Upstate announces major EMS training outreach in Cayuga County on eve of national EMS Week

With the aid of a scissor lift, photographer Susan Kahn takes a group photograph of emergency responders and physicians in the parking lot at Upstate University Hospital’s Community Campus. Photo by Susan Keeter.

Upstate emergency physician Derek Cooney, MD speaks to the media. Photo by Darryl Geddes.

In celebration of National EMS Week, May 19 to 23, Upstate University Hospital will present free training to EMS providers in Cayuga County in what will be one of the largest EMS training efforts undertaken by the hospital outside of Onondaga County.

The Emergency Medical Services training in Cayuga County will take place Wednesday, May 22 at the Auburn Holiday Inn, 75 North St., Auburn. It will feature presentations on Upstate’s EMS Physician Response Team and Mercy Flight Central Air Ambulance. Also part of the training will be presentations on how to take care of an obese patient before they get to the hospital and the importance of conducting a quick assessment of stroke patients and how stroke care differs from hospital to hospital.

EMS officials say it is essential that first responders, including EMS providers, get regular, ongoing education about new techniques and protocols for providing treatment in the field. “Upstate is providing us a valuable opportunity to receive high quality training for all our EMS providers, including individuals working in public safety, nursing, fire and police,” said Brian Dahl, director of emergency medical services for Cayuga County Emergency Management.  “It’s important for everyone to come together and receive this training.”

Mercy Flight was available for the photo shoot. Photo by Susan Keeter.

Cayuga County has about 360 individuals working as EMS providers. Some are paid, and many are volunteers, who live in rural areas that make up most of the county’s 720 square miles. That’s challenging geography in which to provide programming to EMS providers, where many would have to travel significant distances to receive such training, officials say.

Thus Upstate and Cayuga County officials worked on a plan to bring programming to Cayuga County. “Presenting a comprehensive EMS training program where first responders live is essential to ensuring all who arrive first on the scene of an accident, have the most advanced training possible,” said Doug Sandbrook, Upstate’s EMS liaison and director of its paramedic program.

Upstate says it will consider additional educational programming in other outlying communities and is examining the use of provide some training through teleconferencing.

“As the region’s only academic medical center, we are responding to the needs of the region to ensure that individuals throughout Central New York have the very best in care when first responders arrive on the scene,” said Derek Cooney, MD, director of Upstate’s Fellowship Program for EMS and Disaster Medicine.

Upstate University Hospital is the area’s only Level 1 trauma center and provides certification and continuing medical education program to more than 700 EMS professionals annually.

Group photo by Susan Kahn.

Looking Ahead with Dr. Smith: Upstate’s historical foundation attracts doctors who will give back to the community

(This is a continuing series of conversations with David Smith, MD, the president of Upstate Medical University. Read the first conversation here.)

One of our goals is to serve our region, both by recruiting and admitting students from New York state, and to prepare our graduates  to care for our state’s diverse population. We have made a concerted effort to supply a well-educated workforce to the region and this ties back to our original mission.

Our values go back for generations. We were founded, in 1834, to serve the new population that was emerging along the Erie Canal — not to mention the disease and pestilence that followed that growth, and the environmental hazards along the way. We were created to train doctors who would work to solve those problems and who would care for the community.        

I’m not sure we’ve ever turned our back on the urgency from which we were created. It has always been in our roots. The values are still there. That sense of place and of being well-grounded continues today. That’s why we’ve been able to attract such engaged, passionate students. It’s remarkable. Across our four colleges, our students have a keen awareness of the environment and individual circumstances. They have a high level of compassion and caring. They are doing and going above and beyond what is just required in the classroom and the laboratory. They are ready and willing to meet today’s needs.

So their potential probably has not been fully realized — which gives us great hope for being able to do the things we’re going to have to do in the future.

More historical trivia about Upstate — five final answers

Here are the answers from today’s pop quiz on the history of Upstate:

1. This excerpt is from what year? “It was evident that if the College was to survive, even greater financial support was necessary.”

Answer: 1949, when Syracuse University was lobbying for the medical school to be acquired by the State University of New York.

2. In the late 1880s, the Department of Health of the City of Syracuse established a building for contagious diseases on a large plot east of Teall Avenue. It was commonly known as what?

Answer: The “Pest House.” And, by the late 1920s, patients with contagious disease were treated within the new City Hospital, which was later renamed Silverman Hall — and now houses Upstate’s College of Health Professions.

3. Two separate studies in the early 1950s concluded that several of Syracuse’s 10 hospitals merge and that a new hospital be built. What happened before those recommendations were followed?

