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

  • The MRSA-Gay Connection (Columbia Journalism Review)
    The CJR reports: "The press performed a minor mea culpa [last] weekend, explaining that a new multidrug-resistant and especially virulent strain of MRSA staph infection, USA300, is not the new 'gay disease.' ... Unfortunately, UCSF was bearing the burden of an apology that should have been made by journalists. The university’s press release was actually very straightforward."
  • 2 hospitals got millions, spent little on charity (San Francisco Chronicle)
    The Chronicle reports: "San Francisco's five nonprofit hospitals received $79 million last year in tax breaks intended to compensate them for providing free care to the city's poor and uninsured, but they spent just $16 million on charity care, according to a new city report. ... The Health Department did not examine Kaiser because its members have to prepay to participate, and UCSF was omitted because the city and county don't have any authority over it. Laguna Honda Hospital and the Veterans Affairs Medical Center also weren't included because they target specific populations, not the general public."
  • Local tennis: Q and A with Margaret Imai-Kelly (Bakersfield Californian, The)
    Kern County tennis enthusiast Margaret Imai-Kelly, diagnosed with a brain tumor last October, has received help from her community to finance treatments at UCSF Medical Center.
  • Great Drug, but Does It Prolong Life? (New York Times)
    The New York Times reports: "In the fallout from the headline-making trial of Vytorin, a combination drug that was found to be no more effective than a simple statin in reducing arterial plaque, many people are asking a more fundamental question about statins in general: Do they prolong your life? ... Dr. Beatrice Golomb, an associate professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, and a co-author of a 2004 editorial in The Journal of the American College of Cardiology questioning the data on statins," is quoted.
  • Aging Grace: Facing the Uncertainties of Growing Older With HIV (POZ Magazine)
    POZ Magazine reports: "On the morning of January 6, readers of The New York Times awoke to a sobering headline: 'AIDS Patients Face Downside of Living Longer.' The article highlights the stories of two fifty-something HIV-positive men, both of whom boast a disheartening list of ailments more typically found in much older people. Both men seem uncertain about how they might navigate a bleak future filled with illness. The article credits antiretroviral drugs for giving one man back his life and hopes for the future, but poses the question, 'at what cost?' Some readers recognized their own struggles in the men’s stories and felt validated. Steven Deeks, MD, a prominent AIDS researcher and doctor at the University of California San Francisco's General Hospital, said, 'Several patients sent me e-mails saying that finally someone was talking about the important issues that were affecting them.'”

UCSF TELEVISION COVERAGE

  • Governor's Defeat: Governor Schwarzenegger's health care reform plan is dead in the water (NBC11 News: The Bay Area At 6)
    NBC 11 reports: "The Senate Health Committee on Monday rejected Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's ambitious effort to reform the state's health care system, voting it down 7-1." "We need more than a Band-Aid," said Erica Brode, a UCSF medical student. "We want to change this health system." --- [This interview with Brode aired but did not appear in the web story.] --- Air Time: 6 PM
  • Fountain of Youth: A new study shows that exercise may slow down the aging process (ABC News Network -- Good Morning America)
    ABC World News reports: "A study says regular exercise can cut risks of cancer, heart disease and diabetes, and may slow the aging process. Elissa Epel, PhD, professor at the University of California, San Francisco, explained how exercise can slow cell aging. --- This program also aired yesterday on ABC World News with Charles Gibson at 6 PM, Good Morning Washington DC, at 6 AM today, and on several local ABC stations nationwide.]

UCSF HEADLINES

  • National Leader in Family Medicine Dies (UCSF Today)
    UCSF Today reports: "Longtime UCSF educator and clinician Jonathan “Jack” Rodnick, MD, former chair of the UCSF Department of Family and Community Medicine, died unexpectedly on Jan. 26 while vacationing in Hawaii. The Department of Family and Community Medicine will announce memorial plans once they are finalized."
  • Morphine dependency blocked by single genetic change (UCSF News Office)
    Jennifer Whistler, PhD, an investigator in the UCSF-affiliated Ernest Gallo Clinic and Research Center, and associate professor of neurology at UCSF, and colleagues report in the journal Current Biology they have eliminated morphine addiction in mice, a breakthrough that scientists hope will lead to developing treatments to cure drug dependence.