This just in from the U.Va. Health System: U.Va. doctor Mary Lee Vance will be featured in a new Learning Channel documentary on Sultan Kosen, who at 8-foot-1 currently holds the title as the “World’s Tallest Man.”
Kosen has a condition called acromegaly, in which a benign tumor of the pituitary gland causes it to overproduce growth hormone. Despite the care he received in his native Turkey, he continues to grow, a situation that could ultimately threaten his life.
Vance, after consulting with U.Va. neurosurgeon Dr. Jason Sheehan, recommends a course of treatment that includes medication and gamma knife surgery, which is slated to occur later this month.
For U.Va. basketball fans: No, he will not be the second coming of Ralph Sampson, Manute Bol or even Gheorge Muresan, for reasons that should be apparent in this trailer promoting the Learning Channel program:
Health care professionals joined forces with dancers, musicians and other artists on Saturday at Washington Park as part of the 21st annual African-American Cultural Arts Festival. The University of Virginia’s Office of the Vice President and Chief Officer for Diversity and Equity and the U.Va. Health System worked with Martha Jefferson Hospital, the Charlottesville-Albemarle Health Department and the Quality Community Council to offer a range of health screenings. The 80 or so volunteers provided 55 sports physicals for youth, 13 mammograms, 50 checks for peripheral artery disease and more. They conducted screenings and gave information on Alzheimer’s, AIDS, cancer, nutrition and healthy weight and high blood pressure.
Marcus Martin, U.Va.’s interim vp and chief officer for diversity and equity, sent a shout-out to the ODE team, which orchestrated the fair. “I am so proud of the team effort,” he said. “The community benefitted in a very positive way.” Besides the screenings, folks were treated to juice, bagels and coffee. “I was exhausted at the end of the day but really pleased to have such a great ODE team,” Martin said.
Dory Hulse, director of communications for U.Va.’s School of Nursing, spent the weekend with the hundreds of U.Va. volunteers who helped staff the Remote Area Medical clinic in Wise, Va. The annual clinic draws thousands of people from Southwest Virginia and neighboring states seeking medical attention. This is her third and final dispatch from the clinic.
July 24, Wise — Breakfast under the stars. Lions Club volunteers are serving a hot breakfast to all of us volunteers in a buffet line on the stage at the Wise County Fairgrounds. Groggy and bright-eyed people line up for pancakes, eggs, bacon, biscuits with sausage gravy, fruit and juice and coffee. Other volunteers are circulating through the parking lot with food for the patients. I had to clear foggy car windows this morning, but we’re all grateful for the chilly air. Soon enough it will be hovering around 100 degrees.
At least we all slept in beds and enjoyed showers. Out in that parking lot whole families have spent the night sleeping in cars, the backs of vans and in tents. Who are they? Stan Brock, founder of Remote Area Medical, and Dorrie Fontaine, dean of the U.Va. School of Nursing, are at the gate greeting hundreds of people eager for coveted first-come, first-served numbers that will gain them admission for free health care. I circulate through the crowd with an audio recorder and camera.
Dory Hulse, director of communications for U.Va.’s School of Nursing, is tagging along this weekend with the hundreds of U.Va. volunteers who are helping with the Remote Area Medical clinic being held in Wise, Va. The annual clinic draws thousands of people from Southwest Virginia and neighboring states seeking medical attention. She has agreed to provide us with updates through the blog as she goes along.
July 22, Wise — After six hours along interstates and country roads, through undulating banks of thick kudzu and past massive coal operations, my friend and I have arrived at the Wise County Fairgrounds to join the rest of the U.Va. team of volunteers gathering and preparing for the weekend’s annual free clinic.
Some have been here since Tuesday installing wiring and computer and communications networks. A group of Air National Guardsmen are hooking up generators to supply power for lights, equipment and air conditioning. The U.Va. telemedicine department is already geared up to connect patients and on-site clinicians with specialists back in Charlottesville for consultations. Pharmacy students from Virginia Commonwealth University are sorting and bottling medications under a tent and under the watchful eye of their professor. Nursing and medical students are hauling tables and equipment to help set up operations for triage and medical care.
Dory Hulse, director of communications for U.Va.’s School of Nursing, is tagging along this weekend with the hundreds of U.Va. volunteers who are helping with the Remote Area Medical clinic being held in Wise, Va. The annual clinic draws thousands of people from Southwest Virginia and neighboring states seeking medical attention. She has agreed to provide us with updates through the blog as she goes along.