Answer:  After a bad experience at a local hospital, the late Alexander “Casey” Jones, executive editor of the now-defunct Herald-Journal newspaper, encouraged then Syracuse Mayor Donald Mead to fix the city’s antiquated hospital system. A commission was appointed, public hearings were held, and the decision was made to build a new hospital outside of downtown. Community Hospital opened in 1963. The following year it merged with Syracuse General Hospital and became Community General Hospital. It became part of Upstate in 2011.

Julius Richmond, MD went on to become US Surgeon General.

4. Which former chairman of pediatrics went on to become US Surgeon General, overseeing tobacco control efforts?

Answer: Julius Richmond, MD served as surgeon general from 1977 to 1981.

5. A gifted parasitologist and artist who became an adjunct lecturer in the Department of Bacteriology in 1930 (later joining the faculty) made basic discoveries about the life cycle of the tapeworm and drew meticulous illustrations of his findings. Justus Mueller, PhD took multiple scientific expeditions into the rainforests of Central and South America, which earned him election into which elite club in 1980?

Answer:  The Explorers Club, an international professional society dedicated to preserving the instinct to explore. The club, with headquarters in New York City, unifies explorers and scientists from a variety of disciplines from more than 60 countries. Among its members are the first men to reach the North and South poles, the first to summit Mount Everest, the first to the deepest point in the ocean and the first to the surface of the moon.

Upstate surgeon speaks about preventive mastectomy

Dr. Jayne Charlamb, MD is interviewed. Photo by Kathleen Paice Froio.

NewsChannel 9 interviewed Dr. Jayne Charlamb, MD, about actress/director Angelina Jolie’s disclosure that she underwent a double mastectomy to reduce her chances of developing breast cancer. The Syracuse television station focused on Andrea Riccelli, another woman who chose to have her breasts removed because of an 87-percent risk of breast cancer.

“I decided I’d rather choose the preventive mastectomy rather than illness, I’d rather choose that – than have my kids see me sick, or not be here in a decade or so,” Riccelli told NewsChannel 9′s Caitlin Nuclo.

Charlamb said that many patients in the same situation also choose surgery. “It’s not perfect. We can never say you won’t get breast cancer, but it’s the most effective way. Again though, it has to be the right decision for the woman involved.”

Read/watch the Newschannel 9 coverage.

More historical trivia about Upstate — five final questions

The old physiology-pharmacology lab.

This little trip down memory lane wraps up today with five final trivia questions having to do with the history of Upstate. I’ll post answers this afternoon. Thanks for playing along.

1. This excerpt is from what year? “It was evident that if the College was to survive, even greater financial support was necessary.”

2. In the late 1880s, the Department of Health of the City of Syracuse established a building for contagious diseases on a large plot east of Teall Avenue. It was commonly known as what?

3. Two separate studies in the early 1950s concluded that several of Syracuse’s 10 hospitals merge and that a new hospital be built. What happened before those recommendations were followed?

4. Which former chairman of pediatrics went on to become US Surgeon General, overseeing tobacco control efforts?

5. A gifted parasitologist and artist who became an adjunct lecturer in the Department of Bacteriology in 1930 (later joining the faculty) made basic discoveries about the life cycle of the tapeworm and drew meticulous illustrations of his findings. Justus Mueller, PhD took multiple scientific expeditions into the rainforests of Central and South America, which earned him election into which elite club in 1980?

More historical trivia about Upstate – five new answers

1. In what year did the college adopt the metric system?

Answer: 1879. (And judging from the use of three exclamation points in the narrative history, this was an especially exciting development!!!)

State University Hospital, 1965.

2. It would take four years to build, but when was the groundbreaking for the State University Hospital (now Upstate University Hospital?)

Answer: 1961.

3. What was the first full-time educational department that was established?

Answer: Physiology, in 1892. This was followed by pathology in 1900, biochemistry in 1903, anatomy in 1907 and microbiology in 1914.

4. How much money was donated by businesses, foundations and individuals  in order for Community Hospital to open its doors Jan. 1, 1963? (Community Hospital became Community General Hospital in 1964 after merging with Syracuse General Hospital, and it became part of Upstate in 2011.)

Answer: More than 48,000 businesses, foundations and individuals raised more than $7 million. The federal government contributed $2.2 million.

5. What placed Syracuse in the forefront of medical education in the late 1800s? (Hint, Syracuse was following the lead of Harvard and Michigan in this.)

