The University of New Mexico

Category Archives: Health Sciences

3rd Annual Walgreen’s Charity Golf Tournament to Benefit UNM Children’s Hospital

May 15, 2013 | By Steve Carr

Wal­greens Cor­po­ra­tion hosts the 3rd Annual Walgreen’s “Help­ing New Mexico’s Chil­dren Get Well and Stay Well” Char­ity Golf Tour­na­ment on Fri­day, June 7 at Isleta Eagle Golf Course. The tour­na­ment, which ben­e­fits UNM’s Children’s Hos­pi­tal, begins with at 8 a.m. with check-in and a 9 a.m. shot­gun start.

The entry fee for the tour­na­ment is $150 for sin­gle play­ers and $500 for a four­some. Prizes, a silent auc­tion and meals are all included in the price of reg­is­tra­tion ($150 for a sin­gle player and $500 for a team). For more infor­ma­tion or to signup, con­tact Ben Peters at (505) 898‑0971.

Come out and sup­port the UNM Children’s Hos­pi­tal and New Mexico’s small­est patients.

Posted in Campus Community, Events, Health Sciences | |

‘Qualitative Research Methods with Children and Adolescents’ Topic of Discussion

May 13, 2013 | By Steve Carr

UNM’s Com­mu­nity Based Pre­ven­tion Research Pro­fes­sional Devel­op­ment Series fea­tures Dr. Julia Mered­ith Hess who will dis­cuss “Qual­i­ta­tive Research Meth­ods with Chil­dren and Ado­les­cents” on Tues­day, May 21 from 12 to 1 p.m. at the Research Incu­ba­tor Build­ing (RIB) Com­mons located on the UNM cam­pus at 2703 Fron­tier NE. Atten­dees are invited to bring your lunch.

Chil­dren and teens are at par­tic­u­lar devel­op­men­tal and life stages, with their own per­spec­tives, expe­ri­ences and vul­ner­a­bil­i­ties, and they are often per­ceived as per­plex­ing or chal­leng­ing as research par­tic­i­pants. In this sem­i­nar, a dis­cus­sion of qual­i­ta­tive meth­ods for con­duct­ing research with kids, includ­ing inter­views, par­tic­i­pant obser­va­tion, focus groups Pho­toVoice, audio diaries, jour­nal­ing, research via social media (e.g. Face­book, Twit­ter) and par­tic­i­pa­tory research. Come share your own expe­ri­ence and learn some­thing new to try in your next research project.

Hess is a cul­tural anthro­pol­o­gist whose pri­mary research inter­ests are the health and well-being of migrants, includ­ing refugees and immi­grants. Since join­ing the PRC in 2009, she has devel­oped a par­tic­u­lar focus on research with youth. She has been the lead qual­i­ta­tive data ana­lyst on research projects with Native Amer­i­cans and recently reset­tled refugees (Dr. Jes­sica Good­kind, PhD, PI). Hess is a co-editor/co-author of an edited vol­ume, Every­day Rup­tures: Chil­dren, Youth, and Migra­tion in Global Per­spec­tive edited by Coe, et al (Van­der­bilt Uni­ver­sity Press, 2011).

For more infor­ma­tion con­tact Theresa Cruz at (505) 272‑4462 or by email, ThCruz@salud.unm.edu

Posted in Campus Community, Events, Health Sciences | |

Jonathan Abrams MD Art Gallery Exhibition Features Art of David Drummond

May 9, 2013 | By Steve Carr

“Slick Rock Dawn,” David Drummond

The Jonathan Abrams MD Art Gallery at the Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico Hos­pi­tal will host a pub­lic recep­tion for its cur­rent exhi­bi­tion, “David Drum­mond — Recent Works.” The recep­tion will be held Fri­day, May 10 from 4 to 6 p.m. at the Jonathan Abrams MD Art Gallery located in the Fifth Floor of Ambu­la­tory Care Cen­ter. The exhibit will be on dis­play Fri­day, May 10 through June 7, 2013. The gallery is open week­days, 8 a.m. to 6 p.m.

