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Reflection, Celebration, and Thanks

A Message From the Chair, Steve Abramson, MD

As 2016 comes to a close, there are so many accomplishments of our faculty and staff to reflect upon and celebrate. As part of that celebration, Winterfest 2016 was held this past weekend, attended by more than 400 housestaff, fellows, faculty, and staff. The event was a wonderful salute that marked the extraordinary contributions of our housestaff to the department, our hospitals, and the patients we serve. Our residents are remarkably dedicated and talented physicians, the anchors of our academic mission to train the next generation of physicians and scientists. And we owe gratitude to the four faculty who were honored as outstanding teachers, selected by the housestaff: Lou Miller, Annie Garment, Kevin Hauck, and Harald Sauthoff.

Winterfest culminated a year of growth and momentum as we continued to see the successes of our faculty, and to recruit top experts that further develop specialty programs throughout the Department of Medicine. We’ve made great progress in multiple areas, including inflammatory bowel disease, autoimmunity, heart disease, advanced lung disease, and diabetes. Six of our divisions have risen to Top 20 status in the USNWR rankings, including Geriatrics (5), Rheumatology (8), Cardiology (10), Gastroenterology (13), Pulmonary (14), and Endocrinology and Diabetes (20)....

Continue reading Dr. Abramson's message

View the Winterfest photo gallery (password: elsa)
(Above: Kevin Hauck, MD—second from left, in helmet—receives his 2016 Teacher of the Year award from Drs. David Kudlowitz, Patrick Cocks, and Steven Abramson)

Spotlight on Sondra Zabar, MD

In this Spotlight video, we talk with Sondra Zabar, MD, director of the Division of General Internal Medicine and Clinical Innovation, about her central role in the ongoing curricular and clinical innovations at NYULMC, the challenges she faces as the new division director of DGIMCI, and the most significant changes she has witnessed—and participated in—during her three decades as an "NYU lifer."

News From Our Divisions & Programs

Innovation and collaboration are the hallmarks of our divisions' programs and events. Learn more about recent happenings, including the Division of Gastroenterology's second annual J. Christopher Burch Award for Humanism in Medicine ceremony, the second annual One Faculty Hospitalist Retreat, a Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) funded research consensus conference organized by Dr. Caroline Blaum and her team, and the Advanced Seminar in Psoriasis and Psoriatic Arthritis. Plus, discover new books by faculty from the Division of Medical Humanities, including Samuel Shem's At the Heart of the Universe and David Oshinsky's Bellevue: Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America's Most Storied Hospital.

Enjoy the following stories in this month’s Medicine@NYULMC. Open the PDF for the full issue.

Researcher Profiles

The Department of Medicine has long been a leader in cutting-edge research that transforms patient care and education. In this new feature, we highlight some of the important research our faculty is undertaking. First up, Drs. Harmony Reynolds and Peter Izmirly take us inside their projects.

Year-in-Review: Hospital Initiatives & Highlights

Find out more about 2016 accomplishments across our hospitals, including Tisch Hospital's evening Hot Spot Rounds, the VA's Diabetes Prevention Clinic led by Dr. Michael Bergman, and Bellevue's national designation as an Ebola/Special Pathogen Treatment Center.

History Quiz:
A Drop in Life Expectancy

A recent study released by the federal government shows that life expectancy in the United States has dropped for the first time since 1993, when HIV/AIDS was at its height and a major influenza epidemic occurred. The numbers, while hardly dramatic, reflect a "flattening out" of the mortality curve in the previous decade. Which raises two obvious questions: What are the leading causes of death in the United States, and where do we rank in comparison to other countries?

NYU Langone's Musculoskeletal Ball

NYU Langone Medical Center raised $1.6 million at its annual Musculoskeletal Ball, important funding to advance clinical care, education, and research. The event honored Judith and Stewart Colton, whose generous gift in 2013 established the Colton Center for Autoimmunity. The Colton Center supports an extensive research effort among leading physicians and scientists at NYULMC in order to make transformative discoveries designed to identify the seminal immunological events that characterize the onset of autoimmune diseases. The physician honoree was Philip Moskowitz, MD, the Mamdouha S. Bobst Associate Professor of Internal Medicine. (Learn more about the recent Advances in Autoimmunity Symposium sponsored by the Colton Center for Autoimmunity.)

Featured Student Essay

Through the eyes of medical student Lauren Seo, the wards at the VA become a theater, with patients and physicians, students and staff each filling a role: "Somewhere between a player and a watcher, somewhere between a dreamer and dark-eyed realist, there I am. I stand on a ground that likes to keep me on my toes, switching states from solid to slippery liquid at a rhythm I can't quite predict. It likes to see me dance as I struggle to regain my foothold..."

Clinical Correlations and Clinical Inquiry Corner

This issue's Clinical Correlations round-up features a wide range of topics, including pieces on the rising tide of food allergy, physician depression and suicide, the history of early medical photography, and the "hygiene hypothesis," while Clinical Inquiry Corner highlights articles on iron deficiency anemia, colon cancer screening in patients with Lynch syndrome, and more.

DOM in Photos: Winterfest 2016

The Department of Medicine's annual Winterfest, held on December 17th, honored our 2016 Teacher of the Year award recipients: Drs. Ann Garment, Kevin Hauck, Louis Miller, and Harald Sauthoff.

View the Winterfest photo gallery (password: elsa)

Featured Publications

View the PDF for blurbs about this research and for additional featured publications.

Share your news

The next newsletter will be a New & Noteworthy edition focused on faculty, staff, and housestaff news. We welcome your announcements: DOMCommunications@nyumc.org