Frymoyer Scholars Project Topics Range from Firearm Injury Screening to Communication

For nearly two decades, investing in outstanding medical education and promoting teaching that emphasizes the art of patient care has been the mission of the Frymoyer Scholars Program. Recently, Teaching Academy Director and Assistant Dean for Medical Education Kathryn Huggett, Ph.D., and the Frymoyer Scholars Program Review Committee announced the five faculty projects selected to receive 2019 Frymoyer Scholarship funding.

This year’s scholars, and their respective projects, are (pictured above, clockwise from top left to right):

• Bronwyn Bryant, M.D.: “Validating Entrustable Professional Activity-Based Assessment to Determine On-Call Competency in Pathology Residents;”
• Richard "Mort" Wasserman, M.D.; Rebecca Bell, M.D., M.P.H.; and Thomas Delaney, Ph.D. (not pictured): “Firearm Injury Prevention Screening and Counseling;”
• Rebecca Wilson, R.N.; Fuyuki Hirashima, M.D. (not pictured); Nicholas Bedrin, M.D. (not pictured); Serena Murphy, M.D. (not pictured); and Stephen Ranney, M.D. (not pictured): “Establishing UVMMC as a Training Institute & Center of Excellence for Cardiac Surgery Unit Advance Life Support;”
• Leah Pryor; Christina Harlow, D.N.P., FNP-BC, A.P.R.N.; Rebecca Nagle, M.S.N., A.P.R.N.; Emily Clairmont, R.D. (not pictured); and Jana Lichtenfeld, M.D. (not pictured): “Integrative Nutrition Teaching Kitchen and Inter-professional Community Service Learning Curriculum;” and
• Iris Toedt-Pingel, M.D.; Stephen Berns, M.D.; and Kaitlin Ostrander, M.D. (not pictured): “TalkVermontPEDS: Creating an Interprofessional Pediatric Advanced Communication Course.”

Former Pathology Faculty Member Clemmons Receives Honorary degree from UVM

In 1962, when Jackson J. W. Clemmons, Ph.D., M.D., moved to Vermont to join the UVM Department of Pathology, he was only the second African American on the College of Medicine faculty, and the first to stay for any real length of time. That timespan turned out to be decades. His record of accomplishments as an innovative educator, both at the University and in the wider community, was recognized this May with an honorary degree at UVM's commencement ceremony. Clemmons practiced pediatric pathology at UVM until 1991, when he became an emeritus professor.

Soon after arriving in Vermont he and his wife, Lydia, who was the first African American nurse anesthetist at UVM, purchased a large property in Charlotte —148 acres with six historic buildings—and raised five children there.

After the doctor's retirement, the Clemmons family, concerned about the fact that African Americans as a group had, over the last 100 years, lost 93 percent of their U.S. agricultural assets, decided to preserve their property and launched Clemmons Family Farm, a multicultural center dedicated to celebrating African American heritage through the arts.

“It’s very rare to find a farm that is owned by black people in New England,” says Dr. Clemmons' daughter, also named Lydia. “It’s more than a family story. This is American history.”

You can read more about Dr. Clemmons in the upcoming summer edition of Vermont Medicine.

Research Collaborations: Finding a Common Language to Treat Breast Cancer

In the second video of the three-part “Research Collaborations” series, Associate Professor of Molecular Physiology and Biophysics Jason Stumpff, Ph.D., and Professor of Medicine Marie Wood, M.D., both members of the University of Vermont Cancer Center, explain how they are working together to research a potential targeted intervention to treat triple negative breast cancer. Their collaboration was ignited by “repeated chats about cell division around the office coffeemaker” after a serendipitous discovery by Dr. Stumpff, who was studying the organization and division of chromosomes in his lab and discovered that cancer cells appeared to need a specific cell division protein to divide, while normal cells did not. Dr. Stumpff has since been awarded a Susan G. Komen Career Catalyst Research grant, for which Dr. Wood is a member of the mentorship committee.    

Cross-Specialty Panel Explores How Homelessness affects Health in Vermont

How does homelessness affect health? On June 6, over 60 Larner College of Medicine medical students and College of Nursing and Health Sciences physical therapy students attended a panel presentation co-hosted by the Here to Help and Emergency Medicine medical student interest groups that addressed that question. Panelists included Larner College of Medicine alumnus Lincoln Heath, M.D.’12, and Kerry Goulette, PA-C, M.P.H., both representatives of the Community Health Centers of Burlington Safe Harbor Health Center; two representatives from the Committee on Temporary Shelter Serving Vermont (COTS), including Christopher Charron; and Assistant Professor of Surgery Sarah Schlein, M.D. The idea for the panel was initiated by Class of 2022 medical student Zeynep Tek, who, along with Julia Clemens ‘22 and Nikkole Turgeon ‘22, wanted a way to further explore social determinants of health beyond what has been covered in the curriculum to date. “I think that as future doctors, we need to know how to work with people from different backgrounds and socioeconomic statuses,” Tek said. “When we are working through a clinical vignette [in class] and are asked to think about what else we would want to know from a patient, we often don’t think to ask about housing or stability of housing,” Turgeon added. “I think that having the panel [presentation] may have put this in the back of many students’ minds.” The question-driven discussion covered topics such as alcohol and opioid use disorders, creative solutions to preventative care, and collaborative care models between different resources within the state.

