Jeffrey Loeb, M.D., Ph.D., associate professor of Neurology and Molecular Medicine and Genetics, has been selected as an ambassador of the Hiller’s Good Deeds in the Making program. The program is an effort to raise funds for worthy causes through the sale of prepared foods.

Through Nov. 30, you can purchase Jeff Loeb’s Bowtie Pasta at the prepared foods counter at all seven Hiller’s Markets. All of the profits from the sales of the dish will be donated to the Hiller ALS Center at the School of Medicine.

“I hope that if people like the dish they’ll buy more and more through Nov. 30 so we can send funds to a cause that many know is near and dear to my heart,” said Dr. Loeb, who also serves as associate director of the Center for Molecular Medicine and Genetics. “The recipe is a great impromptu, no-hassle weeknight dinner or it can be part of your Thanksgiving feast, and the best part is, you’ll help me raise money to keep funding research and treatment for ALS as we work toward a cure.”

The center was established when Jim Hiller, CEO of Hiller’s Markets, pledged $1 million to establish the clinic and research center at WSU in 2007. Hiller’s mother died of complications from ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. The center focuses on comprehensive team-centered research and patient care while collaborating extensively with other universities and programs which also conduct cutting-edge neuromuscular research.

“I’m honored to be part of a community led by Jim Hiller, who is dedicated to supporting important causes and companies right here in Michigan,” Dr. Loeb said.

Awareness and treatment of chronic diseases, including diabetes and hypertension, improved among Mexican-Americans who had a usual source of care, such as a regular primary care physician. However, Latino groups in the United States are the least likely to live in patient-centered medical homes.

“Diabetes Awareness and Knowledge Among Latinos: Does a Usual Source of Healthcare Matter?,” conducted by Hector Gonzalez, Ph.D., a clinical neuropsychologist and assistant professor in the Department of Family Medicine and Public Health Sciences at the Wayne State University School of Medicine, found that the knowledge gained through access to a primary care physician lessened the effects of diabetes among Latino groups.

The study reported that Mexican-Americans with a usual source of health care – generally considered consistent access to a primary care physician -- were 20 percent more likely to have knowledge about diabetes and the use of important preventive services than those who reported that they did not have such access.

Latinos of Central and South American descent also had lower rates of having a usual source of health care, lower rates of health insurance coverage and lower annual household incomes.

“Our findings indicate that a usual source of health care may be a valuable tool for reducing risks and burden of diabetes, a major health problem,” said Dr. Gonzalez, also a member of the WSU Institute of Gerontology. “With dismay, our research also indicates that no progress has been made over the past decade in achieving the Healthy People 2010 objective of improving the proportion of Latinos with a usual source of health care.

While Latinos are the largest ethnic minority, they are also the least likely to have health care coverage, Dr. Gonzalez said. “Among Latinos, Mexicans, who make up over two-thirds of the Latino population in the United States, have the lowest rate of health care insurance. The bottom line is lack of health care insurance is a barrier to care.”

When the Latino population does gain access to health care, he noted, cultural barriers – primarily language – can arise.

Pointing to a growing Latino population in Detroit and southeast Michigan, Dr. Gonzalez said, “There are very dedicated people committed to Latino health in Michigan and Detroit who are struggling with shrinking budgets. I am delighted that student groups at Wayne, like Amigos Medicos, are looking ahead to the health needs of Michigan and the country. I believe the School of Medicine at Wayne State is well poised to help build the needed infrastructure for the future health needs of the region and the nation in serving diverse populations.”

The Amigos Medicos student group seeks to improve the health and well-being of underserved members of the local Hispanic population by providing free health education in the community as well as Spanish language instruction for future physicians. Graduating medical students who can speak Spanish will be in high demand as the state and nation’s Latino population continues to expand, Dr. Gonzalez said.

The study by Dr. Gonzalez was accompanied by two others examining disparities among Latinos in the United States. “Latino Access to the Patient Centered Medical Home” found that health care disparities were eliminated or reduced for Latinos who have a patient-centered medical home. But, only 35 percent of Mexican-Americans and 34.2 percent of Central and South Americans have such homes. A patient-centered medical home was defined as a personal physician who patients see regularly, who engages them in their own health and provides continuous comprehensive that includes preventive care and coordination of care.

