Reporter

Thirty years ago, Shawn Drumgoole took a life-saving ride to Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt to be placed on Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation (ECMO).

In 2018, Ronnie Kreis began to develop severe heart failure. After being hospitalized multiple times that year near his home in Oliver Springs in East Tennessee, he was told that nothing else could be done.

The multicellular, 3-D structure of human pancreatic islets — the areas of the pancreas containing hormone-producing or endocrine cells — has presented challenges to researchers as they study and manipulate these cells’ function, but Vanderbilt University Medical Center researchers have now developed a pseudoislet system that allows for much easier study of islet function.

A protein linked to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), a progressive neurological disease that causes muscle weakness, may be a key to treating fibrotic disease of the kidneys and other organs, researchers at Vanderbilt University Medical Center reported recently.

Memory complaints in younger postmenopausal women are associated with differences in brain structure and may serve as an early marker for risk of future cognitive decline, according to a study published June 22 in Menopause by Vanderbilt University Medical Center researchers.

Wade Iams, MD, MSCI, assistant professor of Medicine, is the recipient of a National Comprehensive Cancer Network Foundation Young Investigator Award.

During February and March at two large academic medical centers in Nashville and Boston, screening for high cholesterol and high blood sugar dropped 81-90% and initiation of drug therapy for these conditions dropped 52-60%.