Sen. Ron Stollings honored with Marshall med school award

HUNTINGTON, W.Va. -- During its annual alumni gathering last weekend, the Marshall University School of Medicine gave Sen. Ron Stollings, D-Boone, its 2012 Distinguished Alumnus Award.

Stollings was celebrating his 30th class reunion from the medical school.

"I was eternally honored to receive the medical school's second Distinguished Alumnus Award," Stollings said. "It was great to see my fellow classmates.

"During my response last Friday evening, I shared the award with all the significant mentors on my life. Many were in the room," Stollings said.

Dr. Elizabeth Spangler, now at the Charleston Area Medical Center, received the first Distinguished Alumnus Award from Marshall's medical school.

Stollings is board certified and specializes in internal medicine today. Previously, he was also certified in geriatric medicine for 10 years.

Stollings is a partner of the Madison Medical Group in downtown Madison, along with Dr. Robert Adkins and Dr. Mark Snyder.

"I thanked my fellow physicians for covering for me and allowing me to do all the public service I have done over the years."

First elected to the West Virginia Senate in 2006, Stollings is now chairman of the Senate Health and Human Resources Committee.

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Sen. Ron Stollings honored with Marshall med school award

Vicki Sato, professor of management practice, Harvard Business School

Tuesday, September 11, 2012

Its no surprise that a pervading theme at a conference Monday sponsored jointly by Pfizer Inc. and the Harvard Business School Health Industry Alumni Association was the growing trend toward partnerships between pharmaceutical companies and academia.

What was a surprise, however, was the time and attention focused on the limits of such partnerships at this weeks event, titled Innovation and Entrepreneurship in Drug Discovery and Development: Emerging Business Trends in Biomedicine. Conflict of interest issues in recent years - some of which have involved Harvard Medical School itself - were addressed by many of the speakers, including, notably, a talk by Jeffrey Flier, dean of Harvard Medical School.

But one speaker with the distinction of being on both sides of the equation - in academia as well as industry - was Vicki Sato, former president and chief scientific officer at Vertex Pharmaceuticals and vice president of research at Biogen Inc. who now serves as a professor at Harvard. She said that research partnerships between universities and pharmaceutical companies are needed more than ever as industry doesnt have the money to spend on discovery, and universities - which are short on funds themselves - are looking for corporate sponsors. Whether such partnerships have been a benefit to either side yet, she said, is yet to be seen.

The jury is still out, because weve yet to see sustained medical output from one of these partnerships, Sato said from the podium of the Joseph P. Martin Conference Center on the Harvard Medical School campus.

Sato said that strict conflict of interest rules have changed the dynamic between industry and academia. We no longer trade pens with Pfizer. We now trade lab notes, she said. But the fundamental differences in the end goal of each side - academia to do pure research, and pharmaceutical companies to make drugs - lead to inevitable tensions over the amount of secrecy needed, ownership of new discoveries, speed of research and mutual financial dependence, she said.

Sato sees a middle ground between pure and applied research for which she uses the term Pasteurs quadrant, taken from a 1997 book of the same name by Donald Stokes. She said that historically, drug companies have approached research from the standpoint of practical invention, in the style of Thomas Edison inventing the light bulb through trial and error. She used the term, Edisonian quadrant to describe a mode of research driven toward a specific end goal.

For many years, pharmaceutical science was very much in that quadrant... now were in a different place in how we think about drug discovery, she said. Namely, she said, in a kind of research which is aimed both at expanding the body of knowledge as well as finding new drugs. While such an approach may be new to both sides, and comes with its own tensions, she said the key will be getting young people involved, looking for the right problems to solve, and, of course, a big commitment of money.

The evolution of drug discovery is one of collaboration. Were discovering together, she said.

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Sato: Academic-pharma partnerships fraught with tension

LAKE FOREST, Ill.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--

Move over, gamers avatars arent just for entertainment anymore. While most graduate business schools prepare their MBA students for the world of business that awaits them after graduation, Lake Forest Graduate School of Management (LFGSM) is changing the game by immersing a new cohort of students into that world of business through an innovative approach to learning. In LFGSMs new Immersion MBA (iMBA) program, part-time students live out the experiences of business by being the primary actors in a simulated corporate environment where colleagues are avatars and business problems play out on the computer screen rather than through case studies in a classroom. This virtual-reality curriculum is available anywhere in the world, and takes LFGSMs 66-year heritage and its expertise in providing practical business learning from 100% business leaders to a new, and perhaps unexpected, level.

Lake Forest iMBA students will graduate not just with a degree, but with a degree of meaningful experience, explains LFGSM President and CEO John Popoli. As more and more millennials join the workforce, it is increasingly critical that they can demonstrate a true understanding of how business works. Imagine being a hiring manager choosing between two candidates for a job both candidates each have a bachelors degree and two years of work experience in a marketing department, but one candidate has an MBA through which she participated in mergers and acquisitions, projects to improve manufacturing efficiency, sensitive HR issues, and financial analysis. Who would you hire or promote?