Drum­mond has made a name for him­self as one of the Southwest’s most rec­og­nized water­col­orists. He’s a real­ist who’s in love with the West. Dur­ing the past 14 years, Drum­mond has had 14 paint­ings included in the National Arts for the Parks top 100, eight in the Sec­ond 100 show, and has exhib­ited every year since the incep­tion of the Mini 100.

“Art is about com­mu­ni­ca­tion and beauty. I paint what I love at, hop­ing to bring that same emo­tion to the viewer,” Drum­mond said.

Drum­mond has exhib­ited in numer­ous national juried shows includ­ing the Amer­i­can Water­color Soci­ety Annual Exhi­bi­tion, Water­color West, Geor­gia Water­color Soci­ety National Exhibit, Rocky Moun­tain National, and the San Diego Inter­na­tional Exhi­bi­tion. Drummond’s Art’s For the Parks pieces have been made into posters, cal­en­dars and post­cards, and fea­tured in a spe­cial “Arts From the Parks” book.

For more infor­ma­tion, call Chris Fen­ton at 272‑9700 or email: cfenton@salud.unm.edu

Posted in Campus Community, Events, Health Sciences | |

UNM Cancer Center Scientists Discover Novel Chemical That Controls Cell Behavior

April 18, 2013 | By UCAM

It’s the spread of the orig­i­nal can­cer tumor that kills most peo­ple. That’s why can­cer researchers vig­or­ously search for drugs that can pre­vent metas­tases, the spread of can­cer. The Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico Can­cer Cen­ter research team co-led by Angela Wandinger-Ness and Larry Sklar has found a chem­i­cal com­pound that appears to con­trol cell migra­tion and adhe­sion, two impor­tant char­ac­ter­is­tics of metasta­tic can­cer cells. The team recently pub­lished a paper describ­ing how the first-in-class com­pound acts on var­i­ous cells.

Wandinger-Ness, pro­fes­sor of Pathol­ogy and direc­tor of the Flu­o­res­cence Microscopy and Cell Imag­ing Shared Resource, stud­ies pro­teins called GTPases. GTPases act like chem­i­cal switches to con­trol how cells behave: how much a cell grows, what shape it assumes, when it enters the next growth stage and how tightly it sticks to its sur­round­ings, among sev­eral hun­dred other things.

Wandinger-Ness was inter­ested in a par­tic­u­lar GTPase called Cdc42; it con­trols cell migra­tion and cell adhesion.

“It’s an impor­tant tar­get in many dis­eases,” Wandinger-Ness said. “Can­cer is just one. But there were no com­pounds that tar­get this GTPase.”

So she col­lab­o­rated with Sklar and Tudor Oprea to find a com­pound that did. And they were successful.

Sklar is a pro­fes­sor of Pathol­ogy and co-Leader of the Can­cer Biol­ogy and Biotech­nol­ogy Research Group at the UNM Can­cer Cen­ter. He cre­ated and now over­sees the UNM Cen­ter for Mol­e­c­u­lar Discovery.

Oprea is a pro­fes­sor of Med­i­cine and co-director of the Flow Cytom­e­try & High Through­put Screen­ing Shared Resource at the UNM Can­cer Cen­ter. He ana­lyzed Cdc42 using three-dimensional mol­e­c­u­lar ren­der­ing soft­ware. The team used Oprea’s analy­sis of Cdc42 to visu­al­ize how a com­pound might inter­act with the Cdc42 GTPase to sti­fle its activ­ity. Then they searched for such a com­pound in the UNM Mol­e­c­u­lar Dis­cov­ery library.

The search process was akin to find­ing a nee­dle in a haystack, but the lat­est high through­put flow cytom­e­try equip­ment and mol­e­c­u­lar ren­der­ing soft­ware avail­able at the UNM Can­cer Cen­ter sped up their analy­sis sig­nif­i­cantly. The team ana­lyzed thou­sands of com­pound can­di­dates by first nar­row­ing their search to the few hun­dred likely can­di­dates and then test­ing those against sev­eral kinds of GPTases at a time.

“From a purely dis­cov­ery per­spec­tive, that’s a high impact, novel way to look for small mol­e­cules,” Sklar said.

The com­pound they found is called CID2950007.

