Dear Medical College of Georgia Friends,

Statewide Faculty Development Conference was May 29-31; Each year it continues to grow

You’ve probably heard me say it before, but I truly believe our statewide educational model is one of the biggest secrets to our medical school’s success – our secret sauce, if you will. With the fourth largest medical school class size in the country, we simply couldn’t train as many future doctors as we do without the support of our regional clinical campuses and the incredible, mostly-volunteer community clinical faculty who mentor our students. Anytime we get to thank them for their dedication – and for shaping the future of health care in Georgia – is a privilege. That’s part of the reason we host our Statewide Faculty Development Conference each year on beautiful Jekyll Island. This annual gathering is a chance for faculty from all over the state to connect, share ideas, and learn about what’s happening in medical education. This year we had record attendance (over 200 attendees) and more involvement than ever from our educational partners across the state, including more than a dozen of our newest partners at Federally Qualified Health Centers and Community Health Centers in some of Georgia’s most underserved communities.

I would be remiss here not to thank our Office of Academic Affairs, especially Dr. Michelle Krupp, our associate dean for faculty development, and her right hand, Lauren Watkins, clerkship program coordinator, for their endless work to make this conference better year after year.

Regional Clinical Campuses select Community Faculty Award Winners

One of the highlights of the event for me is our Friday night awards dinner – which gives us the opportunity to celebrate educators from each of our regional clinical campuses who have been recognized by students and campus leadership for their outstanding contributions.

This year’s honorees and their campuses are:

·      AU/UGA Medical Partnership – Dr. James McAvoy, a family medicine physician in Elberton and proud 1976 MCG graduate

·      Northwest Campus – Dr. George Hotz, an internist at Atrium Health Floyd Primary Care Internal & Family Medicine in Rome

·      Southeast Campus – Dr. William Bristol, a pediatrician based in Brunswick at Southeast Georgia Medical Center

·      Southwest Campus – Dr. Darrell Jordan, an OB/Gyn based in Tifton

·      MCG Atlanta Campus – Dr. Jenny Joseph, a neurologist at our homebase, Wellstar Kennestone

I want to congratulate and thank each of you, and all our faculty throughout the state. Your commitment to shaping the next generation of physicians is inspiring.

Congressman Buddy Carter, Senator Ben Watson, Representative Mark Newton honored for their MCG advocacy work

We also had the privilege of thanking several state and federal legislators for their advocacy. I was especially glad that our President, Dr. Russell Keen, who truly understands the importance of MCG and our statewide mission, could also join us at Jekyll this year and help honor these dedicated leaders.

Congressman Buddy Carter was honored with this year’s MCG Healthcare Champion Award. He represents Georgia’s 1st Congressional District and has a long history of public service, including roles as Mayor of Pooler and in the Georgia legislature. A pharmacist by trade and a small business owner, he truly understands the importance of improving access, affordability, and innovation in health care. During the pandemic, he helped secure nearly $1 million in Federal Communications Commission funding for our telehealth initiatives, which ensured people across Georgia had access to MCG experts. And more recently, he helped secure $1 million for our Center for Digital Health, further improving access to care and ensuring we are educating our students for the digital health care age they’ll soon practice in.

State Sen. Ben Watson received this year’s Excellence in Advocacy Award for his contributions to health care policy in Georgia. A 1985 MCG alumnus and chair of the Senate Health and Human Services Committee, Watson has championed health care and supported graduate medical education, creating new opportunities for future physicians. A primary care physician specializing in geriatrics, he has served the Savannah area since 1988. He and his wife, Bernice, a retired special education teacher, are always so supportive of this medical school. They are welcome and familiar faces at many of our events. Their son Morris also graduated from MCG in 2020 and is finishing up his urology residency at Ochsner Health in Louisianna.

State Rep. Mark Newton, a 1988 graduate and chair of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Higher Education, was named State Legislator of the Year. An emergency physician and founder of MedNow Urgent Care Centers, he was instrumental in securing $99.8 million in state funding for our new translational research building, which will ensure we continue our 200-year legacy of making health care discoveries that change people’s lives. He also helped advocate for House Bill 144, which expanded tax incentives for preceptors who mentor future healthcare professionals (including many of the people in the room to celebrate him that night). Like the Watsons, MCG roots run deep in the Newton Family. His son Bradley (a Savannah OB/Gyn); and daughter-in-law Danielle (a family physician at Southeast Georgia Health System) also volunteer to teach our students; his son David graduated in 2021; and his son Daniel will graduate next year.

