LESTER CRAWFORD RESIGNS AS FDA COMMISSIONER
Just over 2 months after the Senate approved his appointment as US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) commissioner, Lester Crawford, PhD, suddenly tendered his resignation. Crawford had served as acting commissioner of the FDA for the past 3 years. Andrew von Eschenbach, head of the National Cancer Institute, has been named as his temporary replacement.
Crawford leaves the FDA during a period of public scrutiny. Critics have accused the FDA of not adequately guarding patient safety from medicines such as Vioxx and a variety of antidepressants, as well as from malfunctioning heart devices. Additional controversy surrounded FDA's indecision on whether to approve nonprescription sales of Plan B, an emergency contraceptive pill. In fact, the Senate had delayed the vote on Crawford's appointment for 5 months until US Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Michael O. Leavitt, MD, set a deadline for a decision on Plan B.
During his tenure as FDA commissioner, Crawford's advocates lauded his increased efforts to monitor drug safety and to inform patients and doctors about the risks of drugs, as well as increased scrutiny of the scope and nature of drug advertising. His detractors tended to associate him with recent criticisms of the FDA for its close ties to the pharmaceutical industry. The reasons for Crawford's resignation have not been disclosed.
Prior to serving as FDA acting commissioner, Crawford was deputy commissioner of the FDA, chair of the Department of Physiology-Pharmacology at the University of Georgia, and administrator of the Food Safety and Inspection Service. From 1997 to 2002, he served as director of the Center for Food and Nutrition Policy at Georgetown University. In addition, he is a member of the National Academy of Sciences Institute of Medicine and a fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine and has been an advisor to the World Health Organization of the United Nations for 20 years.
DARRACOTT VAUGHAN APPOINTED SENIOR ASSOCIATE DEAN FOR CLINICAL AFFAIRS
E. Darracott Vaughan Jr, MD, has been appointed the new senior associate dean for clinical affairs at Weill Medical College of Cornell University. Vaughan replaced Dirk Sostman, who has become chief academic officer and chief medical officer for The Methodist Hospital System in Houston, an affiliate of Weill Cornell.
Prior to this appointment, Vaughan served as chief medical officer of the Weill Cornell Physician Organization and the James J. Colt Professor of Urology at Weill Cornell and led the medical college's Department of Urology from 1978 to 2001. During that time, Urology attained departmental status, and he was its first chairman. In 1989, Vaughan began his tenure as Weill Cornell's chief medical officer, during which time the medical college's clinical practice doubled its clinical faculty membership.
An authority on renovascular hypertension, Vaughan is coeditor of the standard text Campbell's Urology. He is president emeritus of the American Foundation for Urologic Disease, past president of the American Board of Urology, and past president of the American Urological Association, which bestowed on him its distinguished Gold Cystoscope Award. He is the recipient of the Hugh Hampton Young Award for his contributions to the understanding of urologic causes of hypertension and renal physiology. Vaughan graduated from Washington and Lee University in Virginia and the University of Virginia School of Medicine.
SCOTT WALDMAN TO HEAD DEPARTMENT OF PHARMACOLOGY AND EXPERIMENTAL THERAPEUTICS
Scott A. Waldman, MD, PhD, has been named chair of the newly formed Department of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics at Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia. Waldman is currently director of the Division of Clinical Pharmacology in the Department of Medicine at Jefferson.
Dr. Waldman joined the faculty at Jefferson in 1990 and was assistant professor of pharmacology and medicine until 1993, when he was appointed professor of biochemistry and molecular pharmacology and medicine. From 1991 to 1997, Waldman was medical director of the Clinical Research Unit at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, after which he was director of the Division of Clinical Pharmacology. He was appointed Samuel M.V. Hamilton Professor of Medicine in 1998 and professor of biochemistry and molecular pharmacology in 2000. He currently directs Jefferson's MD-PhD program.
Waldman has been published in such journals as the Annals of Internal Medicine, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, and the Journal of Clinical Investigation. Much of his research is supported by the National Cancer Institute. He is a member of several scientific societies and has held positions in the American College of Pharmacology and the American Society for Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics, serving as its president from 2000 to 2001. He was a regent of the American College of Clinical Pharmacology from 2000 to 2004.
He received a bachelor's degree in biology from the State University of New York at Albany in 1975. He earned a PhD in anatomy from Jefferson Medical College in 1980. He received a medical degree in 1987 from Stanford University School of Medicine.
DANIEL FORD NAMED VICE DEAN FOR CLINICAL INVESTIGATION
Daniel E. Ford, MD, MPH, has been named vice dean for clinical investigation at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Ford is a professor at both the School of Medicine and the Bloomberg School of Public Health. He will replace Michael Klag, MD, MPH, and will lead one of the largest clinical research enterprises in the world. Hopkins has for the last 13 years been the number one recipient of National Institutes of Health biomedical research funding, much of which is for clinical investigation.
Ford came to Hopkins in 1982 as a medical resident and, apart from a brief time as a National Institutes of Health fellow, has been on the faculty at Hopkins since that time. He joined the Division of Internal Medicine faculty in 1988 and has joint appointments in psychiatry at the School of Medicine and in epidemiology and health policy and management at the Bloomberg School of Public Health.
Ford was director of the University Health Service for 12 years and a member of the oversight committee for the preventive medicine and occupational medicine residency programs. He served on the Committee for Faculty Development and Gender and has been a member of the Admissions Committee for the School of Medicine. For 10 years, Ford was on the General Clinical Research Center protocol and advisory committees.