Struc­turally sim­i­lar to NSAIDs — non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs — CID2950007 restrains the Cdc42 GTPase from chang­ing a cell’s cytoskele­ton. Much like a skele­ton gives a human body shape, a cell’s cytoskele­ton keeps the cell from col­laps­ing on itself. The cytoskele­ton enables a cell to move by grow­ing amoeba-like legs called filopo­dia. Cdc42 also helps to keep cells where they need to be by enabling them to adhere more tightly to their sur­round­ings. So, while uncon­trolled growth and move­ment are hall­marks of metasta­tic can­cer cells, growth and adher­ence are impor­tant traits for healthy cells. Tightly con­trol­ling just how Cdc42 causes a cell to behave is crucial.

In the paper pub­lished Feb. 4, 2013 and titled “Char­ac­ter­i­za­tion of a Cdc42 Inhibitor and its Use as a Mol­e­c­u­lar Probe,” the team of sci­en­tists report that CID2950007 was the only com­pound they found that affected the Cdc42 GTPase with­out affect­ing any other GTPases. This selec­tiv­ity is impor­tant to con­trol the compound’s effects on a cell.

They also found that the com­pound works by chang­ing the phys­i­cal struc­ture of Cdc42, so it doesn’t destroy Cdc42 but it does con­trol how Cdc42 inter­acts with other pro­teins in the cell. Their stud­ies showed that CID2950007 decreased filopo­dia growth and cell adhe­sion in ovar­ian can­cer cells and pre­vented cell adhe­sion in white blood cells. And their stud­ies demon­strated that CID2950007 blocked Han­tavirus infec­tion in mon­key kid­ney cells. By affect­ing the Cdc42 GTPase, and thus the cytoskele­ton, CID2950007 has the poten­tial to fight not only can­cer but also infec­tious diseases.

Human use of CID2950007 as a can­cer drug is a long way off. Before the Food and Drug Admin­is­tra­tion approves any drug for human use, it first requires the suc­cess­ful results of sev­eral tox­i­c­ity and dose esca­la­tion stud­ies on sev­eral types of ani­mals. Then, the clin­i­cal tri­als process, which can take over 10 years, may begin.

“There are going to be a lot of side effects because these adhe­sion pro­teins have many other func­tions,” Sklar said.

So refin­ing CID2950007 into a drug will take fur­ther col­lab­o­ra­tion and stud­ies before tox­i­c­ity stud­ies and dose esca­la­tion stud­ies can begin. To refine the com­pound, the UNM Can­cer Cen­ter researchers will con­tinue to col­lab­o­rate with Jef­frey Aubé, Kansas Uni­ver­sity Dis­tin­guished Pro­fes­sor of Med­i­c­i­nal Chem­istry, and Jen­nifer Golden, assis­tant direc­tor of the Spe­cial­ized Chem­istry Cen­ter at Kansas Uni­ver­sity. Still, con­trol of GTPase Cdc42 offers promise as a way to con­trol can­cer metastasis.

“There’s a lot of enthu­si­asm for a com­pound like this — because there weren’t any,” Wandinger-Ness said. “This is a first-in-class.”

Paper ref­er­ence “Char­ac­ter­i­za­tion of a Cdc42 Inhibitor and its Use as a Mol­e­c­u­lar Probe,” was pub­lished online in the Jour­nal of Bio­log­i­cal Chem­istry on Feb. 4, 2013 (http://www.jbc.org/) . Authors are: Lin Hong (Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico); S. Ray Ken­ney (Uni­verisity of New Mex­ico); Genevieve K. Phillips (UNM Can­cer Cen­ter); Denise Simp­son (Uni­verisity of Kansas); Chad E. Schroeder (Uni­verisity of Kansas); Julica Nöth (Uni­verisity of Kansas); Elsa Romero (Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico); Scar­lett Swan­son (Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico); Anna Waller (Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico); J. Jacob Strouse (Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico); Mark Carter (Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico); Alexan­dre Chi­gaev (UNM Can­cer Cen­ter); Oleg Ursu (UNM Can­cer Cen­ter); Tudor Oprea (UNM Can­cer Cen­ter); Brian Hjelle (Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico); Jen­nifer E. Golden (Uni­verisity of Kansas); Jef­frey Aubé (Uni­verisity of Kansas); Lau­rie G. Hud­son (UNM Can­cer Cen­ter); Tione Buranda (Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico); Larry A. Sklar, co-senior author (UNM Can­cer Cen­ter); Angela Wandinger-Ness, co-senior author (UNM Can­cer Center).

