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

  • Get into the doctor's office - fast (Glamour)
    Making an appointment with some doctors is like trying to score a table at the new "it" restaurant because profitable cosmetic proceedures may be crowding out less lucrative appointments. A study from UCSF found that the typical wait for a Botox injection was just eight days, while the wait to get a weird mole checked was 26. Pointers to get in quicker are offered. (Appears in the March 2008 issue)
  • Eradicate malaria? Doubters fuel debate (New York Times)
    Last year, challenging global health orthodoxy, Bill and Melinda Gates called for the eradication of malaria. Sir Richard G. A. Feachem, former director of the Global Fund and now head of the Global Health Group, a policy institute at the University of California, San Francisco, founded with Gates Foundation money, says malaria can be squeezed to death by moving control downward from southern China, up from southern Africa and up across the South Pacific. He hopes for elimination by 2050.
  • State pay hikes soar - for some (Sacramento Bee, The)
    Four years ago, barely three dozen California state workers earned a base salary of more than $200,000. Today, as the state faces a fiscal crisis, close to 1,000 state workers make that much. Those and other large raises have cost the state hundreds of millions of dollars. They contrast starkly with the more modest raises of most rank-and-file state employees -- and most private workers, according to a Bee analysis of data from the state Controller's Office. Four of the top five highest-paid workers in the state worked for the University of California as of 2007, though two of them have since moved on. When the UC is included in the analysis of state government employees, California's highest-salaried worker is Mark Laret, chief executive officer at UC San Francisco Medical Center.
  • Stem-cell grant applicants to boost financing share (San Jose Mercury News)
    Universities and other non-profit entities hoping to get state grants to build stem-cell research laboratories have agreed to commit far more of their own money for the construction projects than the law requires, state officials said Thursday. The California Institute for Regenerative Medicine plans to award up to $262 million for new stem-cell laboratories. Under Proposition 71, which created the agency, those receiving the grants must contribute at least 20 percent in matching money - or about $50 million. Stanford, which seeks a $50 million building grant, has promised to kick in the most matching money - $150 million. The University of California-San Francisco, which has applied for $40 million, has offered to spend $54.5 million of its money. (AP story)
  • Babies can cause 'momnesia' (USA Today)
    Momnesia, the mental fuzziness and memory lapses that set in shortly after childbirth, causes many moms to feel mentally foggy in the days after delivery. And they notice that the details of labor and delivery, which are scenes one might expect to be seared into a woman's consciousness, began to slowly slip away. Few parents enjoy feeling so scatterbrained, says neuropsychiatrist Louann Brizendine, author of The Female Brain and founder of the Women's and Teen Girls' Mood and Hormone Clinic at the University of California in San Francisco. And momnesia can be dangerous, such as when moms forget to fasten the straps in an infant's car seat. Yet momnesia may give modern mothers an evolutionary advantage.

UCSF RADIO AND TELEVISION COVERAGE

  • San Francisco General Hospital has opened an HIV Cardiology Clinic (KHQ-TV)
    New research shows HIV patients may be at a higher risk of developing heart disease than people who don't have the virus. New research shows that if a patient has HIV, that patient is at a higher risk of developing heart disease. To address the problem, San Francisco General Hospital has opened an HIV Cardiology Clinic, one of the first of its kind in the nation. The goal is to catch early warning signs of heart disease using technology like this high resolution ultrasound. The hope is that the combination of routine screenings like this, medications, exercise and a healthy diet will help people fight off heart disease.

UCSF HEADLINES

  • Co-author of Three Trillion Dollar War to speak at UCSF (UCSF Today)
    Linda J. Bilmes, an expert in budgeting and finance, will speak about the monumental costs of the Iraq war at UCSF on Wednesday, March 5. Bilmes co-wrote The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Cost of the Iraq Conflict with Joseph E. Stiglitz, winner of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics. Their book looks at the price tag of the US involvement In Iraq and Afghanistan and reveals for the first time a litany of costs -- the vast majority financed through borrowing -- that have been hidden from US taxpayers.