Faculty Bibliography

There are about 450 laboratories in the world now that can detect drug-resistant tuberculosis, although many are not performing to capacity, Dr. Mario Raviglione, who directs the health agency's tuberculosis department in Geneva, said by telephone. Other countries may send teams to well-run laboratories elsewhere to learn how to determine the sensitivity and susceptibility of the bacteria isolated from each case to various drugs. Under the plan, all laboratories would perform 1.8 million cultures for tuberculosis in 2007 and 2.2 million in 2008, up from the estimated 200,000 in 2006. The laboratories would perform 750,000 drug-susceptibility tests in 2007 and 900,000 in 2008, up from 75,000 in 2005

An even more serious form, known as XDR-TB for extremely drug-resistant tuberculosis, does not respond to any of the fluoroquinolone class and to at least one of three second-line drugs (amikacin, capreomycin and kanamycin) that are given by injection. There are about 450 laboratories in the world now that can detect drug-resistant tuberculosis, although many are not performing to capacity, Dr. Mario C. Raviglione, who directs the health agency's tuberculosis department in Geneva, said in a telephone interview. Under the plan, all laboratories would perform 1.8 million cultures for tuberculosis in 2007 and 2.2 million in 2008, up from the estimated 200,000 in 2006. The laboratories would perform 750,000 drug susceptibility tests in 2007 and 900,000 in 2008, up from 75,000 in 2005

Radiologists sometimes made house calls, usually for patients bedridden with a fractured hip. Dad's ''black bag'' was a portable X-ray machine the size of a large suitcase and heavy. Use of portable X-rays was limited, because the radiation exposure time was long and the quality of the films seldom matched those taken in an office. X-ray films were developed in a darkened room with the type of chemical solutions used for camera film. A technician mixed fresh solutions daily, and they stank. Radiologists would give a preliminary ''wet reading'' after looking at the X-rays before they dried. The digital age has eliminated those steps by making X-ray film obsolete. ''The more experienced eye can take in a complex pattern of shadows and images almost at a glance and become instinctively sensitive to an abnormal contour or shadow,'' said Dr. Joseph T. Ferrucci Jr., the emeritus chairman of radiology at Boston University, whose radiologist father was one of my dad's colleagues

Heartland [Television Program] -- The premise: At St. Jude's Regional Transplant Center in Pittsburgh, transplant surgeon Nate Grant (Treat Williams) is having difficulty finding a heart that is the proper size and match for 14- year-old heart failure patient Leslie Walker. Grant's ex-wife Kate Armstrong (Kari Matchett) is the transplant coordinator, and she approaches the parent of a dying potential donor who turns her down. Walker's mother then attempts to overdose on her daughter's morphine so that her own heart can be used. Armstrong finally finds a match, Sarah Evans, 24, who is dying from car accident injuries, and obtains consent from Sarah's father. During the transplant operation, however, the harvested heart becomes ischemic (doesn't get enough oxygen), and after the operation, Walker develops an irregular heartbeat, for which she's given mechanical support as well as anti-rejection drugs. Grant considers performing a new transplant, but Dr. Bart Jacobs, former chief of surgery, recommends Grant give the current heart 'a chance to take.'

Chemistry was developed to synthesize the title series of compounds. The ability of these novel ligands to bind to the glucocorticoid receptor was investigated. These compounds were also tested in a series of functional assays and some were found to display the profile of a dissociated glucocorticoid. The SAR of the 6,5-bicyclic series differed markedly from the previously reported 6,6-series. Molecular modeling studies were employed to understand the conformational differences between the two series of compounds, which may explain their divergent activity. Two compounds were profiled in vivo and shown to reduce inflammation in a mouse model. An active metabolite is suspected in one case.

One cellular function of intermediate filaments is to provide cells with compliance to small deformations while strengthening them when large stresses are applied. How IFs accomplish this mechanical role is revealed by recent studies of the elastic properties of single IF protein polymers and by viscoelastic characterization of the networks they form. IFs are unique among cytoskeletal filaments in withstanding large deformations. Single filaments can stretch to more than 3 times their initial length before breaking, and gels of IF withstand strains greater than 100% without damage. Even after mechanical disruption of gels formed by crossbridged neurofilaments, the elastic modulus of these gels rapidly recovers under conditions where gels formed by actin filaments are irreversibly ruptured. The polyelectrolyte properties of IFs may enable crossbridging by multivalent counterions, but identifying the mechanisms by which IFs link into bundles and networks in vivo remains a challenge.

After statements by Dr. Julie Gerberding, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or CDC, about her agency's role in detecting the extremely drug-resistant form of the disease and then notifying Speaker about it, he told the committee, 'A few of things you were told are simply not accurate.' Gerberding had just told the committee that her agency learned on May 18 that Speaker had left the country. Gerberding said that her agency did not determine that Speaker had the extremely resistant form of tuberculosis until May 22 and that it then started searching for him in Europe. Speaker said CDC officials, local health officials and his doctors knew of the resistance problem before the May 10 meeting. 'They were all discussing this, because of the fact that there was resistance,' Speaker said, 'and talking about getting me out to Denver.'

Speaking by phone to a Senate panel, Andrew Speaker contradicted some accounts by government officials about the timing of who knew what and when about his plans to travel abroad after being told that he had extremely drug-resistant tuberculosis. Speaker, 31, who is in isolation at a Denver hospital, created an international health scare by taking commercial flights for his wedding in Greece and honeymoon in Europe last month. He spoke from his room at the National Jewish Medical and Research Center in Denver to a Senate Appropriations subcommittee that oversees the Public Health Service. After statements by Dr

We're about to head full-force into the hurricane season, and invariably the country will spend a few moments revisiting the stricken Gulf Coast region, but particularly New Orleans. It's the city's biannual checkup (the other being on the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina). We'll hear questions about levies, rebuilding and the city's economy. Kathleen Crapanzano, medical director for the Office of Mental Health for Louisiana, acknowledges that the state has primary responsibility for helping to restore mental health care to New Orleans. But she also recognizes that the city is virtually starting over. 'We lost the whole mental health infrastructure in the storm,' she says. 'It was inadequate before. Then we lost the clinics, the hospitals, the staff and the administration.' 'Some progress is being made,' says Fred Cerise, secretary of the Department of Health and Hospitals in Louisiana. But 'some,' in this case, won't do. Many good people are working to heal this wounded city, but the problems are too pervasive and too dangerous to allow for gradual solutions