Answer: The plan and establishment of a three-year graded curriculum, which was considered a daring move in the face of the economics of medical training. Many medical students preferred the standard two 16-week series of lectures followed by three years of preceptorship at little or no expense to them.

More historical trivia about Upstate — five new questions

This welcomes everyone to Weiskotten Hall.

Here’s part two of the pop quiz I’ve assembled regarding Upstate’s history, based on the research I’ve been conducting for a forthcoming Upstate Health magazine article. Later this afternoon, I’ll post the answers.

1. In what year did the college adopt the metric system?

2. It would take four years to build, but when was the groundbreaking for the State University Hospital (now Upstate University Hospital?)

3. What was the first full-time educational department that was established?

4. How much money was donated by businesses, foundations and individuals  in order for Community Hospital to open its doors Jan. 1, 1963? (Community Hospital became Community General Hospital in 1964 after merging with Syracuse General Hospital, and it became part of Upstate in 2011.)

5. What placed Syracuse in the forefront of medical education in the late 1800s? (Hint: Syracuse was following the lead of Harvard and Michigan in this.)

Time for historical trivia about Upstate — five answers

Here are the answers to the questions I posed this morning having to do with interesting tidbits in the history of Upstate. I’ll post five more trivia questions tomorrow.

1. This weekend, Upstate will graduate 477 students — 170 from the College of Health Professions, 149 from the College of Medicine, 135 from the College of Nursing, and 23 from the College of Graduate Studies. How many students graduated 50 years ago?

Answer: In 1963, the College of Medicine had 75 graduates, and the College of Nursing had 54. In addition, three individuals obtained doctorates.

2. Name the Upstate founding father who was among the first group of physicians to promote vaccination (against smallpox, in 1803.)

Answer: Edward Cutbush, MD, the first dean at Geneva Medical College.

This is part of the historical collection at Upstate’s Health Sciences Library.

3. What was the total price of a bill dated Sept. 11, 1892 for an operation and five-day hospital stay?

Answer:  $4.65

4. What began to disappear when, starting in 1930, the senior medical students were assigned 10-day rotations living in the hospital?

Answer: Home births. Prior to the 1930s, students helped staff prenatal clinics and were in charge of home delivery services for clinic patients. More women began delivering in the hospital when student residencies in obstetrics began.

5. Today’s in-state tuition for medical school is $29,530. What was it 100 years ago?

Answer: $175 (Which, in today’s dollars, would be in the $4,000 ballpark.)

Time for historical trivia about Upstate — five questions

This undated newspaper ad is part of the historical collection in the Upstate Health Sciences Library. Chancellor Charles N. Sims is first mentioned in the college catalogue in 1888.

I’ve been delving into records about the history of Upstate Medical University lately. I spent some time in the Upstate Health Sciences Library archives, and I perused a scrapbook compiled by J. Howard Ferguson, MD in 1968 that is full of interesting information. So I thought I would offer a pop quiz this morning – with answers to be posted later this afternoon.

1. This weekend, Upstate will graduate 477 students — 170 from the College of Health Professions, 149 from the College of Medicine, 135 from the College of Nursing, and 23 from the College of Graduate Studies. How many students graduated 50 years ago?

2. Name the Upstate founding father who was among the first group of physicians to promote vaccination (against smallpox, in 1803.)

3. What was the total price of a bill dated Sept. 11, 1892 for an operation and a five-day hospital stay?

4. What began to disappear when, starting in 1930, the senior medical students were assigned 10-day rotations living in the hospital?

5. Today’s in-state tuition for medical school is almost $29,530. What was it 100 years ago?

Personalized medicine lecture open to the public May 20

Aaron Ciechanover, MD

After he receives an honorary degree at Upstate Medical University’s commencement Sunday, Nobel laureate Aaron Ciechanover, MD will give a talk on personalized medicine that’s open to the public from 9 to 10 a.m. Monday, May 20 in the Medical Alumni Auditorium of Weiskotten Hall on the Upstate campus.

Ciechanover speaks about “The Revolution of Personalized Medicine — Are we Going to Cure All Diseases, and at What Price?” In 2004, he and his collaborators —  Avram Hershko, MD, PhD, and Irwin Rose, PhD — received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for the discovery of ubiquitin mediated protein degradation that revolutionized today’s approach to treating cancer and that created new pathways to develop more effective therapies for neurodegenerative disorders and other genetic diseases.

Ciechanover is distinguished research professor of the Cancer and Vascular Biology Research Center, The Rappaport Faculty of Medicine and Research Institute at the Technion, Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa, Israel.