Donald Mathews, M.D., professor of anesthesiology, has been named chair of the Department of Anesthesiology and health care service chief of anesthesiology, effective July 15. Mathews succeeds Mazen Maktabi, M.D., who served in this role since August 2016.

A five-year, $20 million National Institutes of Health (NIH) Clinical and Translational Research (CTR) Network grant will fund a joint program between the University of Vermont (UVM) and Maine Medical Center in Portland, Maine to develop and sustain a clinical and translational research infrastructure improving rural and community health for residents of Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine.

The Conrad N. Hilton Foundation has awarded a three-year, $1.8 million grant to James J. Hudziak, a professor of child psychiatry and pediatrics at the University of Vermont Larner College of Medicine, to determine if the UVM Wellness Environment, or WE, in concert with a health promotion and disease prevention app he developed will promote wellness among college students, in the process reducing their use of alcohol and other drugs.

Two University of Vermont research teams have been awarded SPARK-VT grants by the university to help commercialize their work and move it a step closer to the marketplace, following a faculty pitch competition held June 16, 2017.

Patients whose hearts have a faulty mitral valve and are considered high risk for open-heart surgery now have a treatment option offered by cardiologists at the University of Vermont Medical Center. Called Transcatheter Mitral Valve Repair (TMVR), the procedure uses a catheter inserted through a vein in the leg to reach the heart and make the repair. The mitral valve performs a check-valve function and is located between the left atrium, where blood enters the heart from the lungs, and the left ventricle, which pumps the blood to your entire body.