Since its founding in 1946, Lake Forest Graduate School has been the Chicago areas only independent, not-for-profit, accredited business school that focuses exclusively on serious working professionals. Its flagship program, the Leadership MBA, has graduated more than 8,000 alumni and has produced entrepreneurs, not-for-profit executives, and C-level leaders across the Fortune 500. Historically, the kind of rigorous, practical learning available in the Leadership MBA program was only available to candidates with significant work experience; the average Leadership MBA student at Lake Forest is 38 years old with 14 years of professional experience. Now, LFGSM has developed a way to offer the unique value and experience of its practical MBA model to aspiring professionals who have as little as one year of work experience. The Immersion Master in Business Administration (iMBA) is a different path to the Lake Forest MBA credential, and one that is best suited to professionals early in their careers who want to rapidly develop and practice critical business skills.

A typical student in our Leadership MBA program, explained LFGSM Vice President of R&D and Innovation, Kathy Leck, is an Abbott scientist, a CDW sales manager, a marketer from Kraft, a Motorola engineer, or an Allstate finance professional. Those professionals come to Lake Forest Graduate School mid-way through their careers to help them get a broader perspective outside their area of functional expertise and to work on their leadership skills so they can rise even higher. Our new iMBA program, on the other hand, attracts professionals earlier in their business careers when they have perhaps just a few years of experience, or when they are transitioning from a non-business career, like nursing or the military. iMBA students are men and women who like to learn by doing and are looking for a chance to earn a been there, done that perspective on how organizations really run, but dont want to wait another 10 or 15 years into their career to get that perspective.

What makes the iMBA program so powerful and unique is not that its delivered online, but that its virtual reality learning environment engages students emotionally and intellectually, and leaves them with memorable, sticky learning that they can apply on the job right away and for years to come. The virtual reality platform for the iMBA takes what we know to be effective about other kinds of simulated learning like flight simulators for pilots and surgical simulators for medical students and applies it to the world of business, where the stakes are arguably higher than ever. Mentoring, networking and career services are built into the program, too.

Students in the iMBA program become management trainees in a simulated manufacturing company, where they spend time in each of the fictional companys key departments, such as finance, marketing and human resources, corresponding to the curriculum. They interact with other classmates from various geographies, computer-generated colleagues and customers inside the online platform, and business-leader faculty from the Chicagoland area and beyond encountering and handling situations they will eventually face in the actual corporate world. LFGSM faculty members help students translate the learning to their current jobs and understand how their performance in the virtual reality informs their careers.

We feel immersion-based learning is the next generation of online education. LFGSM iMBA students will have an advantage over their peers in the job market, having already interacted, managed and navigated a corporate environment, says Popoli. We can offer employers graduates who already have hands-on experience in multiple departments. And what we offer to students is powerful and unique. With an estimated 60% of millennials wanting to start their own businesses someday, the practical approach of the iMBA allows these future business owners to experience major business scenarios in the safety of the virtual environment.

The program is ideal for aspiring leaders seeking a career boost as well as those transitioning out of non-business professions. LFGSMs iMBA program enables students who may be unfamiliar with the corporate world to confidently and quickly gain practical experience they can add to their resumes.

The 22-month MBA program is 100% online and is designed to fit into busy schedules. Admission requirements include a Bachelors degree and at least one year of professional work experience. To learn more about the Lake Forest Graduate School of Management iMBA, view a program demo now, fill out the inquiry form at http://www.immersion.lfgsm.edu or contact an enrollment counselor at 800-890-7340.

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Lake Forest Graduate School of Management Introduces the Next Generation of Online Learning

JOINED: Weirton native Dr. Raymond Hinerman, DDS, is now on the staff of the ear, nose, throat, head and neck surgery at Medical Park in Wheeling.

Certified by the American Board of Otolaryngology, he is a graduate of the West Virginia University Dental School with an additional residency in hospital dentistry. He had a general dentistry practice in the Elkins area before graduating from WVU Medical School. During a five-year residency in otolaryngology at WVU Hospitals, he researched and authored several publications concerning the outcome of endoscopic sinus surgery in children with allergies as well as smoke exposure.

As an assistant professor in otolaryngology at WVU hospital, he received the B.G. Slaughter Fitz-Hugh Research Award for the southern section Triological Society and has presented and an eight-year review of frontal sinus fractures at WVU.

Hinerman previously was an associate at Morgantown ENT with surgery privileges at Ruby Memorial Hospital and Mon General Hospital. He comes to Wheeling from Abingdon ENT in Bristol, Va., and is presently a member of American Academy of Otolaryngology, American Medical Association and American Academy of Otolaryngic Allergy.

