May faculty and staff features

Dennis E. Ohman, Ph.D., Department of Microbiology and Immunology, VCU School of Medicine
Ohman, professor and chair in the department of microbiology and immunology in the VCU School of Medicine, has been named a Fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology (AAM), a professional organization dedicated entirely to microbiologists and the science of microbiology. Ohman’s research has focused on determining the various pathogenic properties of Pseudomonas aeruginosa, a bacterium responsible for causing life-threatening infections in those with immuno-compromised conditions. Ohman and his group were the first to determine the function of many of its genes, and the basis for their regulation.

AAM Fellows are elected annually, through a highly selective, peer-reviewed process based on their records of scientific achievement and original contributions that have advanced microbiology. There are now more than 2,500 fellows representing all subspecialties of microbiology, including basic and applied research, teaching, public health, industry, and government service. 

Stephen S. Mick, Ph.D., Department of Health Administration
Mick, Arthur Graham Glasgow professor and chair of the Department of Health Administration, has been named a Fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives. The ACHE is an international professional society of more than 30,000 health care executives who lead the nation’s hospitals, health care systems and other health care organizations.

Tracy Ryan, Ph.D., associate professor of advertising research, School of Mass Communications
Ryan was selected to participate in the Fulbright Senior Specialists Program. Ryan will spend 30 days this summer at the Argentine University of Business in Buenos Aires developing new courses in Internet marketing for the school. She also will give seminars to prepare faculty to teach the material.

Kenneth N. Daniels, Ph.D., professor of finance, and Jayaraman Vijayakumar, Ph.D., associate professor of accounting, School of Business
Daniels and Vijayakumar received the reward for the Outstanding Investment Paper at the 43rd Annual Meeting of the Eastern Finance Association on April 19 in New Orleans. The winning paper was titled “Debt Maturity, Risk and Information Asymmetry: The Case of Municipal Bonds.” The award is sponsored by the American Association of Individual Investors and includes a cash award.

Cathy J. Bradley, Ph.D., Department of Health Administration
Bradley, professor of health administration and co-leader of the Cancer Prevention and Control program, received $3 million in grant funding from the National Cancer Institute to study the effects of health insurance on treatment decisions and labor market outcomes of women with breast cancer. The study will be complete in March 2012.  Patients will be recruited from the Massey Cancer Center and from the Virginia Cancer Institute.

John Kellum, M.D., professor, Department of Surgery
Kellum worked with colleagues to write two chapters in the recently-published, sixth edition of Shakelford's “Surgery of the Alimentary Tract,” a textbook dealing with the anatomy, physiology and biology of abdominal surgery. Kellum and his two surgical research fellows, Drs. Roberto Iglesias, M.D., and Jarrod Day, M.D., wrote the chapter on “Anatomy and Physiology of the Duodenum.” Kellum collaborated with former VCU Surgical Chief Resident Michael Stoner, M.D., who is now an assistant professor in the Division of Vascular Surgery at East Carolina School of Medicine, to publish the chapter on “Small Intestinal Diverticula.” 

Dina Soliman, M.D., assistant professor, Department of Anesthesiology.
Soliman has joined the School of Medicine as assistant professor. She previously was an assistant professor in the Department of Anesthesia and Critical Care Medicine, Division of Cardiothoracic Anesthesia – Transesophageal Echocardiography, at the George Washington University Medical Center in Washington, D.C. Her specialty interest is in Transesophageal Echocardiography. 

Antonio Abbate, M.D., assistant professor of medicine, Department of Internal Medicine
Abbate has joined the School of Medicine as an assistant professor. In addition to teaching, he will be involved with initiating and conducting research studies and expanding clinical practice.
His research interests involve the pathophysiology of post-infarction remodeling and heart failure. A member of the European Society of Cardiology since 2005, Abbate received his medical degree from the University Campus Bio-Medico in Rome, and completed an internship and cardiovascular medicine specialty training at the Catholic University in Rome in 2004.

School of Medicine Faculty Honors
David Cifu, M.D., has been asked to chair the Veterans Health Systems Brain Injury Screening Committee, a nationwide initiative to screen all returning Operation Iraqi Freedom/Operation Enduring Freedom soldiers for evidence of mild Traumatic Brain Injury and Post-Concussive Syndrome. Janet Niemeier, Ph.D., was elected for a three-year term as secretary of the American Board of Rehabilitation Psychology. Joy L. Ware, Ph.D., professor of pathology, was appointed as the first director of the VCU Conservation Medicine Program in a collaboration between the School of Medicine and the VCU Rice Center.

Gloria Bazzoli, Ph.D., Department of Health Administration
Bazzoli, Bon Secours professor of health administration, has received more than $1 million in grant funding from the National Institutes of Health to examine the effects of the safety net on health disparities. The grant will run through April 2010. This project will be a cooperative effort involving VCU’s Department of Health Administration, the VCU Health System and RTI, International of Research Triangle Park, N.C.