Colasurdo Named Dean of Medical School

Dr. Giuseppe N. Colasurdo, chair of the Department of Pediatrics, has been named dean of the Medical School, effective Sept. 1.

Colasurdo, an internationally known researcher and clinician, joined the Medical School’s faculty in 1995 as an assistant professor of pediatrics in the Division of Pulmonary Medicine. He became the division head in 1997 and has directed the fellowship training program in pediatric pulmonary medicine since 2001.

“Dr. Colasurdo will be a great dean of our Medical School,” said Dr. James T. Willerson, president of the UT Health Science Center. “He is an outstanding leader, physician-scientist, educator and builder. He will build on the very important earlier efforts of Drs. Jerry Wolinsky, Stan Schultz, Max Buja, John Ribble, Cheves Smythe, and others and will lead our Medical School into the very top echelons of medical schools in the country in a relatively short period of time.”

Dr. Jerry S. Wolinsky, professor and holder of the Bartels Family and Opal C. Rankin Professorships in Neurology, has served as the interim dean since June 2006. Prior to that, Dr. Stanley Schultz was dean from June 2004 until he stepped down for health reasons.

“We are very grateful to Dr. Jerry Wolinsky, who stepped in as interim dean and has worked very hard to achieve progress in our Medical School, recruiting some excellent new leaders, developing new programs and being concerned with financial and compliance matters,” Willerson said. “Dr. Wolinsky will now return to his original role as a physician-scientist and educator with our gratitude and deep appreciation.”

Wolinsky commended Colasurdo’s appointment. “Over the course of the last 15 months I have come to appreciate Dr. Colasurdo’s talents, enthusiasm, energy, and wisdom and agree that he is an appropriate academician who can help chart the course of the school over the next phase of its development,” Wolinsky said.

“The UT Health Science Center at Houston has a solid foundation, and our numerous strengths and talents will lead to a future of excellence in our educational and research programs,” Colasurdo said. “The clinical endeavor will be powered by a strong partnership with a national leader in health care, the Memorial Hermann Healthcare System, and will continue to build centers of excellence led by the UT physicians.”

Colasurdo, physician-in-chief at Children’s Memorial Hermann Hospital, specializes in respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), pediatric asthma, and other lung disorders in infants and children.

Colasurdo earned his medical degree at G. D’Annunzio School of Medicine in Chieti, Italy, and completed his residency training at The University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston. He completed his fellowship training in pulmonary medicine at the University of Colorado Health Science Center and the National Jewish Research and Medical Center in Denver.

Colasurdo will remain the chairman in the Department of Pediatrics for approximately one year while a search committee is formed to identify and recruit a new chair.


-M. Raine

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Ceremony Marks Beginning of students’ Quest to Become Physicians

Meeting the nation’s need to train more physicians, the Medical School is enrolling its largest entering class of students this month. To welcome the Class of 2011, the school hosted its White Coat Ceremony Aug. 15 at the Edwin Hornberger Conference Center.

Physicians from the Medical School helped each of the 230 new medical students into white coats. The donning of the short white coat signals the first milestone in the students’ quest to become physicians dedicated to excellence in patient care.

The students, who begin classes Aug. 20, also signed an ethical pledge and took the traditional “Oath of Hippocrates.”

“Medicine has traditions that go back centuries. The White Coat Ceremony is a recent construct, but a rather important one,” said Dr. Jerry Wolinsky, interim dean. “It serves as a strong symbol of passage from a phase of education for the growth of self to one dedicated to the service of others.”

Dr. Judianne Kellaway, the 2007 recipient of the Leonard Tow Humanism in Medicine Award, was the keynote speaker. “This life of medicine is now a deep and meaningful and integral part of you,” Kellaway said. “The responsibilities are great. The burden is great. But you will bear it with enthusiasm and great care, as there is no higher calling than taking care of your fellow man… Enjoy the wonder and excitement of this world of medicine. You’re going to love it.”

