MESA, Ariz. (Mar. 18, 2009) – A team from A.T. Still University’s Arizona School of Health Sciences (ATSU-ASHS) was recently awarded a $10,000 grant by the National Headache Foundation for a research project entitled “The effect of sport-related concussion on headache- and health-related quality of life in children and adolescents.”

According to Tamara Vaolvich McLeod, Ph.D., ATC, associate professor of athletic training at ATSU-ASHS and principal investigator in the project, the broad, long-term objective of the research will be to improve the health-related quality of life of individuals following sport-related concussion during childhood and adolescence. Co-investigators on the project include ATSU-ASHS interdisciplinary health science team members Curt Bay, Ph.D., associate professor; John Parsons, M.S., ATC, assistant professor; and Alison Snyder, Ph.D., ATC, assistant professor.

“This grant will help to advance the sports medicine communities’ understanding of how sport-related concussions impact the whole person, making this project both innovative and consistent with the osteopathic principles that define ATSU,” said Eric Sauers, Ph.D., ATC, ATSU-ASHS athletic training program director and chair of the department of interdisciplinary health sciences. “This research could lead to the development of new measurement instruments for assessing this vital outcome in a vulnerable population.”

The National Headache Foundation, founded in 1970, is a non-profit organization which exists to enhance the healthcare of headache sufferers. It is a source of help to sufferers’ families, physicians who treat headache sufferers, allied healthcare professionals and to the public. The NHF accomplishes its mission by providing educational and informational resources, supporting headache research and advocating for the understanding of headache as a legitimate neurobiological disease.

KIRKSVILLE, Mo. (Jan. 28, 2009) – The Missouri State Library Office of the Secretary of State (Library Services and Technology Act Federal Grant Program) has awarded the Still National Osteopathic Museum’s International Center for Osteopathic History and the A.T. Still Memorial Library $38,761 to transcribe and digitize the historical handwritten personal papers of Andrew Taylor Still, M.D., D.O., the founder of osteopathy.

According to Debra Loguda-Summers, museum curator and project director, the museum and library have shared responsibilities for maintaining the historic documents represented by Dr. Still’s papers and have experienced an ever-increasing demand for access to his correspondence, manuscripts, notes, Civil War records, and documents reflecting his philosophy, holistic perception of patients, and his unique, homespun approach to both.

“This grant will allow us to transcribe and place online with the Missouri Digital Heritage database more than 560 pages of Dr. Still’s documents for patrons throughout Missouri and the world,” said Loguda-Summers.

The project, which begins in February, is scheduled to be completed by January 2010. Visit http://www.sos.mo.gov/mdh/ for more information on the Missouri Digital Heritage Database. This project is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by the Missouri State Library, a division of the Office of the Secretary of State.

KIRKSVILLE, Mo. (Jan. 9, 2009) – A.T. Still University’s Kirksville College of Osteopathic Medicine (ATSU-KCOM) recently approved a medical humanities elective course titled “Medical Letters – Literature in Medicine,” which will be added to its curriculum in the third quarter of the 2008-09 school year.

“Medical Letters – Literature in Medicine” will expose students to the interaction of physician, patient, caregiver, society and the system of medicine through literary works. “It is hoped that examining the writing of others on these topics will increase perspective, deepen understanding, enrich the love for the art of medicine, and enhance empathy,” said Course Director Patricia Sexton, D.H.Ed., assistant professor of Family Medicine.

Educational literature indicates that because medicine is both art and science, students and future patients benefit from formal reflection on medical humanities. Through this lens, students gain an understanding of the human condition, the nature of healing and suffering, and their role in this cycle. 

This elective, which was developed through support of HRSA’s Predoctoral Training in Primary Care grant, enhances the KCOM curriculum by offering an additional humanities elective, the first being the Spirituality in Medicine course which was implemented in the Fall of 2008.

This elective also builds upon the objectives of the George Washington Institute for Spirituality and Health Curricular Award granted to KCOM’s Family Medicine Department to impact spirituality, cultural competence, and humanities in medical education. Margaret Wilson, D.O., is the family medicine chair and project director for the HRSA Pre-Doctoral Grant and the George Washington Institute for Spirituality and Health Grant. 

MESA, ARIZ. (Sept. 12, 2008 ) – A.T. Still University’s School of Osteopathic Medicine in Arizona (ATSU-SOMA) has been awarded funding for two projects that will further enhance efforts to train students in rural and underserved areas in Arizona.

