An air of optimism is apparent at Brody, and it's not just because spring has arrived. We are well on our way to having a new dean. We have a new executive director for the practice plan. Plans for expansion of the medical student class size are moving forward. In short, we are making progress in many areas.

One area of progress is partnerships. Our Leo W. Jenkins Cancer Center and the Lineberger Cancer Center at UNC-Chapel Hill have signed a formal agreement to work together on clinical and research programs. This agreement will result in sharing clinical trials between the two institutions, which will enhance the care available to cancer patients. It will also create new opportunities for cancer research, which will boost our faculty recruitment activities. Brody has also signed a memorandum of understanding with Eastern Neurosurgical and Spine Associates to make that practice part of ECU and add neurosurgery to our educational and patient care offerings. The addition of these highly respected clinicians is evidence of the vitality of our clinical enterprise. Working with PCMH, we will soon open the East Carolina Endoscopy Center on the third floor of Moye Medical Center.

We are also making progress in updating our medical curriculum. Brody faculty members have been reviewing our curriculum to identify strengths, needs and areas for improvement. We are looking at how courses stack up against national standards, student evaluations of courses and other information. The Curriculum Renewal Task Force is also looking at different models of curriculum organization and various ways to deliver it. We are excited about the possibility of modifying our curriculum, especially as we continue to explore and plan for expansion. This detailed review will allow us to learn from other schools by visiting them and hosting them here. The ultimate goal is to continue providing our students with quality, comprehensive education in the best way possible.

In addition, faculty members in our basic sciences departments are working with leaders of the new ECU School of Dentistry on how Brody and the dental school can collaborate on the basic science curriculum for dental students. Our goal is to have a robust curriculum in place for the first class of dental students in the fall of 2011.

Many thanks go to our faculty for all the hours and thoughtful consideration they are putting into this curriculum work. Their efforts will benefit our students for many years to come.

Chancellor Ballard plans to join us at our April 24 faculty meeting to provide an update and respond to your questions. I look forward to seeing you there.

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Through February, practice plan expenses are outpacing revenues. Total revenues are $121.6 million, while total expenses are $132.6 million. Our budget for this fiscal year plans for a deficit of $2.3 million. We have some ground to make up by June 30 to reach our target.

In related news, the Medical Faculty Practice Plan Steering Committee had its final meeting March 19. This ad hoc committee was established in August 2006 by the chancellor in consultation with the Board of Trustees to oversee the business and financial turnaround of ECU Physicians. Significant progress has been made in this regard, and with the anticipated appointment of a new dean later this spring, it was time to transition the work of this group to a permanent structure. The Health Sciences Committee of the Board of Trustees has assumed central charge for the work of the ad hoc committee and will meet monthly for at least the remainder of this calendar year to assure the board's support for continued financial stability and business growth. My thanks to the faculty members, administrators and trustees who served on the steering committee for the dedicated work you did to help ECU Physicians regain its financial footing. The committee was chaired by David Brody, vice chair of the ECU Board of Trustees. Other members were Chancellor Ballard, ECU trustees Robbie Hill and Bruce Austin, Dr. Phyllis Horns, Dr. Michael Rotondo, Dr. Ronald Perkin, Dr. Walter Pories, Dr. Valerie Gilchrist, PCMH President Steve Lawler and Janice Faulkner

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We have a new executive director for ECU Physicians. Brian Jowers accepted the appointment this week. He will be coming to ECU from Columbia, S.C, where he is associate dean for administration and finance at the University of South Carolina School of Medicine and secretary/treasurer of their practice plan.

Jowers has a master's degree in business and management from Webster University in St. Louis and a bachelor's degree in political science from Charleston Southern University.

Please join me in giving Brian a warm ECU welcome!

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Our search committee began interviewing six semi-final candidates in mid-March, and interviews should be complete within a week or so. After the committee interviews are complete, we expect to schedule first-round final interviews involving an array of individuals from Brody and including open forums with candidates. We have an outstanding list of candidates, all of whom have the requisite background and experience for this leadership role at Brody. We are excited about bringing these candidates to Brody, and the candidates are eager to share their ideas.

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Patel	Bower	Wagner
Dar	Ejaz	Marilley

Let's welcome several new faculty members to Brody. Among them is Dr. Kirtida Patel, a family physician who is seeing patients at our Firetower Medical Office. She completed her residency here and a fellowship in sports medicine at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School in New Jersey.

Dr. Curtis Bower has joined the Department of Surgery. He came to ECU from a private practice in Virginia. He also completed residency training here and lists minimal-access surgery techniques among his clinical interests.

Dr. Peter Wagner, a cardiologist, has joined the new Department of Cardiovascular Sciences. He comes to ECU from a local private practice. In addition to cardiology, he's an active scuba diver and has a clinical interest in dive medicine.

Dr. Moahad Saeed Dar, an endocrinologist, has joined the Department of Internal Medicine. He comes to ECU from Pollocksville, where he was in private practice. Dar has a medical degree from ECU, and his clinical and research interests are metabolic bone disease, diabetes, thyroid disease and studying how gastric-bypass surgery resolves diabetes.

Dr. Sohail Ejaz, a nephrologist, has joined the Department of Internal Medicine. He has taught at Eastern Virginia Medical School in Norfolk. His clinical and research interests are interventional nephrology, hypertension and chronic kidney disease.

