Summer 2020 e-News About and For Alumni

September 1, 2020

STUDENT NEWS

Watch a video of students reciting the Hippocratic oath at the official May 6 VP&S virtual graduation ceremony.

Read about the first virtual White Coat Ceremony at VP&S here.

Medical student Lauren Fields’21 won an international poetry prize. Read more.

An Ohio newspaper wrote about the online platform created by VP&S student Vibhu Krishna to honor front-line health care workers, Faces of the Frontline.

A Princeton newspaper wrote about how Isao Anzai, a third-year student at VP&S, helped patients with medical problems unrelated to the virus transition from in-person doctor visits to app-based consultations.

A Columbia Spectator video includes interviews with four VP&S students.

 

VP&S AND CUIMC NEWS

Columbia University President Lee Bollinger announced plans to rename Bard Hall, the student residence on Haven Avenue. Read the president’s message here.

To develop and implement solutions to structural racism, Columbia University Irving Medical Center leadership convened a CUIMC-wide committee co-chaired by Olajide Williams, MD, and Rafael Lantigua, MD, to oversee working groups that are reviewing recruitment, retention and promotion of a diverse workforce; changes needed in education, training, and the curriculum; community programs and relations; health disparities; clinical practice; and professionalism. CUIMC also created a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion website and in June observed nine minutes of silence in response to the death of George Floyd and in recognition of the medical center’s commitment to anti-racism.

View a video that chronicles the medical school’s COVID response.

The Department of Neurological Surgery has a new chair. Read the announcement.  

The Institute of Human Nutrition has a new director. Read the announcement.

The Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center has been competitively renewed as a designated Comprehensive Cancer Center by the NCI. Read more.

How is the pandemic affecting education and other activities at the medical center this fall? Read Interim EVP and Dean Anil Rustgi’s message here.

 

OF HISTORIC INTEREST

Thomas Tuttle, who graduated in 1892 and became a leading public health figure, had an important role in public health measures during past epidemics. This Forbes article calls him “The Dr. Fauci of the 1918 Spanish Flu.” CNN echoed the story.

Did you know that James G. Graham, one of Columbia’s earliest medical students (he attended 1773-74), played an important part in the discovery of the earliest complete mastodon? Read about it in Archives & Special Collections’ blog.

Another blog post from the library’s Archives & Special Collections highlights Alexander Anderson, an early graduate who was both a medical hero of the NYC yellow fever epidemics of 1795 and 1798 and the “father of American wood engraving.” Read more.

Read a review of a book that prominently includes Stewart Alexander’37 and his service in Italy during World War II.

 

A SELECTION OF CLASS NOTES

Edwin Updike’49 and his wife celebrated their 70th wedding anniversary in August. Read more.

Read a newspaper story about the career of Henry Buchwald’57.

Virginia Utermohlen Lovelace’68 gave a virtual talk in June at the Chatham Marconi Maritime Center in Massachusetts about her grandfather’s coordination of the first rescue at sea by wireless. Read more here.

Bill Bergmam’70 has been appointed chief medical officer of St. Matthew’s House in Florida to direct the nonprofit’s addiction recovery programs. Read more here and here.

Phillip Peterson’70 writes a blog titled “GERM GEMS: Microbes in the News.” Read more.

Watch Donald Quest’70 perform during New York City’s 7 p.m. “Clappy Hour.”

Vital Data Technology appointed Alan Spiro’77 chief medical officer in residence. Read more.

Read about the first challenge Louis Brusco Jr.’85 faced in his new role as chief medical officer of Hackensack Meridian Health Raritan Bay Medical Center Old Bridge and Perth Amboy.

Scott Plevy’88 has been named chief science officer of a new company being formed through the combination of Kintai Therapeutics and Senda Biosciences. Read more.

Read an article about the American University of Beirut, led by Fadlo Khuri’89.

Newton-Wellesley Hospital announced Sareh Parangi’90 as the hospital’s new chair of the Department of Surgery. Read more.

Adam Saltman’90 MD/PhD was appointed chief medical officer of Eko, a digital health solutions company. Read more.

Patrick Swier’93 has been recognized by Continental Who’s Who as a top plastic surgeon in acknowledgment for his contributions at the Swier Clinic in Delaware. Read more.

Read about the work of Wassim K. Choucair’94, a cardiologist & electrophysiologist who founded the Heart and Rhythm Institute of South Texas in San Antonio.

Andrew Thomas’99 left Minnesota to return to NYC—and his former room at Bard Hall—to volunteer at NYP during the pandemic. Read his letter home about his experiences.

Read a Chattanooga, Tennessee, newspaper article about a supermarket chain partnering with Reliant Immune Diagnostics, founded by Henry (Hank) Legere’02, to offer MDBox telehealth to customers.

Devinder Singh’02 is the new chief of plastic surgery at the University of Miami Health System and Miller School of Medicine. Read more.

Pediatric urologist Kristin Ann Kozakowski’03 has joined Hackensack Meridian Children’s Health at K. Hovnanian Children’s Hospital. Read more.

Eve Glazier’04 co-authors a syndicated Q&A-style column that runs in several newspapers. Read one recent column in a Kansas newspaper.

Jonathan Horey’06 has opened two new locations of his psychiatry practice in Oregon. Read more.

Read about the COVID-19 patient care experiences of Jenny Thompson’06.

The mayor of Houston named Anjail Sharrief’07 to Houston’s citywide COVID-19 response task force, the Health Equity Response Initiative and Task Force. She also co-chairs the group’s medical care subcommittee. Read more.

Read about Erin Ferenchick’08 and her global health work.

Daniela Lamas’08 wrote an op-ed in the New York Times about being a critical care doctor during the pandemic. Read more.

Michael J. Whalen’08 was selected as Top Urologist of the Year for 2020 by the International Association of Top Professionals. Read more.

Read a first-person contribution by Uzodinma Iweala’11 in Vanity Fair.

View a ColumbiaDoctors video in which Susana Bejar’14 explains her experiences while working as a hospitalist at NYP/Columbia.

Rachel Easterwood’14 organized musical performances for patients, doctors, and other hospital staff at Allen Hospital. Read more.

Elinor Zhou’14 has joined the Melissa L. Posner Institute for Digestive Health and Liver Disease at Mercy Medical Center in Baltimore. Read more.

Wilson Siu’17, a resident in urology at Vanderbilt, was profiled in a resident spotlight this year. Read more.

David Edelman’20 was interviewed on “Admissions Straight Talk,” a podcast for individuals interested in applying to medical and other graduate school programs. Read more.

 

IN MEMORIAM

Paul Lurie’42

Charles Reed’45

Leonard S. Sommer’47

Paul Marks’49

William Revercomb’51

Henry Bernard Holle’54

Roger Woodham Jelliffe’54

Lewis Arnow’57

John Manley Roberts’57

Dwight Robinson’57

Robert Schaefer’58

Richard Baum’59

Peter Berkman’59

Peter Dodge Mott’59

Peter Pressman’59  

John Ryan’61

Anthony Horan’65

Angelo Lopano’65

William B. McCullough’65

Jeffrey Weisberg’69

William Solomon’75

Jay Galst’76

Antoinette Williams-Akita’77

Barbara Winkler Monsanto’78

 

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