Dartmouth Medicine Spring 1999
Dear Reporter, Editor, or News Director:
Inside the Spring 1999 issue of Dartmouth Medicine, (to request a printed copy, call 603-653-0772 or e-mail dartmed@Dartmouth.edu), read about:
The first Navajo woman surgeon in the country: Could the high-tech world of the OR possibly have anything to learn from the ancient hands-on ways of Navajo healers? Yes, indeed, if you're asking Dartmouth Medical School's Dr. Lori Alvord. See page 20.
When a get-well card takes wing: A class of fourth-graders, inspired by a story their art teacher had read to them, committed to folding a thousand paper cranes as a get-well wish for their teacher when she was diagnosed with lymphoma. The cranes will soon be hung in Dartmouth's Norris Cotton Cancer Center, where their teacher (who is doing well) was treated. See page 3.
What the public thinks about science: If the early registrants for the first session of the Dartmouth Community Medical School are any indication, they're fascinated by the field. The seven-week lineup of classes on topics from genetics to heart disease has attracted much interest. See page 4.
What medical students have to teach prison inmates--and vice versa: When medical student volunteers teach health to inmates in three Vermont prisons, the learning goes both ways. See page 7.
A new medical journal about clinical practice: A member of the Dartmouth Medical School faculty is the editor of a new journal titled Effective Clinical Practice. Its subject matter is not lab-based scientific research but the front-line doctor's office. See page 10.
How Dartmouth helped in Honduras: The far-reaching effects of Hurricane Mitch's devastation in Honduras last fall have been in the news again recently. Several members of the Dartmouth medical community don't need those reminders of the difficulties Hondurans face--they were there, volunteering their medical skills, during and since the storm. See page 10.
When the "classroom" is the community: Faculty at an academic medical center don't just teach residents and students--often the audience for educational and support services is patients and their caregivers, especially family members caring for those with an illness like Alzheimer's. See page 18.
What to do when counting sheep isn't enough: Dartmouth's sleep laboratory was only the third such facility in the country when it was founded in 1971. The physician who now heads it details how the field has grown since then and why treatment of sleep disorders is so important. See page 42.
The "whys" of medical research: There has been a shift in recent decades from investigating the "what" and "where" and "when" questions of medical science to exploring the "whys" of biological processes. This increasing emphasis on mechanisms, maintains Dartmouth Medical School's dean, holds extraordinary promise for the future--auguring a transition from palliation to cure. See page 49.
If you'd like to pursue any of these stories, contact:
- Hali Wickner, communications coordinator for Dartmouth Medical School, at (603) 650-1520.
- The Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center Office of Public Affairs, at (603) 650-7041.
Or feel free to give me a call; my direct line is (603) 650-4058.
Dana Cook Grossman,
Editor