times as likely to develop Alzheimer’s disease.
In the triceps, the risk was 2.6 times as likely.
“What this is telling us is we need to worry about the disease a lot earlier than we are no,” said Sam Gandy, M.D., Ph.D.,
Director of the Farber Institute for Neurosciences of Thomas Jefferson University.
Department of Neurology
Jefferson Hospital for Neuroscience
Farber Institute for Neurosciences
Media Coverage:
The Charlotte Observer
The Wichita Eagle
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TheState.com
The Telegraph
Lexington Herald-Leader
Centre Daily Times
Jefferson reports advance in fighting cancer
(Published 4-4-06, Philadelphia Inquirer) Scientists at Jefferson Medical College and Jefferson’s Kimmel Cancer Center report
discovering how an enzyme produced by colorectal cancer cells helps them break free and spread to lung, liver and other tissues
in the body. This discovery could possibly lead to new anti-metastasis drugs that work by blocking this enzyme, called matrix
metalloproteinase 9 or MMP-9.
GianMario Pitari, M.D., Ph. D., assistant professor of pharmacology and experimental therapeutics at Jefferson Medical College
and his group reported that in colorectal tumors, not only do cancer cells produce an excessive amount of the enzyme, but
they seem to trigger excessive production by normal stromal cells as well. When the enzyme is blocked, the process is interrupted,
and cancer cannot migrate to other tissue.
Dr. Pitari’s report is in the March 15th issue of Clinical Cancer Research.
CancerCARE at Jefferson
Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics
Kimmel Cancer Center
Media Coverage:
Philadelphia Inquirer
TimesLeader.com
CentreDaily.com
Responding to physician shortage
(Published 4-4-06, Physician's News Digest) Evidence – both anecdotal and statistical – is mounting that both the nation and
state will soon face a physician shortage. Multiple studies agree that that an aggregate shortage will occur by 2020.
The Association of American Medical Colleges’ (AAMC) Center for Workforce Studies, and the American College of Physicians
(ACP) have both recently responded with reports that address the various manifestations of shortage – geographic and specialty
maldistribution in addition to aggregate shortfalls – and offer suggestions to academic institutions and policymakers.
Academic institutions are heeding the AAMC call. Salsberg says that in response to the group’s call for a 15 percent enrollment
boost, approximately half of all academic medical institutions have either already increased enrollment or are planning to
do so – a group that includes several Pennsylvania schools.
According to Dean Thomas Nasca, M.D., Jefferson Medical College boosted its enrollment from 228 to 255 in August (an increase
of 11.8 percent), and grew its nursing and occupational and physical therapy programs. The increase is possible as a result
of an expansion at the school that includes a new 129,000 square-foot education building currently under construction.
Jefferson Medical College
Media Coverage:
Physician's News Digest
Advances in medicine: New treatments benefit enlarged prostate
(Published 4-4-06, News Journal) An enlarged prostate is par for the course among men of middle age and older. And for decades,
surgical removal of the prostate has been the treatment of choice when the condition starts causing problems with urination.
Medical technologies using microwaves and lasers have been introduced in recent years, allowing for less invasive ways to
treat blockage of the urethra caused by the growing prostate.
Enlargement of the prostate, or benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH), occurs in about half of men in their 60s and as many as
90 percent in their 70s and 80s. The enlarged prostate can constrict the urethra, which channels urine from the bladder and
out of the body. When this occurs, pressure on the bladder can increase the urge to urinate, even when there's little fluid.
Eventually, the bladder can lose its ability to empty itself entirely. The risk for infection also increases without treatment.
Before medications for BPH were introduced in the early 1990s, about 80 percent to 90 percent of enlarged prostates were treated
by removing the prostate through transurethral resection of the prostate (TURP), said Dr. Leonard Gomella, chair of urology
at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital. Now, with medications and noninvasive alternatives, that number has decreased to
around 20 percent, he said.
Department of Urology
CancerCARE at Jefferson
Media Coverage:
News Journal