“Predictors of Hypertension Awareness, Treatment and Control Among Mexican American Women and Men” showed that in Mexican-American adults with high blood pressure, 65 percent were unaware they had hypertension and 71 percent were not receiving treatment for the condition.

The study, published in the November issue of The Journal of Maternal-Fetal & Neonatal Medicine, set out to determine the diagnostic indications and predictive value of biomarkers measured in maternal blood in the first and second trimester of pregnancy. The goal was to determine whether the biomarkers could predict the subsequent development of preeclampsia. The findings of the study -- the largest of its kind ever undertaken -- will help clinicians assess the risk for preeclampsia, and monitor mothers and their unborn babies at risk for the silent killer.

Estimates indicate that preeclampsia is responsible for 76,000 maternal deaths and more than 500,000 infant deaths every year, according to the Preeclampsia Foundation. Preeclampsia occurs only during pregnancy and sometimes after delivery. It is characterized by high blood pressure and the presence of protein in maternal urine. Preeclampsia can affect the liver, kidney and brain. Sometimes mothers develop seizures (eclampsia) and suffer intracranial hemorrhage, the main cause of death in those who develop the disorder. Some women develop blindness.

“Left untreated, preeclampsia can lead to serious -- or even fatal -- complications for both the mother and baby,” said Juan Pedro Kusanovic, M.D., director of Translational Research of the Perinatology Research Branch, the National Institute of Children’s Health and Development, the National Institutes of Health, and assistant professor of the School of Medicine’s Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology. He served as lead author of the study, “A prospective cohort study of the value of maternal plasma concentrations of angiogenic and anti-angiogenic factors in early pregnancy and midtrimester in the identification of patients destined to develop preeclampsia.”

The unborn babies of preeclamptic mothers are affected by the disease and may develop intrauterine growth starvation or die in utero. Many believe preeclampsia results from insufficient blood supply to the uterus and placenta, causing the development of high blood pressure. The increase in maternal blood pressure is a compensatory response to improve the condition of the fetus. Preeclampsia may have evolved to protect the infant, but when the disease is out of control it threatens the health of the mother. The earlier the disease starts in pregnancy, the worse the outcome for baby and mother.

The study received the Frederick P. Zuspan Award for Clinical Research by the International Society for the Study of Hypertension in Pregnancy. The award is given for the most outstanding clinical work relating to the study of hypertension in pregnancy.

“Our study found that maternal plasma concentrations of angiogenic and antiangiogenic factors, together with a combination of other demographic, biochemical and biophysical factors, are useful in assigning risk for the subsequent development of early-onset preeclampsia,” said Roberto Romero, M.D., chief of the Perinatology Research Branch of NICHD, NIH, who is one of the world’s leading experts on this condition and in the study of complications of pregnancy.

“The establishment of an accurate means to assess the risk for preeclampsia would enable health care practitioners to identify women who require more intensive monitoring to safeguard both mother and baby from this devastating condition,” said Dr. Romero, a professor of Molecular Obstetrics and Genetics with the WSU Center for Molecular Medicine and Genetics. “This study is the first of its kind in which women were prospectively followed from the beginning of pregnancy to determine if simple blood measurements can predict early onset preeclampsia. The results are very encouraging and suggest that the biomarkers studied can be used to identify women at risk in the second trimester, many weeks before the clinical onset of the disease.”

The results of the study will encourage laboratories and clinicians to use biomarkers to track the health of pregnant women. Several companies are developing rapid methods to measure these biomarkers and make them available for clinical use in hospitals throughout the world.

Dr. Romero explained that these tests would allow health care practitioners to identify women at risk and to intensify monitoring. An important challenge still lies in finding methods to treat preeclampsia. He noted that defective angiogenesis may be observed in other complications of pregnancy such as premature labor, fetal death and intrauterine growth restriction. The markers are likely to identify not only patients with preeclampsia, but those at risk for other complications of pregnancy.

“This research breaks new ground and will lead to healthier outcomes for mothers and infants,” said Valerie Parisi, M.D., M.P.H., M.B.A., interim dean of the School of Medicine. “This is a prime example of the bench-to-bedside research being conducted in the heart of Detroit.”

