FYI…UCSF in the News is a daily summary of news stories published worldwide that highlight UCSF, its affiliated programs, and issues that affect the University.  To read the full news story, click the individual headlines listed below.

On the second Wednesday of each month, FYI…UCSF in the News includes an additional "Research Roundup" section that lists research papers authored by UCSF faculty and published in the journals Cell, Health Services Research, JAMA, Lancet, Nature, NEJM, Nursing Research, and Science.

UCSF PRINT AND ONLINE COVERAGE

  • Africa's health care crisis extends beyond diseases -- Opinion (San Jose Mercury News)
    In an opinon piece published in the Mercury News, Doruk Ozgediz, M.D., adjunct assistant professor of surgery at the University of California, San Francisco, writes: "When it comes to health issues in Africa, most people think of infectious diseases - HIV, malaria, and tuberculosis - the primary focus of global health donor organizations today. But surgical problems such as trauma, complicated pregnancy, birth defects, and some types of cancer and infections also kill and disable millions of people in Africa each year. The most basic surgical care, which we take for granted here, even routine appendicitis, is missing in many African countries. For the past few years, the University of California-San Francisco, has established a research and training program in surgery and anesthesia in partnership with Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda. In the long run, we hope this will improve surgical services."
  • Calls Help Couch Potatoes Walk (Chicago Tribune - Online)
    The Associated Press reports: "Researchers at Stanford University, who studied sedentary people for a year, found that automated exercise reminder phone calls had about the same get-up-and-go power as calls from human counselors. ... Dr. Rachelle Bernacki, an assistant professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, who was not involved in the research, said she was impressed at how much the computer-generated calls worked."
  • Stem-cell agency flags 4 universities' grant requests for conflict of interest violations (San Francisco Chronicle)
    The Chronicle reports: "California's stem cell agency may toss out grant applications seeking millions of dollars for researchers at UCSF and other prestigious universities because they included letters of support from deans who also sit on the citizens' board that governs the $3 billion program."
  • Correction: Long decline in birthrate of teens ends (Los Angeles Times)
    The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported Wednesday that "after 14 years of steady decline, the rate of teen births rose 3% last year," said the Los Angeles Times. -- *Yesterday's FYI summary incorrectly stated Dr. Claire Brindis said the study results were "encouraging." Dr. Brindis' quote in the LA Times stated: "We shouldn't lose sight of the remarkable progress on an issue that traditionally was seen as a problem that couldn't be solved," said Claire Brindis, co-director of the Center for Reproductive Health Research and Policy at UC San Francisco, who was not involved in the study. "The challenge is: We may have reached the first wave of young people...but each year there is a new group of teens," she said. "We need to regroup and recommit ourselves."

UCSF TELEVISION COVERAGE

  • Deep voiced men lucky in love (CBS 5 KPIX-TV CH 5 San Francisco)
    UCSF Neuropsychiatrist Louann Brizendine MD, talks to KPIX's Dr. Kim Mulvihill about the new Harvard research showing men with deep voices are lucky in love. -- Air Time: 5 PM

UCSF HEADLINES

  • Overweight adolescents projected to have more heart disease in young adulthood (UCSF News Office)
    "A new study investigating the health effects of being overweight during adolescence projects alarming increases in the rates of heart disease and premature death by the time today's teenagers reach young adulthood. Findings of the study are reported in the Dec. 6, 2007 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine," reports Lauren Hammit in the UCSF News Office.
  • UCSF Medical Center Lobby Fills with Holiday Spirit (UCSF Today)
    "The UCSF Medical Center lobby was a scene of holiday jubilation as nurses, physicians, staff, patients, volunteers, visitors and children from the nearby child care center celebrated the holiday season on Dec. 3. Wearing Santa hats, staff from UCSF Volunteer Services once again assumed their usual role of making merry, inviting passersby to stop in the lobby for some holiday cheer," writes UCSF Editor Lisa Cisneros.
  • Grilling cells: Leukemia yields personal secrets (UCSF Today)
    "There’s a new way to personalize drug therapy. It’s pharmacogenetics -- using information on genetic differences to tailor treatment. Deanna Kroetz, PhD, of UCSF's School of Pharmacy is exploring pharmacogenetics in the most common and deadly form of adult leukemia," reports UCSF Science Writer Jeffrey Norris. "Some leukemia cells supercharge cell pumps to get rid of chemotherapy. Kroetz is aiming toward a simple way to identify these tumors, select the best treatment and avoid complications."
  • Speaking of Science: Can We Talk? You Tell Me (Science Cafe)
    Science Cafe editor Jeff Miller writes: "It has been a heady few months for the 'state of knowing' we call science. From global heating to stem cell reprogramming, science news -- some of it generated by UCSF discoveries -- has jammed the airwaves and filled our computer screens. But does quantity qualify as understanding? Should we feel that a new age of enlightenment is upon us? Can we declare reason victorious and retire from the field of battle in clean lab coats? You tell me."
  • Nominations Sought for the Chancellor’s Award for the Advancement of Women (UCSF Today)
    UCSF Today reports: "Nominations are now being sought for the annual Chancellor's Award for the Advancement of Women. This award recognizes exceptional efforts toward the advancement of women at UCSF beyond the scope of an individual’s job, area of research or student training."