The energy at this annual event is always inspiring. I think I can safely say we always walk away feeling even more excited about and committed to teaching the next generation.

First-year students lead efforts to establish a hypertension and chronic kidney disease screening clinic for at-risk patients

Here’s a great example of why that mission matters. Last fall at a meeting of the MCG Chapter of the American Medical Women’s Association, which Dr. Laura Mulloy, our chief of nephrology, always graciously hosts at her home, first-year student Fabiha Anwar approached Dr. Mulloy with an idea to launch a hypertension and chronic kidney disease screening clinic for at-risk patients in underserved areas of our community. With lots of hard work and determination they found a community partner in Green Grove Missionary Baptist Church and hosted their first clinic there last month, where they gave advice to a handful of patients about blood pressure goals and chronic kidney disease awareness. Their next clinic, scheduled for July, will focus on the theme “food is medicine,” collaborating with dietetic interns to provide patients with tailored nutrition plans.

Fabiha first connected with MCG as an undergrad at AU, researching salt-sensitive hypertension. She says after living in Augusta for five years she’s seen firsthand the effects of hypertension and the lack of awareness surrounding its dangers. As a first-year, she’s still trying to figure out what kind of physician she wants to be but says medical school and this clinic have “opened my eyes to the resiliency of the kidney. If I’m lucky enough, and sharp enough, to follow in the footsteps of those who care for them, I’d be honored.” Fabiha tells me her classmates, Man Shah, Satyatejas Reddy, Alina Hussain, and Tavi Hall were also instrumental in the clinic’s success.

Truly impactful stuff you all. I’m sure you have a bright future in medicine and research ahead of you – no matter what specialty you choose. And my thanks also go to Dr. Mulloy, who has always served our students so well and proven time and time again why mentorship matters.

Dr. Jessica Faulkner receives Shih-Chun Wang Young Investigator Award from American Physiological Society

No doubt that mentorship shapes careers and fosters better research. Here’s a great example: Dr. Jessica Faulkner came to us in 2015 to complete a postdoctoral fellowship under the mentorship of Dr. Eric Belin de Chantemele in the Vascular Biology Center. Since joining our faculty in 2021, she has built her own successful research program focused on sex differences in cardiovascular disease, contributing to the field through more than 40 peer-reviewed publications, leadership roles in AHA and NIH study sections, and service on the Trainee Advisory Committee of the American Heart Association’s Council on Hypertension.

She has served as principal investigator on grants, totaling over $3 million, from the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute — one exploring the role of the satiety hormone leptin in preeclampsia and another aimed at better understanding obesity-associated cardiovascular disease in women. In 2023, the AHA honored her as the recipient of the Harry Goldblatt Award for New Investigators and just last year, we named her our Outstanding Young Basic Science Faculty member. Now she can add another accolade, the Shih-Chun Wang Young Investigator Award from the American Physiological Society. This award is given annually to an individual demonstrating outstanding promise based on their research program – in Dr. Faulkner’s case, the focus is on adverse outcomes of pregnancy and preeclampsia.

I am confident that, just as was done for her during her postdoctoral work, she is now and will continue inspiring and supporting young scientists for generations to come. Congratulations, Dr. Faulkner, on this latest well-earned recognition.

Dr. Vaughn McCall helping lead clinical trial to better understand how therapy may help prevent suicide

Here’s some more exciting news on our research front. You’ll remember that back when he retired in June 2024, I theorized that it wouldn’t be the last we heard from Dr. Vaughn McCall, specifically because he told us then that he wanted to remain fully involved in psychiatry research. I’m glad to say I was right and he has.