July 21, Charlottesville — Like swallows to Capistrano, flocks of people are heading to Wise this weekend for one of the largest free clinics in the country. Organizers expect to see a repeat of last year’s 20 percent increase in the number of patients who drive for hours to get what may be the only health care they’ll have all year: medical, dental, vision and hearing.
Zeta Tau Alpha sorority will host the local “Run for Life” on March 27 (registration 8 a.m., starting gun at 10), to benefit the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation and the U.Va. Cancer Center. The race begins and ends at Newcomb Hall Plaza.
They’re looking for runners and donors to support the runners. (Register here; donate here.) Getting your donation in by Sunday will double it, thanks to a matching donor.
It cites an omnibus study of 39 studies conducted since 1932 that found a higher rate of deaths due to heart disease and heart attacks during flu season. “Researchers suspect that flu may cause a strong inflammatory response in some people that can trigger events such as a heart attack,” according to the note. “This may be particularly true for people with chronic conditions such as heart disease or diabetes.”
Thus, preventing the flu may prevent such inflammation.
Monday’s UVA Today will feature an update on the H1N1 pandemic. While new cases have fallen off dramatically, officials remain wary of a resurgence and are still pushing flu shots. The University hopes it will soon have enough vaccine to conduct clinics for faculty and staff.
Matthew Hanna is a rising fourth-year student from Atlanta, majoring in mechanical engineering with a minor in engineering business. This summer, he has been participating in the School of Engineering and Applied Science’s Science and Technology Policy Internship Program, which places student interns with policymaking organizations at home and abroad. Hanna is working in Paris with the National Science Foundation’s Europe Office and with the U.S. embassy, and agreed to send back regular reports for the UVA Today News Blog.
July 19-25: At the beginning of the summer, I started my first entry with a comment on how fast the preceding week had flown by. As I was writing, I was thinking about how certain I was that the entire summer would move at the same pace, and I was right. I never would have thought that I could fit so much into such a relatively brief time, and by the same token, I’ve never learned so much in two months.
U.Va. provided about 250 of the 800 or so health professionals that staffed this weekend’s Remote Area Medical (RAM) Health Expedition in Wise, Virginia. After a five-hour drive to Wise, they helped provide care to almost 2,000 people on the first day of the three-day clinic, reports the Kingsport (Tenn.) Times-News.
Click here to watch a Times-News video that gives a good feel for RAM.
On Tuesday, July 28, at noon, Provost Arthur Garson, Jr. will be part of a Washington think tank discussion of how public policies used to curb smoking in America could be applied to shrink the rapidly growing epidemic of American obesity and shave billions from our national healthcare bills.
Think taxes on fattening foods, clearer nutrition labels and banning the advertising of junk food. Similar measures helped halve adult tobacco use over four decades.
If it worked for puffers, can it work for overeaters? In this New York Times article, Paul Krugman explains how an anti-obesity campaign will face obstacles that weren’t around when the anti-smoking push took off in the 1970s.
Update:Click here to download or read highlights from the new paper, “Reducing Obesity: Policy Strategies from the Tobacco Wars,” co-authored by Garson, U.Va. professor and health policy analyst Carolyn L. Engelhard and Stan Dorn, a senior research associate at the Urban Institute.
People at the U.Va. Health System are preparing for the annual Remote Area Medical Clinic, which begins tomorrow in Wise. The Health System’s media relations team has a nice package about the preparations. focusing on the medical and nursing students who will be participating.
If you haven’t heard about the RAM Clinic, it’s a remarkable operation. every year, thousands of people line up in the pre-dawn hours to be seen by hundreds of volunteer health care workers. Most have little or no health insurance, and rely on the free care offered.
The Hook has a nice piece today, the 40th anniversary of the Apollo moon landing, with Kathryn Thornton, associate dean for graduate programs in U.Va.’s School of Engineering and Applied Science and a former NASA shuttle astronaut.
“I remember seeing them walk on the moon and walking outside and thinking people are up there,” Thornton says. “It was a pretty amazing moment.”
Despite her excitement about the moon landing, Thornton didn’t see a future for herself in space.
“At the time it wasn’t an option (for women),” Thorton says.
Ever notice how an ankle, once sprained, has the tendency to be sprained again and again?
A New York Times blog post, featuring Jay Hertel, an associate professor of kinesiology at the University of Virginia and an expert on the ankle, has great advice for fixing “bad” ankles.
The U.Va. Health System has an interesting note out