Hinerman, a 1987 graduate of Weir High School, can be reached at (304) 234-2060.

DIRECTOR: Shane T. Stack is now the full-time director of alumni relations at West Liberty University.

Stack graduated from WLU in 2010 with a degree in business administration. He previously was employed with the WLU Research Corp. as program director.

While an undergraduate, Stack served two terms as student body president and was the student representative and voting member on the WLU board of governors. A native of Powhatan Point, he has served as treasurer for the town of West Liberty for three years. He resides in Wheeling.

PROMOTED: Anne Grealy is now executive director of state government affairs for FirstEnergy.

In this role, she will oversee legislative strategies in the company's Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, West Virginia and Maryland service areas as well as in areas where the company's competitive subsidiary, FirstEnergy Solutions, is active, including Illinois and Michigan. She also will act as the company's liaison with public utilities commissions.

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Quick Takes

Big Pharma is going back to school.

To help reverse a decline in drug pipelines, pharmaceutical giant Pfizer Inc. and Harvard Business Schools Health Industry Alumni Association host a conference today chronicling both the complexities of bringing drugs to market, and how collaborations between academia and Big Pharma are giving the drug developers a much-needed shot in the arm.

Innovation and drug discovery and development is happening in academia and in biotech, and Boston is a renowned center for biotech, said conference co-chairman Wolfgang Klietmann, a lecturer on pathology at Harvard Medical School. The two sides have to reunite to achieve innovation in drug discovery and overcome the attrition of the pipelines, which is a major concern overall in the drug development industry.

The conference will be held at Harvard Medical Schools Joseph P. Martin Conference Center.

Klietmann, citing a recent gene transfer partnership between Novartis and the University of Pennsylvania, said its essential for academic physician-scientists to think past the notion of industriophobia, as new drugs can cost up to $1.5 billion and take an average of 12 years to develop.

There is a necessity for a more natural collaboration, and medical schools and also the industry are very well aware of it, he said. I sense here a new climate for openness.

Along with panel discussions, guest speakers include Harvard Business School professor Clayton Christensen and 23andMe co-founder Anne Wojcicki, who will discuss the role of social entrepreneurship in the future of medicine. Wojcicki is the wife of Google co-founder Sergey Brin.

Conference co-chairman Jose Carlos Gutierrez-Ramos of Pfizer will discuss the companys Centers of Therapeutic Innovation, which unite scientists from academia with Pfizer drug hunters in order to translate novel ideas into efficient medicines.

Pfizer, which has research units in Kendall Square, currently has CTIs in San Diego, New York and Boston that work with 23 academic medical centers, including nine in the Hub.

Gutierrez-Ramos, Pfizers senior vice president and head of biotherapeutics research and development, said another goal of the conference is to generate more entrepreneurs from the venture capital world or Big Pharma who can focus on drug development for the long-term.

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Unclogging the drug pipeline

MICHIGAN CITY Eight new teachers have joined the ranks at Michigan City High School this year. Four of these teachers are assigned to special education classes, one to physical education, one to English, one to German and one to industrial technology.

Valerie Beglin was born and raised in Evansville, Ind., and recently relocated to Michigan City after completing her education and special education degrees at Indiana University. She taught at Knapp Elementary as a special education and a second grade teacher.

After taking time off to raise her children, Beglin is returning to the classroom to as a co-teacher of English 10.

Charles Brennan was raised in La Porte County and attended Michigan City Area Schools. He is a Rogers High School graduate of the class of 1988.

Brennan decided to go back into teaching this year and said he is looking forward to a long career teaching autoCad and life and careers at MCHS.

Laura Diemer is a resident of Michigan City and a 2006 graduate of Michigan City High School. As a beginning teacher, she will teach first-year German to high school students.

Diemer graduated from Valparaiso University in 2011 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in German and secondary education. She spent a year studying abroad in Tuebingen, Germany while at Valparaiso University.

Diemer is hoping to assist with the German Club activities at the high school and help out during the foreign exchange program this spring.

Andrew Eubank comes to Michigan City High School as a physical education, health and strength training teacher and assistant football and track coach, and will be the JV basketball coach this spring. He is originally from Logansport, Ind.

Eubank holds a Bachelors of Science from Purdue University in West Lafayette in physical education. He has coached basketball for seven years at four schools and also coached football and track for three years.

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Three MCAS alumni among new teachers at high school

After graduation students ultimately have two options: enter the workforce or continue their education. Though students can wait to start sending out job applications, several graduate programs require planning and forethought.

Medical schools and law schools require that applicants take the MCAT or LSAT either the summer before or the fall of their senior year. But one of the first things students can do to prepare for graduate school is to have a strong GPA.

I wish someone wouldve reiterated that your GPA matters, said Emily Pence 10, a current student at Indiana Universitys Maurer Law School. She, like many of the panelists at the Life after DePauw forum on Thursday, encouraged the use of the Kaplan Prep courses for their respective graduate school tests.

