For a third year, Ricq Pattay, a senior analyst and programmer with the Academic Health Center Information Systems, will participate in Mush for a Cure to raise funds for the National Breast Cancer Foundation…

The University of Minnesota’s Academic Health Center (AHC) is a leader in the movement of interprofessional education (IPE).  In fact, the AHC was recently selected to lead a new coordinating center that will provide national leadership in the field of interprofessional education and collaborative practice among health professionals.

Interprofessional education occurs when students from the health professions and related disciplines learn with and from each other to improve the effectiveness and quality of health care; a practice which promotes excellence in learning through collaboration.

To promote a better understanding around this topic, the U of M Medical School and Academic Health Center’s Office of Education will be co-hosting a speaker series with health science faculty from around the country. Attendees of the interactive sessions will be presented topics surrounding best practices and innovation in IPE.

It’s been a big month in honors and awards for AHC researchers, professors, students and alumni. Read on to see the ways they are being recognized in their respective fields:

The NIH has given Susan Marino, Ph.D., assistant professor in the School of Pharmacy, a 5-year, $2.76 million grant to investigate ways to characterize and predict drug effects on cognition. Marino will serve as the PI for this project, looking at Topiramate, an antiepileptic drug.

The Minnesota Public Health Association (MPHA) Awards were given at the end of September, and we extend congratulations to the following exceptional Academic Health Center community members:

• John Finnegan, Jr., Ph.D., dean of the School of Public Health, was honored with the Albert Justus Chesley Award. This award recognizes distinguished MPHA members who have made a definite contribution to the MPHA.
• Linda Olson Keller, D.N.P, R.N., APHN-BC, FAAN, clinical professor in the School of Nursing, was given the Paul and Sheila Wellstone Public Health Achievement Award.
• Samantha Mills, graduate student in the School of Public Health, took home the MPHA Student Achievement Award.

Tina Huang, M.D., received the American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery Honors Award at this year’s annual meeting in Washington, D.C.

Masonic Cancer Center researcher Dan Harki, Ph.D., an assistant professor in the Department of Medicinal Chemistry, has been awarded two grants for his research. Hyundai Hope On Wheels awarded Harki and collaborator John Ohlfest, Ph.D., associate professor in the Department of Pediatrics, $250,000 to develop new drug therapies for pediatric brain tumors.

Harki was also named a 2012 V Foundation “V Scholar,” which comes with a $200,000 research grant to support collaborative research with David Largaespada, Ph.D., professor in the Department of Genetics, Cell Biology and Development, to develop new small molecules targeting acute myeloid leukemia.

Linda Krach, M.D., associate professor of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, is a recipient of the 2012 American Academy of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation Distinguished Clinician Award.  She will receive her award on November 17^th.

The Spinal Research Foundation will recognize David Polly, M.D., U of M Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, as an outstanding clinician and researcher in the field of spine research. He will be profiled as a Spinal Hero in Fall 2012′s Journal of the Spinal Research Foundation.

Joe Westermeyer, M.D., professor in the Department of Psychiatry, was honored with the 2012 Charles Bolles’ Bolles-Rogers Award from the West Metro Medical Foundation. The award is given for professional contributions on the basis of medical research, achievement or leadership. This is the first time in the award’s 35 year history it has gone to a psychiatrist.

College of Pharmacy alumnus Ahmad Fuad Afdhal, Ph.D.  is a 2012 recipient of the University of Minnesota’s Distinguished Leadership Award for Internationals. The annual award is conferred on alumni who have distinguished themselves as leaders in their professional careers.

The University of Minnesota welcomed the Chinese Minister of Health, Dr. Chen Zhu, to the Twin Cities campus earlier this week.  Minister Chen was in town to receive an honorary doctorate of science for his work as a groundbreaking leukemia researcher, and for his efforts to reform China’s health care system.

Minister Chen was the first to use synergistic cancer targeting therapy, and he developed the first successful model in the treatment of acute promyelocitic leukemia.  His work turned this once fatal form of cancer into a curable disease.

On a broader scale, Minister Chen’s work to reform health care in China has been just as ambitious.  Over the last three years, China has worked to transform healthcare by incorporating nearly universal coverage of basic health insurance, expanding coverage of essential drugs and increasing access to basic public health services.

Going forward, Minister Chen is working to accelerate health care reform in his country, including efforts to ensure universal coverage to all children who are faced with cancer or other catastrophic illnesses.

Minister Chen’s visit did generate some discussion in the news media about a controversial program in China related to organ donation.  One U of M faculty member questioned the University’s decision to grant a doctorate to Minister Chen because China’s transplantation system has relied primarily on executions for organs needed for transplant.

However, another University faculty member, John R. Lake, M.D., disagreed with that assessment.  Dr. Lake is a professor of medicine and surgery at the University of Minnesota Medical School and executive medical director of solid organ transplantation at the University of Minnesota Medical Center.

He applauded the University for recognizing Minister Chen, who he said is actually providing courageous leadership in reforming China’s transplant program.

KSTP-TV highlighted this aspect of Minister Chen’s visit in a story.

Click here to read Lake’s full letter, as well as to get a full sense of the issue of China’s transplant system and to read about the many reforms Minister Chen has helped usher in since taking office.

Across the country, health reform has ushered U.S. health systems into a period of great change.

Not surprisingly, it can be challenging for health care graduates to enter such an environment – the landscape in many systems looks nothing like it did just a few years ago.

As a result, transforming health care has become about transforming higher education.  Across the country, academic institutions have started to shift to more interprofessional education models, including teaching team-based care, to augment standard curriculum with the goal of better preparing the emerging health care workforce.

The University of Minnesota is nationally-recognized for developing new models of interprofessional development programs, essentially setting the course for educating our nation’s health professionals.

Now, the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) has announced the selection of the University of Minnesota’s Academic Health Center to lead a new coordinating center that will provide national leadership in the field of interprofessional education and collaborative practice among health professionals.

The University of Minnesota has agreed to a one-year, renewable agreement with Nobel laureate Peter C. Agre of Johns Hopkins University.

Agre will act as a senior adviser to President Kaler for biomedical research, and will retain his Johns Hopkins appointment.

In his uncompensated University role, Agre will help identify strengths and weaknesses in the U’s biomedical research portfolio and how to strengthen it; provide input into the external review of the Academic Health Center, which will occur in August; and help identify new partnerships between university faculty and nationally and internationally recognized experts at other institutions.

The Star Tribune recently profiled the move, calling it “coup” for the University.  According to the recent profile.

“The arrangement is among the gifts of the late Carl Platou, founder of the Medical School’s Board of Visitors, who died May 29. In the last year of his life, Platou assiduously courted Agre for a role in the interdisciplinary Biomedical Discovery District that is rising near TCF Bank Stadium. When Platou called me a few days before he died, it was to assure me that a contract with Agre was in the works – and that it would be a big plus for Minnesota.”

Agre was awarded the 2003 Nobel Prize in Chemistry (which he shared with Roderick MacKinnon) for his discovery of aquaporins.

Read more from the Star Tribune about Agre’s new role with the University.