Dr. McCall recently shared that he’s serving as a principal investigator on a multi-site randomized clinical trial coordinated by the University of Pittsburgh, with MCG and UCLA as recruiting sites. Funded by a $2.5 million grant from the National Institute on Aging (that’s just MCG’s share), the study is focused on reducing suicide risk – an area which Dr. McCall has dedicated much of his life’s work. Building on his research treating insomnia to ease suicidal ideation, this new project will enroll approximately 140 patients aged 55 and older who are experiencing depression and additional risk factors for suicide, including current ideation or past attempts. Researchers will explore whether cognitive behavioral therapy – often difficult for patients to access – can effectively improve sleep, mood, and suicidality. Participants will receive eight weeks of therapy and ongoing suicide risk monitoring.

As Dr. McCall often reminds me, psychiatry has too few tools for prevention. Here’s hoping we’re on our way to finding at least one more.

Annual Paceline Research Grant Awards given to investigators with high-risk, high-reward research propositions

Earlier this week I was honored to get to again join Dr. Keen, along with the leadership of our Georgia Cancer Center, as we recognized this year’s recipients of Paceline’s Research Grants. Paceline is centered around the goal of raising money for research at the cancer center. Their primary fundraising event is PaceDay, an annual bike ride (that’s seen me cycling 25 miles several times), that sadly had to be cancelled this year, due to the devastating effects of Hurricane Helene. Still, teams and individuals came together and raised a little over a quarter of a million dollars for the cause.

Those funds mean that each year MCG researchers who have bold ideas that might not get traditional funding but could lead to breakthrough discoveries in cancer treatment and prevention have those ideas funded. In just six years, supporters across our community have raised $1.7 million, funding 26 research projects. Even better, four of those have resulted in NIH grants totaling over $9 million.  

This year’s recipients and their proposals are:

·   Elayne Benson (graduate research assistant): Studying how specific receptors, olfactory receptors, may influence immune cell behavior and help regulate the body’s immune response to tumors.

·    Dr. Kebin Liu: Developing a new therapy that targets a protein called OPN to slow or stop the growth of colon cancer.

·    Dr. Patricia Schoenlein: Exploring how specific signaling pathways in cells can trigger a type of cell death and boost the immune system’s ability to fight breast cancer.

·    Dr. Shilpa Sharma: Creating a new kind of immune-boosting therapy to help the body better fight colon cancer.

·  Dr. Meng-Han (Mina) Tsai: Investigating how patients in underserved communities in Georgia are diagnosed with colorectal cancer, with the goal of improving early detection and access to care.

·    Dr. Chunhong Yan: Testing a new strategy to treat prostate cancer by altering how cancer cells use energy, potentially making them more vulnerable to treatment.

·   Dr. Gang Zhou: Working to make CAR-T cell therapy—a type of personalized cancer treatment—even more effective by combining it with specially engineered bacteria that stimulates the immune system.

Congratulations to all of you. I look forward to hearing how you will change the trajectory of cancer research and find tomorrow’s treatments and cures.

Dr. Rodger MacArthur passed away June 7

As we wrap up today, I wanted to share some sad news. Dr. Rodger MacArthur, a professor in our Division of Infectious Diseases, an honored educator and gifted physician, passed away Saturday, June 7. Dr. MacArthur joined our faculty after spending 20 years in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Wayne State. He graduated medical school right around the time the AIDS epidemic began and dedicated much of his career to finding better treatments for people living with HIV. He was an NIH-funded researcher that previously headed the WSU AIDS Clinical Trials Group (ACTG) Clinical Research Site. He was extensively published, with over 100 publications in peer-reviewed journals.

Those are impressive credentials, but I believe Dr. MacArthur’s greatest legacy is his commitment to educating the next generation. When the pandemic disrupted classrooms and clinics, he helped quickly launch a pandemic medicine course – creating an online platform for students to stay engaged and contribute. He helped develop student-led service initiatives to support frontline workers and educate the community. He often took time to speak with the media and the public and support, and attend, student-led vaccine education events. And no matter the time, day or night, he answered students’ phone calls, offering his wisdom, when they worried they may have developed COVID symptoms and wondered what to do about it. His compassion will no doubt influence the type of physicians they all become.

Our thoughts and prayers are with his family and friends.

My best to you always,

David C. Hess, MD

Dean, Medical College of Georgia

Upcoming Events

June 27 – MCG Faculty Senate Meeting, noon, J. Harold Harrison, MD Education Commons, GB1210B