A new Gilda’s Club is forming on the Detroit's east side to continue the battle against cancer and offer support for those combating the disease.

A “Project Gilda Friend-Raiser” will take place June 13 beginning with an open house at 6:30 p.m. at 26717 Little Mack, in St. Clair Shores. The guest speaker will be Michael Radner, Gilda Radner's older brother. Mr. Radner will speak again at a second open house from noon to 4 p.m., June 14.

There are 22 Gilda’s Clubs nationwide, named after the comedienne and Detroit native who died of ovarian cancer. The clubs’ mission is to provide social and emotional support for people living with cancer.

Pre-registration is preferred for the June 13 event. To register and for more information, call (313) 574-4233, or visit www.gildasclubdetroiteast.org.

 

The Wayne State University School of Medicine has received a substantial financial pledge to assist in construction of the building that will become the new face of the SOM.

Bashar Succar, M.D., chairman of the Ibn Sina Committee, has pledged a substantial gift in the name of the Arab American community to the Richard J. Mazurek, M.D., Medical Education Commons. The gift will name either a debriefing room or a student assembly room in the new facility.

Dr. Succar said the Arab American community of metropolitan Detroit is engaged in the project as a way of creating a legacy for future generations, and as a demonstrable example of how strongly the community values the importance of education.

This pledge marks the Arab American community’s second financial commitment to Wayne State University. The Ibn Sina Committee previously raised $200,000 to establish an endowed scholarship for students of Arab descent.

To mark the pledge, Dr. Succar and members of the Arab American community met at the School of Medicine and toured the facilities May 21. They also viewed the progress on the construction of the Education Commons.

The Richard J. Mazurek, M.D., Medical Education Commons will create a nucleus for all programs at the School of Medicine. It will optimize the on-campus educational experience for students and clinicians at every career stage and provide new spaces and services that will enhance campus life and convenience for students, faculty, health professionals, and guests. New classrooms and laboratories and new educational opportunities such as the latest patient simulation technology will play a key role in enriching medical education for our students. By uniting expertise, technologies and services in a common space with shared resources, the Richard J. Mazurek, M.D., Medical Education Commons will create a centralized hub for students and health care professionals.

Dr. Harold E. Usndek, his family and representatives of the Wayne State University School of Medicine gathered May 19 to celebrate the establishment of the Harold E. Usndek, M.D., Endowed Chair in Dermatology.

“The commitment to our School and the generosity of important alumni like the Usndeks are keys to advancing research and education for the new generation of physicians who are training at our School of Medicine,” said Dean Robert M. Mentzer Jr., M.D., who also serves as senior advisor to the president for Medical Affairs.

Dr. Usndek and Mrs. Usndek have a long history with Wayne State University and the School of Medicine. Dr. Usndek graduated from the College of Liberal Arts in 1939 and went on to attend the School of Medicine. While in medical school, he met Mrs. Usndek, another Wayne student, who was pursuing a degree in medical technology. Part of her degree requirement was class-work with second-year medical students. It was during this time that the Usndeks met. Both graduated in their respective programs in 1944 – she in medical technology, he from the School of Medicine. They married a year later.

Dr. Usndek decided to specialize in dermatology and was accepted into a three-year fellowship at Wayne. The first year was performed in Chicago through a collaborative program between the University of Chicago, the University of Illinois, Northwestern University and what is now Rush University Medical Center. Incidentally, the Usndeks found an apartment owned by a man who happened to be friends with President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s right-hand man, Harry Hopkins. Hopkins invited the aspiring pulmonologist to Washington, D.C., to try to help the president, but to no avail.

Nine months later, Dr. Usndek was back at Wayne for the final two years of the fellowship. After completing his training in 1950, Dr. Usndek went into private practice.

Dr. Usndek has held the position of clinical instructor, assistant professor and associate professor of the Department of Dermatology, and has served as chairman of the section of Dermatology for the Michigan State Medical Society.

The Wayne State University School of Medicine’s Microscopy & Imaging Resources Library Confocal Imaging will hold an open house for university researchers from noon to 4:30 p.m. June 11.

A number of imaging manufacturers will demonstrate and explain their equipment.

Refreshments will be served at the event, which will take place at 6339 Scott Hall. For more information, call (313) 577-2511.

Wayne State University School of Medicine is proud to acknowledge the following faculty members who have been recommended for promotion and/or granting of tenure by the president and provost of the University. These recommendations will be presented to the Wayne State University Board of Governors for approval this summer. Each member was chosen for outstanding academic achievements and continued commitment to the SOM.

Tenure Granted

Deborah Ellis - Pediatrics

Csaba Juhasz - Pediatrics

Melody Neely - Immunology & Microbiology

T.R. Reddy - Immunology & Microbiology

Promotion to Associate Professor

Nahed Abdel-Haq - Pediatrics

Nelia Afonso - Internal Medicine (General Medicine)

Nedim Cakan - Pediatrics

Deborah Ellis - Pediatrics

Sonia Hassan - Obstetrics & Gynecology (Perinatology Research Branch)

Csaba Juhasz - Pediatrics

Melody Neely - Immunology & Microbiology

Rajaprabhakaran Rajarethinam - Psychiatry & Behavioral Neurosciences

T.R. Reddy - Immunology & Microbiology

Gabriel Sosne - Ophthalmology

Joel Steinberg - Internal Medicine (Geriatrics)

Youming Xie - Cancer Institute

Promotion to Professor

Cynthia Aaron - Emergency Medicine

George Alangaden - Internal Medicine (Infectious Disease)

Murali Guthikonda - Neurosurgery

Sabrina Heidemann - Pediatrics

Mark Juzych - Ophthalmology

Jason Mateika - Physiology

Bharati Mitra - Biochemistry & Molecular Biology

Robert Morris - Obstetrics & Gynecology

Otto Muzik - Radiology

George Yoo - Otolaryngology

 

The Department of Internal Medicine will hold a June 4 open house to formally introduce the Translational Research and Clinical Epidemiology (TRaCE) division to the university.

TRaCE was created in 2006 to support the research efforts of the Department of Internal Medicine and other university-wide collaborators. The division assists in the areas of study design, data collection, clinical trial management and manuscript/grant preparation. TRaCE has been an integral resource utilized by researchers within the Department of Internal Medicine as well as other university and community-based investigators since its inception.

The open house will take place from 3 to 6 p.m. in the second-floor lobby of the University Health Center.  Attendees will have the opportunity to meet with Department of Internal Medicine Chair and TRaCE Division Chief John Flack, M.D., as well as other members of the division.

Renee R. Jenkins, M.D., F.A.A.P., will give the Margaret Couzens Slattery Memorial Lecture at the Children’s Hospital of Michigan Alumni Dinner & Awards Presentation on May 15.

Dr. Jenkins, president of the American Academy of Pediatrics, is a 1971 graduate of the Wayne State University School of Medicine. She is the first African-American president of the nation’s largest pediatric organization.

Dr. Jenkins is professor and chair of the Department of Pediatrics and Child Health at Howard University and adjunct professor of Pediatrics at George Washington University. After completing a fellowship in Adolescent Medicine at Montefiore Hospital in New York, she began an adolescent medicine program at Howard. In 1994, she was appointed department chair, and during her tenure directed the departmental training program and practice plan.

The dinner begins at 5:30 p.m. at the Detroit Yacht Club. Dr. Jenkins will speak at 6:30 p.m.