VCU Faculty and Students Celebrate Eighth Annual Women’s Health Research Day

By Frances Dumenci

The Virginia Commonwealth University Institute for Women’s Health this week hosted the Eighth Annual Women’s Health Research Day, a networking opportunity celebrating and promoting excellence in interdisciplinary women’s health research.

This year’s event, “From Bench, To Bedside, To Community: Focal Topics in Women’s Health Research,” included four faculty presenters.

• Sabo Masho, M.D., associate professor in the Department of Epidemiology and Community Health, discussed the association between stress and poor birth outcomes.
• Daniel Conrad, Ph.D., professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology, addressed allergic disease in women.
• Ananda Amstadter, Ph.D., assistant professor in the Department of Psychiatry, talked about risk and resilience factors for post-traumatic stress disorder.
• Eric Benotsch, Ph.D., associate professor in the Department of Psychology, presented information on mental health and HIV risk in transgender adults.

This year, nearly 60 research posters were on display by VCU faculty and students covering a wide range of women’s health topics. There were three poster categories, including basic science, clinical and socio-behavioral research.

Awards were given to the best posters in each category. Winners included Masayuki Nagahashi (basic science), a post-doctoral student in the Department of Surgery; Adeola Adeniji (clinical), graduate student in the School of Pharmacy; and Candace Burton (socio-behavioral), assistant professor in the Department of Family and Community Health Nursing.

In addition, Nagahashi’s poster titled “Sphingosine kinase 1-induced sphingosine-1 phosphate promotes breast cancer profession by stimulating angiogenesis and lymphangiogenesis,” received the Elizabeth Fries Young Investigator Award. This award was created in memory of Elizabeth Fries, Ph.D., a VCU psychology professor who served as co-director of cancer control at the VCU Massey Cancer Center. Fries died in 2005. The award is given to a young research who shows promise for improving women’s health.

Jean Cheek, R.N., clinical coordinator in the Department of Emergency Services, was given the Building Interdisciplinary Bridges in Women’s Health Research award for her poster, “Intimate Partner Violence Reduction in the Health Care System and the Integration of the Forensic Unit into a Multidisciplinary Evidence Based Response.” This award honors the poster that best demonstrated interdisciplinary investigator collaboration in women’s health.