Here is a glimpse into the Class of 2011:

While working with a doctor who was caring for undeserved populations in Yucatan, Mexico, Edgar Araiza found his medical calling. “The towns we worked in were so indigenous, the populations often didn’t speak Spanish and still spoke Mayan language,” said Araiza, who was born in Saltillo in the state of Coahuila, Mexico. “In these underprivileged areas, with no health care, many of these people didn't go to doctors. I found the love for the patient.” Araiza, 23, a graduate of Austin College in Sherman is the first in his family to graduate from college and purse a career in medicine.

Peter Kaldis, 23, has the medical profession in his blood. He is the grandson of famed heart surgeon Dr. Denton A. Cooley, founder of the Texas Heart Institute at St. Luke's Hospital and namesake of the Denton A. Cooley Building, and the nephew of Dr. Susan Cooley King, project director of Reach Out and Read-Texas and a former assistant professor of pediatrics. Kaldis, a graduate of Santa Monica High School, considers Los Angeles his hometown, where his mother (also a UT Houston graduate) is an ophthalmologist and his father works in real estate. Kaldis has spent the past summer working in the Santa Monica free clinic helping to provide care to underserved populations.

Lance Harris, 22, plans to become a physician so he can give back to his community. Harris grew up in a southeast Houston neighborhood where health care wasn’t easy to come by. “Growing up in my neighborhood, it became a passion and a dream of mine to become a doctor so I could go back and take care of the people in my community,” said Harris, who graduated from the Michael E. DeBakey High School for Health Professions before completing his studies at Texas Southern University. Harris hopes to one day open a nonprofit medical clinic in southeast Houston for those who would not otherwise be able to afford it.

For Jeff Kemp, 45, becoming a physician was not his childhood dream. “I never dared to dream so large,” he said. Kemp dropped out of high school when he was 17 and immediately went to work, first as an artificial turf installer and then as a hardwood floor installer. He eventually started his own successful flooring business. Kemp was in his late 30s before he ever entertained the idea of a career in medicine. With the encouragement of his wife, a psychiatrist, he enrolled at a community college and later graduated from the University of Texas at Dallas. He volunteered at Baylor University Medical Center at Dallas, logging 500 hours in the emergency room. “That’s when the passion for medicine really started,” said Kemp, of Flower Mound. “I’ve seen people who have trouble accessing health care and have to wait until it’s so severe that they come to the ER doubled over in pain,” Kemp said. “I want to help them.”

-N. Camarata, M. Raine


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CCTS builds infrastructure

The Center for Clinical and Translational Sciences (CCTS) has a new main phone number and will soon have a new home on the 11th floor of the UT Professional Building.

By calling 713.500.7900, faculty and trainees can receive referrals to the myriad components of the CCTS:

• Help with study design, including biostatistics, bioinformatics, ethics, regulatory issues, and community engagement issues;
• Funding opportunities;
• Educational programs for predoctoral, postdoctoral, and junior faculty;
• Core laboratory services; and
• Clinical research unit (CRU).

“We are planning to move in the spring. Our new space will house representatives from all of our components and will include meeting spaces,” explained Dr. Maureen Goode, administrative director of the CCTS.

In addition, the CCTS space will feature a satellite office of the Memorial Hermann – Texas Medical Center CRU.

“Since so many of our clinics are located in the UT Professional Building, if a patient wants to join a clinical trial, they could easily come to the satellite office for a blood draw or to complete a questionnaire,” Goode said.

In another effort to promote clinical trials, the CCTS has created SPARK (Scientific Partners for Research Kickoff), which helps potential investigators with the design and conduct of studies performed in the CRU. “We gather an experienced group together to talk to the investigator about the details of potential CRU studies before the proposal is submitted for approval. It’s very helpful,” Goode said.

Call 713.500.7926 or 713.704.4147 for more information.

The goal of CCTS is to improve the process of translational research – to facilitate it from bench to bedside at a local and national level, Goode said. “We’re trying to bring groups together – helping people and connecting the dots,” she said.

-D. Brown

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