Graduate and Postdoctoral Training

Over the last three weeks, a team of scientists, engineers and doctors at the University of Vermont, including Professor of Medicine Jason Bates, have developed a new design—and built a working model—for a simple, inexpensive ventilator.

Over the past few weeks, Larner College of Medicine students have sought out and initiated impactful volunteer projects to help address a growing variety of needs presented by the novel coronavirus pandemic. Seeing the need for a centralized model to coordinate these various efforts, Christa Zehle, M.D., senior associate dean for medical education, and Nathalie Feldman, M.D., director of the learning environment, convened the LCOMCares Service Corps – COVID-19 Task Force.

(APRIL 8, 2020) Mary Cushman, M.D., M.Sc., professor of medicine, discussed reducing the risk of blood clots and thrombosis due to more sedentary behavior during quarantine in USA Today.

Medical student Adam Ross ’22 keeps a piece of paper tacked to the wall above his desk. It’s a brief note from Vito Imbasciani, Ph.D., M.D.’85, that Ross discovered tucked in the pocket of the white coat he received as a first-year Larner College of Medicine student in September of 2018.

​Do the cognitive changes that sometimes occur at menopause relate to an increased risk for Alzheimer’s disease? That’s what a newly launched study, co-led by University of Vermont Associate Professor of Psychiatry Julie Dumas, Ph.D., aims to determine.

(APRIL 1, 2020) Larner College of Medicine Class of '21 medical student and Essex EMT Hilary Danis was featured in an NBC10 Boston/New England Cable News (NECN) story on Vermont Governor Phil Scott's call for help in supporting the state's health care workforce during the COVID-19 emergency. In the interview, Danis says "I think each and every one of us can serve our part."

A new app developed by UVM faculty called PanicMechanic, may be a resource for panic attack sufferers facing new anxieties in light of the COVID-19 crisis. The app, which adapts biofeedback-like monitoring so it can be used on a mobile phone, works at any time and in any location, and is the first technology to do so for panic.

As president and CEO of a Delaware organization that includes major health systems and research universities, UVM medical alum and family physician Omar Khan, M.D. ’03, is at the frontlines of the COVID-19 response. He and his team are working to ramp up testing and treatment, source PPE for healthcare workers, and keep the community informed.

When commercial flight cancellations jeopardized the transport of COVID-19 specimens - and same-day test results for patients - from Burlington to Mayo Clinic Laboratories, a group of fast-acting health care administrators and business leaders sprang into action to find a solution.

Reviews from January’s Emergency Medicine Update in Stowe have been wildly over the top. By all accounts, the conference was a great success. Drawing participants from 20 states, the program provided dozens of presentations in addition to optional workshops. Attendees were happy with the short-talk format.

Research findings, published in JAMA Network Open and led by University of Vermont Cancer Center researcher Brian Sprague, Ph.D., show that breast cancer screening with digital breast tomosynthesis (also known as 3D mammography) improves breast cancer screening performance among most radiologists.

(MARCH 30, 2020) Expert advice from Professor of Medicine and Director of Clinical Ethics Tim Lahey, M.D., M.M.Sc., has been featured in multiple local, regional and national media outlets, including the New York Times and Medium.

(MARCH 27, 2020) Local television station NBC 5 aired a story about Meals on Wheels volunteers helping deliver food to seniors during the COVID-19 pandemic. Second-year medical student Richard Brach, who was featured in the story, says that since the College of Medicine's move to remote learning, he has some time in his schedule to help out in the community.

Dear Larner Community: I am writing to provide further updates on the Larner College of Medicine during these changing and challenging times. For the first time, this is being written at home, as I adhere to our Governor’s order and good public health practice in this difficult time. Medical Education: The education of the next generation of physicians, continues unabated. We just finished our third week of entirely remote classroom education, for which we were well prepared by our commitment to active learning. For the time being, and consistent with AAMC recommendations, all medical student participation in clinical care has been suspended. For our M1 students this means only that “Doctoring in Vermont” is on hold. The M2 class has a delay in initiating clerkships, made up for by the choice of a few non-clinical courses including Medical Spanish and a new public health project, “Pandemic Response: Understanding COVID 19”. Our M3 students just finished a two-week non-clinical course “Prep 4 Practice”, delivered with synchronous (Zoom) and asynchronous teaching methods. And our M4 students, coming off the heels of a successful virtual Match Day event and anticipating graduation in May, are completing non-clinical duties to fulfill their graduation requirements; any modifications of our curriculum will undergo review by our Medical Curriculum Committee, consistent with guidance from the AAMC and LCME.

Gary Ward, Ph.D., professor of microbiology and molecular genetics at the UVM Larner College of Medicine has been working to make scholarly research available to those who would benefit from the information. In a story published in Vermont Medicine, Dr. Ward recounts the precise moment he decided to champion for change in scientific publishing. Read more about his story here from Vermont Medicine Fall 2019 edition.

(MARCH 26, 2020) Joshua Farkas, M.D., associate professor of medicine in the Division of Pulmonary Disease & Critical Care Medicine, was quoted in a New York Times article, titled "‘The Other Option Is Death’: New York Starts Sharing of Ventilators."

(MARCH 24, 2020) James Hudziak, M.D., professor of psychiatry and pediatrics, chief of child psychiatry, and director of the Vermont Center for Children, Youth, and Families, provides advice to coaches on how to continue working with their teams using virtual sessions in a Washington Post article.

MARCH 22, 2020) Professor of Medicine in the Hematology/Oncology Division, Mary Cushman, M.D., M.Sc. was quoted in a recent Healthline article, titled "Does Your Blood Type Increase Your Risk for Coronavirus?"