SOMA students spend their second through fourth years learning at community health center campuses throughout the nation, giving them an opportunity for hands-on learning in a small group setting while at the same time helping to provide healthcare services to many underserved populations. Three of those community health center campus locations are in Arizona.

The Arizona Area Health Education Centers (AHEC) awarded SOMA $75,000 to fund the Arizona Rural and Underserved Health Workforce Training Project, and another $25,000 to fund the American Indian Rural Service (AIRS) Training and Northern Arizona Rural Service (NARS) Training Projects.The Arizona AHEC Program is administered through the University of Arizona Health Sciences Center.

“We are honored to work in partnership with the AHEC central office and the three regional AHECs to train medical students in local community environments that provide exceptional care to underserved populations,” said Thomas E. McWilliams, D.O., FACOFP, associate dean of bio-clinical sciences at SOMA. “These grants allow students to be exposed to didactic and clinical materials in context; that is, in an environment where the knowledge can be applied and services rendered.

“We believe that this type of learning is more effectively recalled and that such experiences will promote the selection of specialty careers that are needed by underserved communities and populations,” he continued. “The grants also allow us to better prepare the next generation of healthcare professionals to provide culturally appropriate care and to work effectively as part of a healthcare team.”

The Arizona Rural and Underserved Health Workforce Training Project gives students an opportunity to assist in the delivery of medical services to underserved populations served by AHEC centers. As part of this project, ATSU will establish “classrooms in a box” at SOMA’s three Arizona community health center campuses: Phoenix Indian Medical Center in Phoenix, North Country Community Health Center in Flagstaff, and El Rio Community Health Center in Tucson. The classroom in a box includes a computer, network connection equipment, and audio, video, and graphics components that together form a system that will enable remote lecture presentations, conferences, and workshops at the community campus sites. Funds will also help facilitate inter-professional experiences with ATSU peers from the Arizona School of Dentistry & Oral Health, and fund a consultant who will present a workshop on cultural competency and cross-cultural communication.

The AIRS Training Project partners SOMA students with the Greater Valley Area Health Education Center and allows them to become an integral part of the Phoenix Indian Medical Center healthcare team that provides quality primary care to approximately 153,500 American Indian patients. Similarly, the NARS project partners students with the Northern Area Health Education Center to observe patient care and gain an understanding of the local healthcare system. Funds from AIRS and NARS projects pay for students’ travel expenses to remote training sites as well as provide portable equipment for effective training at those sites.

KIRKSVILLE, Mo. (Sept. 2, 2008 ) – A.T. Still University’s Kirksville College of Osteopathic Medicine (ATSU-KCOM) will host its Cultural Competency and Spirituality in Medicine Conference September 12-13, 2008. The conference will explore spirituality in medicine and spiritually/culturally competent care. Topics will include patient values, belief systems, cultural and psychosocial factors in health practices, the nature of suffering, and self-care concepts.

Students and professionals who are interested in these topics are encouraged to attend. The registration fee is $20 and includes all conference materials and a continental breakfast and lunch on September 13. The registration fee is $10 for students, and KCOM students may attend the conference for free. The registration deadline is Wednesday, September 10. For registration materials and more information contact Carrie Gaines, sponsored projects coordinator, at 660.626.2860 or cgaines@atsu.edu.

Pauline W. Chen, M.D., is the keynote speaker and will discuss “The Tyranny of Diagnosis: One Surgeon’s Search for What Really Matters.” Dr. Chen, a liver transplant and liver cancer surgeon, is the author of “Final Exam: A Surgeon’s Reflections on Mortality” (2007), a New York Times bestseller. She graduated from Harvard University and Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine and completed her surgical training at Yale University, the National Cancer Institute (National Institutes of Health), and UCLA, where she was most recently a faculty member in the Department of Surgery. In 1999, she was named the UCLA Outstanding Physician of the Year.

This conference is sponsored in part by The George Washington Institute for Spirituality in Health Spirituality and Medicine Curricular and Residency Training Program Award funded by the John Templeton Foundation and ATSU’s Pre-doctoral Training in Primary Care, Grant Number D56HP08338 funded by the Division of Medicine, Bureau of Health Professions, Health Resources and Services Administration, Department of Health and Human Services. GWISH is funded by the John Templeton Foundation.