About 24 percent of DePauw students typically enter further post graduate education, said Bill Tobin, director of Institutional Research. Six percent of those students head to either law school or medical school with the other 18 percent pursuing post-graduate education in a variety of fields, according to Tobin.

Michelle Sollman Sharp08, who went studied occupational therapy post-grad at Marian University, said students should be your own advocate meaning that it is ultimately the students responsibility to search out deadlines and the processes that are required for their respective graduate schools.

Adrienne Cobb 09 wishes that she had followed preparation more closely while she was at DePauw.

Since we dont have a set pre-med major, I didnt have someone to spell it out for me, Cobb said.

As a result, she and several of the other panelists, especially those who went into the medical field, nearly missed deadlines to apply for graduate school.

Although the application process to graduate school is in many ways similar to the application process for undergraduate institutions, the differences end there. According to the panelists, the biggest changes between life at DePauw and graduate programs are the class size and the specialty necessarily involved in graduate studies.

You are focused on one area, Sharp said. The fun sociology class no longer exists.

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Graduate school alumni offer advice to hopefuls

Steve Marcus

Dr. Aimee Fleury confers with Dr. Nick Spirtos, medical director of the Womens Cancer Center of Nevada, at the center Thursday, Sept. 6, 2012. Fleury, a gynecologic oncologist, joined the center thisAugust.

By Conor Shine (contact)

Sunday, Sept. 9, 2012 | 2 a.m.

When the Veterans Affairs Medical Center opened last month in North Las Vegas, it was hailed by local and national leaders as a major step forward for delivering healthcare in the valley.

The $600 million, 1-million-square-foot building, which is stocked with state-of-the-art technology and provides a centralized location for a variety of specialized clinics, is expected to improve the quality of care for veterans and will allow the VA to increase the number of Southern Nevada patients it serves by a third to 60,000.

The only problem: There arent enough doctors on staff to handle the influx of new patients.

A doctor shortage has long been plagued Nevada, which consistently ranks near the bottom nationally in doctor-to-patient ratios. In 2011, the most recent figures available, Nevada had 171 physicians for every 100,000 of its residents.

With affordable housing, good weather and a medical industry thats easier to break into than in older, more-established cities, Las Vegas is an attractive option for many doctors.

But a lack of residency and fellowship programs especially in specialty areas like gastroenterology and head and neck surgery makes it difficult to train enough doctors in state to meet the demand, forcing hospitals to look out-of-state when recruiting physicians.

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Shiny, new VA hospital suffers from longtime Nevada malady: doctor shortages

As the Ateneo de Naga HS Class 62 celebrates its 50th graduation anniversary, it is but fitting that our class pays tribute to one member who turned out to be our brightest star and one of the schools most outstanding and most accomplished alumni.

Uldarico V. Brizuela is better known by his nickname Rico.

Rico is one Atenean who has brought honor, glory and goodwill to his alma mater. He joins a long list of distinguished alumni who had done the same thingthe late Raul S. Roco perhaps the most notable of them all, owing to his 2004 run for the Philippine presidency; as well as Sandiganbayan Chief Justice Francis Garchitorena; former Comelec chair Ramon Felipe Jr.; former PCGG chair Ramon Diaz; Camarines Sur Gov. Lray Villafuerte; constitutionalist Joaquin Bernas, SJ; and the late Interior Secretary Jesse Robredo.

These people had one thing in common. They were all involved in politics and public service.

But Rico is of a different mold. He feels he can contribute more to society by being a productive, caring and law-abiding private citizen, far from the temptations of graft and corruption, which is the bane of most politicians.

Humble beginnings

From humble beginnings in his hometown, Pili, Camarines Sur, he went to high school in Naga City and college at the Mapua Institute of Technology. Through sheer determination and hard work, he found entrepreneurial success in the business of cargo international airfreight forwarding, as chair of Airlift Asia Inc. (AAI). He also became one of the biggest benefactors of Ateneo de Naga.

Even before Rico institutionalized his philanthropy in 2002 by establishing his R.V. Brizuela Foundation Inc., and registering it as a non-stock, nonprofit corporation with the Securities and Exchange Commission, he had already manifested and demonstrated his generosity to his AAI management team and employees by providing them a very competitive salary structure, a fair and objective employee performance appraisal system, and mid-year and Christmas bonuses equivalent to one months salary every time AAI hit its targets and improved the bottom line.

He was also the catalyst behind the formation of an AAI Employee Multi-Purpose Cooperative, because he believed that some of the needs of AAI employees could be met through this type of organization.

And he opened a scholarship program at the Ateneo de Naga for indigent but deserving high school students, as a way of giving back to the school for the valuable education he received from it.

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Living the Atenean ideal