Posted in Health Sciences, Research, University News | |

UNM Health Sciences Center Hosts 2013 Health Disparities Joint Conference

April 2, 2013 | By Mara Kerkez

The Health Sci­ences Cen­ter at the Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico, in con­junc­tion with the New Mex­ico Cares Health Dis­par­i­ties Cen­ter and the New Mex­ico Pub­lic Health Asso­ci­a­tion, hosts the 2013 National Health Dis­par­i­ties Joint Con­fer­ence “Dis­par­ity to Equity: Strate­gies and Solu­tions” Thursday-Friday, April 18–19 at the Hyatt Regency Down­town, located at 330 Tijeras Ave. N.W.

The con­fer­ence hosts two keynote speak­ers: Linda Rae Mur­ray, chief med­ical offi­cer of the Cook County Depart­ment of Health, and Junius Gon­za­les, provost and vice pres­i­dent for aca­d­e­mic affairs at the Uni­ver­sity of Texas-El Paso.

The event aims to bring together dis­par­i­ties researchers, health care providers, pub­lic health prac­ti­tion­ers and com­mu­nity mem­bers from across the coun­try and state, to share strate­gies and solu­tions to build efforts to decrease health dis­par­i­ties and increase health equity in New Mexico.

Reg­is­tra­tion is required. To view fees and reg­is­ter, visit: Dis­par­ity to Equity.

Posted in Events, Health Sciences | |

UNM Child Abuse Prevention Partnership announces ‘Precious Gems Gala’

April 1, 2013 | By UCAM

The Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico Child Abuse Pre­ven­tion Part­ner­ship (NM-CAPP) hosts its first “Pre­cious Gems Gala” on Sat­ur­day, April 20, 5:30–10:30 p.m. at the Hyatt Regency Down­town Albuquerque.

The pub­lic is invited to gala for a daz­zling evening of din­ing and danc­ing, and a silent auc­tion to raise funds and aware­ness for the pre­ven­tion of child abuse in New Mex­ico. Tick­ets are $100 per per­son, or a table of 10 for $1,000. Pro­ceeds will ben­e­fit the NM-CAPP, a group born of UNM Children’s Hos­pi­tal and Car­rie Tin­gley Hos­pi­tal front line lead­er­ship, physi­cians and staff who see daily the effects of child abuse in our state.

In 2010, New Mex­ico had the sec­ond high­est rate of deaths in the nation at 3.74 per 100,000. In 2009, New Mex­ico had 30,235 total refer­rals for child abuse and neglect, and 3,328 chil­dren were indi­cated as abused or neglected; a rate of 11.2 per 1,000 children.

NM-CAPP is a con­sor­tium of stake­hold­ers through­out the state, each with its own mis­sion relat­ing to child abuse pre­ven­tion, com­ing together to elim­i­nate child abuse. The col­lab­o­ra­tion of NM-CAPP with these stake­holder orga­ni­za­tions pro­vides a struc­tured, uni­fied, diverse and com­pre­hen­sive approach to the pre­ven­tion of child abuse.

The New Mex­ico Child Abuse Pre­ven­tion Part­ner­ship pro­vides pub­lic aware­ness regard­ing child abuse through the use of pub­lic ser­vice announce­ments, statewide adver­tis­ing cam­paigns and fundrais­ing activities.

  • NM-CAPP brings edu­ca­tion to our NM fam­i­lies in nur­tur­ing, par­ent­ing, and skills for life.
  • NM-CAPP sup­ports our stake­hold­ers in their ini­tia­tives and forges col­lab­o­ra­tions with State and local agen­cies through­out NM.
  • NM-CAPP pro­motes research, edu­ca­tion, pub­lic pol­icy, access, and change.