When his care team came in, we would cluster in the seating area. Instead of looking down on a patient in a bed, you can sit in a circle. It changes the dynamic and is an incredibly powerful signal that you are in this together.” 

—Lauren Curry, a UVM Medical Center patient and family advisor whose husband was unexpectedly admitted to the medical center the weekend of June 1, commented on the benefits of him staying in the Miller Building. 

Accolades

CITATION HIGHLIGHTS

Aspergillosis myocarditis in the immunocompromised host. Bullis SS, Krywanczyk A, Hale AJ.IDCases. 2019 May 31;17:e00567. doi: 10.1016/j.idcr.2019.e00567. eCollection 2019.

A Novel Diagnostic Approach for Suspected Icodextrin Pleural Effusion in a Peritoneal Dialysis Patient. Onuigbo MAC, Agbasi N, Wahlberg K, Karki B, Khan S. Mayo Clin Proc Innov Qual Outcomes. 2019 May 5;3(2):238-240. doi: 10.1016/j.mayocpiqo.2019.02.001. eCollection 2019 Jun.

The Ankle Fracture Stability-Based Classification: A Study of Reproducibility and Clinical Prognostic Ability. Delaney JP, Charlson MD, Michelson JD. J Orthop Trauma. 2019 May 15. doi: 10.1097/BOT.0000000000001507. [Epub ahead of print] PMID: 31188253

Vitamin D Supplementation and Prevention of Type 2 Diabetes.Pittas AG, Dawson-Hughes B, Sheehan P, Ware JH, Knowler WC, Aroda VR, Brodsky I, Ceglia L, Chadha C, Chatterjee R, Desouza C, Dolor R, Foreyt J, Fuss P, Ghazi A, Hsia DS, Johnson KC, Kashyap SR, Kim S, LeBlanc ES, Lewis MR, Liao E, Neff LM, Nelson J, O'Neil P, Park J, Peters A, Phillips LS, Pratley R, Raskin P, Rasouli N, Robbins D, Rosen C, Vickery EM, Staten M; D2d Research Group. N Engl J Med. 2019 Jun 7. doi: 10.1056/NEJMoa1900906. [Epub ahead of print]

Optimizing the use of point of care testing devices for screening patients. Sarraf E, Mathews DM, Tsai MH, Goodwin AJ. J Clin Monit Comput. 2019 Jun 10. doi: 10.1007/s10877-019-00332-w. [Epub ahead of print]

To the Point: A Prescription for Well-being in Medical Education. Hopkins L, Morgan H, Buery-Joyner SD, Craig LB, Everett EN, Forstein DA, Graziano SC, Hampton BS, Mckenzie ML, Page-Ramsey SM, Pradhan A, Bliss S; Undergraduate Medical Education Committee, Association of Professors of Gynecology and Obstetrics, Crofton, MD. Am J Obstet Gynecol. 2019 Jun 7. pii: S0002-9378(19)30670-2. doi: 10.1016/j.ajog.2019.05.012. [Epub ahead of print] Review.

Evidence-Based Practice: Improving the Quality of Perinatal Care. Soll RF, McGuire W.Neonatology. 2019 Jun 5:1-6. doi: 10.1159/000496214. [Epub ahead of print] Review.

Preschool Language Outcomes following Perinatal Hypoxic-Ischemic Encephalopathy in the Age of Therapeutic Hypothermia. Chin EM, Jayakumar S, Ramos E, Gerner G, Soares BP, Cristofalo E, Leppert M, Allen M, Parkinson C, Johnston M, Northington F, Burton VJ. Dev Neurosci. 2019 Jun 5:1-11. doi: 10.1159/000499562. [Epub ahead of print]

Is the Potable Water System an Advantageous Preinfection Niche for Bacteria Colonizing the Cystic Fibrosis Lung? Wargo MJ. MBio. 2019 Jun 4;10(3). pii: e00883-19. doi: 10.1128/mBio.00883-19.

Inclusivity of Diverse Patient Groups-Reply. Howard VJ, Howard G, Cushman M. JAMA Neurol. 2019 Jun 3. doi: 10.1001/jamaneurol.2019.1390

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