Venuprasad K. Poojary, Ph.D., assistant professor of the Wayne State University School of Medicine’s Department of Immunology and Microbiology and the Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute, has secured a two-year federal grant for almost $1 million to further his research into creating more effective immunotherapy strategies for cancer treatment.

Among the more than 20,000 applications the National Institutes of Health received for the NIH Challenge Grants, Dr. Poojary’s application ranked within the top 1 percent. He received a grant for $999,094. The NIH has allocated $200 million for the challenge grants for fiscal years 2009 and 2010. They are part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 passed in February of this year.

Dr. Poojary’s research, “Role of TIEG1 in Foxp3+Treg development and tumor progression,” explores tumor pathways that cause effector T cells -- those that help maintain a healthy immune system -- to be converted to regulator T cells, which allow the growth of cancerous tumor cells.

Researchers have already created vaccines that are effective in controlling regulator T cells in a lab environment, but so far immunotherapy vaccines have not been successful when used on humans.

“Immunotherapy for cancer has not been successful because tumors exploit the immune system,” Dr. Poojary said. “We must now build on immunotherapy’s great cancer treatment potential by learning how we can make it more effective.”

Dr. Poojary’s research strives to understand on a molecular level how immune suppressor cells can be controlled so that tumor cells do not proliferate. He believes this research will provide him and his colleagues significant new insight to overcome the limitations of current immunotherapy strategies.

“We want to develop inhibitors for regulator T cells to use along with tumor vaccines and our goal is to block the development of tumor-promoting regulator T cells in the tumor microenvironment,” he said. “People have tried to deplete regulator T cells from the body using antibodies, but such an approach is associated with the risk of triggering autoimmunity in patients.”

The nearly $1 million NIH grant will allow Dr. Poojary and his staff to invest the grant monies in what they need to conduct work more quickly and efficiently. As part of the grant, Dr. Poojary will hire four people to assist him.

“If we can understand the pathway of T cells, we will be very close to determining the inhibitors for what converts good cells into tumor-promoting bad cells,” he said. “This is the hard step, but I am very confident that I’ll achieve my goals with the project.”

Dr. Poojary said it will be significant when doctors can control the conversion of normal T cells into abnormal cells that allow tumors to grow. “With this knowledge, we would be very close to having the immunological tools to more effectively treat aggressive cancers, such as locally-advanced and metastatic breast cancer, prostate cancer and brain cancer,” he said.

Dr. Poojary has been studying immunology since 1998 when he began his doctorate studies at the National Center for Cell Science in Pune, India. After receiving his Ph.D., he served as a postdoctoral fellow and later a research scientist in the Division of Cell Biology at LaJolla Institute for Allergy and Immunology in San Diego, Calif. He has been with the Karmanos Cancer Institute since March 2009.

The lecture will take place in the Margherio Family Conference Center in the Richard J. Mazurek, M.D., Education Commons.

Sir Michael Berridge, the discoverer of inositol triphosphate, will present “Calcium Signaling in Health and Disease.”

Professor Berridge is an emeritus fellow at the Babraham Institute and honorary professor of Cell Signaling at the University of Cambridge. He is a fellow of Trinity College and was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 1984. In 1997, he was knighted for his contributions to science.

In 2005 he received the Shaw Prize for pioneering work in the field of cell signaling. His discovery of the key role that calcium plays in regulating cellular activity and orchestrating the complexities of cellular communication provided insight into the processes behind medical conditions like hypertension, cardiac arrhythmia and heart failure, cancer and bipolar disorders such as manic depressive illness.

His discovery of inositol trisphophate and its role in calcium signaling pathways was a major breakthrough in understanding how a cell translates chemical stimuli at its external surface into an intracellular chemical language that enables the cell to drive a physiological response.

The lecture is open to all faculty and students. For more information, call (313) 577-9553.

Having these resources reside on a single Web site is an efficiency measure itself. “There’s no need for researchers and project teams to start from scratch,” said Laura-Mae Baldwin, M.D., M.P.H., a co-investigator on the project, University of Washington professor of Family Medicine and practicing clinician.