For more infor­ma­tion, visit New Mex­ico — Child Abuse Pre­ven­tion Part­ner­ship and also the Pre­cious Gems Gala.

Posted in Events, Health Sciences, University News | |

UNM Center for Development and Disability Kicks Off Autism Awareness Month in April

April 1, 2013 | By Mara Kerkez

The Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico School of Med­i­cine Cen­ter for Devel­op­ment and Dis­abil­ity kicks off Autism Aware­ness Month with an invi­ta­tion to go to any Chili’s Restau­rant (a new com­mu­nity part­ner with the CDD) in New Mex­ico any Tues­day in April to raise aware­ness for autism and Camp Ris­ing Sun. Bring in a copy of this flier or men­tion to a server that you are there for Autism Aware­ness and 15 per­cent of the cost of your meal goes to Camp Ris­ing Sun.

Camp Ris­ing Sun was founded in 2006 by a group of par­ents and pro­fes­sion­als who wished for a sum­mer camp expe­ri­ence for New Mex­i­cans with Autism Spec­trum Dis­or­ders. In 2009, Camp Ris­ing Sun became a part of The Autism Pro­grams at UNM Cen­ter for Devel­op­ment and Dis­abil­ity. The pro­grams of Camp Ris­ing Sun are accred­ited by the Amer­i­can Camp­ing Asso­ci­a­tion (ACA).

For more infor­ma­tion on Camp Ris­ing Sun, visit: www.camprisingsunnm.org

For more infor­ma­tion on the UNM Cen­ter for Devel­op­ment and Dis­abil­ity, visit: http://www.cdd.unm.edu

Posted in Events, Health Sciences | |

Hospital Donation Key to Cozy Concert

February 28, 2013 | By UCAM

Karen-Lynn Fiato and Dr. Court­ney Johnson.

Tucked into a toasty cor­ner of the Bar­bara & Bill Richard­son Pavil­ion on a cold win­ter night, UNM Hos­pi­tal patients and staff, along with Health Sci­ences Cen­ter (HSC) employ­ees, were treated to a very spe­cial con­cert made pos­si­ble by the gen­er­ous gift of a Bald­win grand piano by Karen-Lynn Fiato. Fiato donated the instru­ment in mem­ory of her late hus­band, Daniel Garza.

“This was an excep­tional evening of music per­formed by truly tal­ented artists from within UNM’s Health Sci­ences Cen­ter,” said Veron­ica Reed, a pro­fes­sional direc­tor and UNM alum cred­ited with coor­di­nat­ing the evening’s per­for­mance. While the frigid wind howled out­side on an early Jan­u­ary evening, about 60 peo­ple from all cor­ners of UNM’s North Cam­pus gath­ered near the fire­place, sam­pling sump­tu­ous sweets while tak­ing in a breadth of music and enter­tain­ment that included Coun­try West­ern, Clas­si­cal, Jazz, Mid­dle East­ern, and other eth­nic musi­cal gen­res. The price of admis­sion? A book dona­tion to UNM Children’s Hospital.

“This inau­gural pre­sen­ta­tion of ‘Sounds & Sweets’ was a won­der­fully inti­mate event that pulled peo­ple from all parts of our health care home into an ele­gant space in the Pavil­ion to share a unique energy and mood that only live music can evoke,” says UNM Pedi­a­tri­cian Dr. Court­ney John­son, who helped to develop and coor­di­nate the event. “Karen Fiato’s gift is so unusual and won­der­ful. Our patients and staff will enjoy this par­tic­u­lar dona­tion for years to come,” adds Sheena Fer­gu­son, UNM Hospital’s chief nurs­ing offi­cer who accepted the donation.

The idea of such an in-house con­cert came from Johnson’s col­league at Wash­ing­ton Uni­ver­sity School of Med­i­cine in St. Louis, Mo. Delec­table sweets were pro­vided by UNMH Food & Nutri­tion Ser­vices, and the piano was mas­ter­fully tuned by UNM Depart­ment of Music’s Fred Sturm. With col­lab­o­ra­tion from HSC admin­is­tra­tion and staff, the UNM Music Depart­ment, and UNMH admin­is­tra­tion and nurs­ing staff, “Sounds and Sweets” is expected to be an annual event.