Dr. Mark Marilley, a gastroenterologist, has joined the Department of Internal Medicine. His clinical and research interests are colonoscopy and other procedures used to examine and diagnose gastrointestinal issues, probiotics and antibiotic-associated diarrhea.

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Several new construction and renovation projects are occurring on or near the health sciences campus. Here are updates on five of them:

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Brody faculty members have voted to create a Department of Public Health within the Brody School of Medicine. The next step will be a vote by the ECU Faculty Senate April 22 followed by the chancellor's signature to authorize the department. If all goes well, the new department should be a reality by July 1. This program began in 2003 as part of the Department of Family Medicine.

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This year's Schweitzer Fellows from Brody are Ashley Alexander, Ying Zhang, Anita Unnithan, Brandy Edwards, Laura Wolfe, Brandon Yarns and Nancy Shinouda.

Their projects are creating therapeutic activities for cancer patients at the Hope Lodge, teaching first aid to children, teaching children about nutrition and helping them grow a vegetable garden, and creating an orientation program at PCMH for pediatric surgery patients.



Two more students, Marie Rowe and Nicolaus Glomb, have received the prestigious Albert Schweitzer Lambarene Fellowship. Rowe will work from August to October at the hospital Schweitzer founded in Lambarene, Gabon, West Africa. Glomb will travel to Gabon in December to spend three months working on public health projects, primarily water sanitation, to help reduce the incidence of malaria. ECU is the only school this year to have two Lambarene Fellows.

Congratulations and best wishes to these students!

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As part of the Centennial celebration, ECU has established the Servire Society to recognize faculty, staff and students who have contributed at least 100 hours of service to the community and/or university. Inaugural members were inducted into the society during the Centennial Convocation March 27. Faculty and staff members inducted were Drs. Paul Bolin, Christopher Mansfield, Kaye McGinty, John Meredith and Timothy Reeder along with Jacqueline Cannon, Susan Copeland and Karen Parker.

Students inducted were Lynda Bridges, Wylie Carhartt, Yatta David, Natalie DeSouza, Bari Everhardt, Hollis Moye, Hayden Pappas, Marie Rowe, David Small Jr., Rita Sridarin, Sarah Strickland, Jeffrey Urieto, Courtney Weems, Yvonne Whitelaw and Ying Zhang.

Also recognized were Dr. Kathy Kolasa of the Department of Family Medicine, who received the Centennial Award for Excellence for Service, and Dr. W. Randolph Chitwood Jr. of the Department of Cardiovascular Sciences and senior associate vice chancellor for health sciences, who received the Centennial Award for Excellence for Leadership. 

Dr. Chitwood also was recently elected president of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons during the group's 44th annual meeting Jan. 27-29 in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

Dr. Virginia Hardy, senior associate dean, has been named to the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation advisory panel. She will serve a three-year term helping the foundation understand issues affecting North Carolina and exploring opportunities for more effective grantmaking.

Dr. Tom Irons, professor of pediatrics and associate vice chancellor for regional health services, has been named a recipient of the Distinguished Service Award from the UNC-Chapel Hill School of Medicine. Irons will accept his award at an event in Chapel Hill on April 18.

Dr. Irons is also the new director of the Office of Generalist Programs. He helped establish the office in the 1990s and has continued to preach the importance of training generalist physicians.

Dr. Dorcas O'Rourke, chair of the Department of Comparative Medicine, has been named vice president of the Council on Accreditation for the Association for the Assessment and Accreditation of Laboratory Animal Care International.

Congratulations on your achievements!

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A "great job" goes out to the Pediatric Healthy Weight Research and Treatment Center, which received an award from the National Initiative for Children's Healthcare Quality during its National Childhood Obesity Congress March 19 in Miami. The award recognizes programs making a difference in addressing disparities in childhood obesity.

The center primarily serves families from rural eastern North Carolina with overweight children ages 2-18, most at the highest risk of obesity and its complications. Seventy percent of the children seen at the center receive federal or state health insurance for low-income people, and 63 percent are African-American.

The center is part of the Department of Pediatrics. Dr. Suzanne Lazorick, an assistant professor of pediatrics, and Keeley Pratt, an intern in ECU's medical family therapy program, accepted the award. They also gave a 15-minute presentation on the center's work.

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Dr. Jeffrey Pierce of the Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Dr. Junhong Zhang of the Department of Internal Medicine and Dr. Janice Daugherty of the Department of Family Medicine are medical acupuncturists who treat patients with a wide variety of conditions, and they are seeing impressive results. We are working on getting them space at Moye Medical Center where they can see more patients.

In the meantime, feel free to contact them to learn more about their acupuncture services and schedule an appointment.

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The ECU Medical & Health Sciences Foundation is doing its part in East Carolina's Second Century Campaign, which aims to raise $200 million. Securing support for health care facilities, research support, scholarships and professorships are all important parts of the campaign strategy.

The foundation is also celebrating the 25th anniversary of the Brody Scholars program. Foundation staff members are working on an anniversary booklet with updates on all 100 Brody scholars.

In addition, the annual Internal Medicine Research Day, to be held May 29, will be named for Dr. Yash Kataria. A dinner will be held in his honor May 28. Plans are to raise $100,000 to endow the research day in Dr. Kataria's name, and the foundation is already a third of the way to that goal. For more information about the planned endowment, call the foundation at 744-2238

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