“We enjoyed great sup­port from within UNM, but also from Jer­sey Jacks and Serafian’s Ori­en­tal Rugs, who pro­vided addi­tional food and ele­gance for the event,” John­son adds. “It’s impor­tant that we do right by our sup­port­ers. With this par­tic­u­lar gift, we wanted to bring together patients, physi­cians, and staff to cel­e­brate Ms. Fiato’s gen­eros­ity, and to enjoy an eclec­tic blend of musi­cal per­for­mances – a gift to patients of all ages and to those here who help heal.”

Posted in Health Sciences, University News | |

UNM Children’s Hospital Annual Radiothon Set for Feb. 27 — March 1

February 20, 2013 | By Steve Carr

UNM Children’s Hos­pi­tal Annual Radio­thon, broad­cast live on KPEK-FM 100.3 — The Peak from the 6th floor of UNM Children’s Hos­pi­tal, will be held Thursday-Saturday, Feb. 27 — March 1. Jackie, Tony, Don­nie and other on-air per­son­al­i­ties host the event for three days from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. talk­ing with patients, doc­tors, nurses and listeners.

The Radio­thon sup­ports the Children’s Mir­a­cle Net­work Fund at UNM Children’s Hos­pi­tal. In the last eight years, nearly $2.5 mil­lion in pledges have been gen­er­ated from com­mu­nity sup­port dur­ing the Radio­thon. The Radio­thon helps fund pro­grams and state-of-the-art equip­ment that saves children’s lives. These fam­i­lies have ben­e­fited from the gen­eros­ity of lis­ten­ers in past Radio­thon events who opened their hearts and wal­lets so equip­ment and ser­vices needed to treat the tini­est patients were made avail­able right here in New Mexico.

Lis­ten­ers “pledge” their sup­port by call­ing in or vis­it­ing the Radio­thon website.

UNM Children’s Hos­pi­tal treats more than 60,000 chil­dren each year and cares for chil­dren from every county in New Mex­ico regard­less of their family’s abil­ity to pay.

For more infor­ma­tion, visit: Radio­thon. To pledge your sup­port, lis­ten­ers may call (505) 272‑1003 or 1–866-811‑1003. To donate online, visit: Online Giv­ing or on the Radio­thon website.

Posted in Campus Community, Health Sciences | |

University Hospital Art Program Hosts Artist’s Reception with Janet Yagoda Shagam

February 19, 2013 | By Steve Carr

Silk Road 2 relief (wood cut) and hand drawing.

The Uni­ver­sity Hos­pi­tal Art Pro­gram hosts an artist’s recep­tion fea­tur­ing Janet Yagoda Shagam on Fri­day, Feb. 22 from 4 to 6 p.m. The exhi­bi­tion, titled “Marks and Remarks,” opened recently at The Jonathan Abrams MD Art Gallery, Fifth Floor, Ambu­la­tory Care Cen­ter, Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico Hospital.

In 2002, after a nearly 35-year hia­tus, art came back into Shagam’s life. With a focus on print­mak­ing over the past decade, Shagam used mul­ti­ple print media such as lith­o­g­ra­phy, cop­per­plate etch­ing, relief (wood­cut) and col­la­graph. Prints, made from odd matri­ces such as milk car­tons and flat­ten road detri­tus, are a dis­tinc­tive fea­ture of her work.

Shagam’s prints have been exhib­ited in gal­leries and muse­ums through­out the United States, Europe and Asia. In 2010, she was juried into a group show at the Smith­son­ian Insti­tute Rip­ley Gallery. In 2011, Shagam received an Albu­querque 1 per­cent for the Arts grant to pro­duce an edi­tion at the Tamarind Insti­tute and also par­tic­i­pated in two-month art res­i­dency in Venice, Italy.

Call Chris Fen­ton at 272‑9700 or email cfenton@salud.unm.edu for more infor­ma­tion or to pur­chase a work.

The exhi­bi­tion will be on dis­play through Fri­day, April 5, 2013.

Posted in Campus Community, Events, Health Sciences | |