DAVID HELLMANN APPOINTED VICE DEAN OF HOPKINS BAYVIEW
David B. Hellmann, MD, MACP, has been named the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine's vice dean for the Johns Hopkins Bayview Campus. Hellmann succeeds L. Reuven Pasternak, who is leaving Johns Hopkins to become chief medical officer of the Health Alliance of Greater Cincinnati, which includes the University of Cincinnati Medical Center. Hellmann will remain as chairman of the Department of Medicine at Johns Hopkins Bayview and as the Mary Betty Stevens Professor of Rheumatology.
A magna cum laude graduate of Yale, Hellmann has been at Johns Hopkins for 30 years, beginning with his years as a medical student. Aside from 6 years at the University of California in San Francisco, all of his clinical and educational work has been at Johns Hopkins. He has served as deputy director of the Department of Medicine and associate physician-in-chief of The Johns Hopkins Hospital, clinical director of the Division of Molecular and Clinical Rheumatology, medical director of the Faculty Practice Center, director of the Osler Medical House Staff training program, and cofounder and codirector of the Johns Hopkins Vasculitis Center.
Hellmann was the executive vice chairman of the Department of Medicine at Johns Hopkins Hospital and its vice chairman for clinical affairs when he became chairman of the Johns Hopkins Bayview department in 2000.
DAVID VAN ESSEN ELECTED PRESIDENT OF SOCIETY FOR NEUROSCIENCE
David Van Essen, PhD, has been elected president of the Society for Neuroscience. Van Essen is the Edison Professor of Neurobiology and head of the Department of Anatomy and Neurobiology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. A leading investigator of the structure and function of the cerebral cortex in primates, Van Essen will officially become president-elect at the society's annual meeting in November 2005. His 1-year term as president will start at the society's 2006 meeting. He previously served as secretary of the society for 2 years.
Van Essen has endorsed the activities of the Society for Neuroscience in support of neuroinformatics, a new field focused on making many types of neuroscientific data, ranging from the molecular components of the brain to human neuroimaging discoveries, available on-line in easily searchable formats.
MICHAEL IMPERIALE JOINS BIOSECURITY ADVISORY BOARD
Michael J. Imperiale, PhD, has been appointed to the National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity (NSABB). The 24-member board is charged by the Department of Health and Human Services with advising federal officials on national bioterrorism issues in research. Of particular interest is federally approved “dual-use” research, which has the potential to be used as a biologic threat to the United States.
Imperiale is professor of microbiology and immunology at the University of Michigan Medical School and chair of that institution's Biosafety Committee.
The NSABB was recently formed and has initiated discussions of five basic issues related to biosecurity. The Board will need to define what makes research processes and results dual use versus non-dual use. Also important will be the question of how best to communicate the results of studies with a potential dual use and to preserve academic freedom while miminizing the potential threat of misuse. The Board will also help develop a code of conduct for researchers in the biologic sciences that can be included in research education curricula and will issue recommendations on seeking international cooperation in support of these efforts. Finally, the specific issue of synthetic genome research will be studied. Scientists are able to create viruses synthetically, and bacterial genomes will not be far behind.
EDMUND PELLEGRINO JOINS PRESIDENT'S COUNCIL ON BIOETHICS
Edmund Pellegrino, MD, has been named by President George W. Bush to join the President's Council on Bioethics. President Bush also announced his intention to name Pellegrino as chairperson of the Council, which is charged with advising the president on ethical issues related to biomedical science and technology.
The Council was created in 2001 to apprise the president and the nation of bioethical developments. The Council deals with a range of bioethical matters related to specific biomedical and technological activities, such as embryo and stem cell research, assisted reproduction, cloning, uses of knowledge and techniques derived from human genetics or the neurosciences, and end-of-life issues.
Pellegrino is professor emeritus of medicine and medical ethics at Georgetown University Medical Center, senior research scholar of the Kennedy Institute of Ethics, and adjunct professor of philosophy at Georgetown University. He has served as director of the Center for Clinical Bioethics and head of the Kennedy Institute of Ethics and director of the Center for the Advanced Study of Ethics at Georgetown University, president of Catholic University, president and chairman of the Yale-New Haven Medical Center, chancellor and vice president of health affairs at the University of Tennessee, founding chairman of the Department of Medicine at the University of Kentucky, dean of the School of Medicine at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, and founder of their Health Sciences Center.
In 2004, Pellegrino was named to the International Bioethics Committee of the United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization, which is the only advisory body within the United Nations system to study the ethical implications of advances in life sciences.
Throughout his career, Pellegrino has remained a practicing physician, seeing patients in clinical consultations; teaching medical students, interns, and residents; and doing research. Since his retirement 5 years ago, Pellegrino has remained at Georgetown University, continuing to write, teach medicine and bioethics, and participate in regular clinical attending services.
BRYAN NOE NAMED DEAN OF GRADUATE SCHOOL
Bryan D. Noe, PhD, has accepted the position of dean of the graduate school at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB). Noe comes to UAB from Emory University, where he has been interim dean of that graduate school since June 2003. He joins UAB effective November 1, 2005.
Noe joined Emory University in 1972 as an assistant professor of anatomy. He was promoted to associate professor in 1997 and professor of anatomy and cell biology in 1983. He directed graduate studies for the department from 1977 to 1991, when he became director of the graduate division of biologic and biomedical sciences, a position he held until 2003.
DONALD WILSON TO RETIRE AS DEAN OF UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND SCHOOL OF MEDICINE
Donald E. Wilson, MD, MACP, dean of the University of Maryland School of Medicine since 1991, has announced his intention to retire on September 1, 2006, but will remain in his position as dean and vice president for medical affairs at the university during the search for a new dean. Wilson, the fourth longest-serving medical school dean in the United States, cited health reasons and a desire to spend more time with his family.
When Wilson was appointed dean of the School of Medicine in 1991, he became the nation's first African American dean at a predominantly white medical school. Today, the School of Medicine has one of the most diverse student bodies in the country and the number of African American faculty members has doubled. In 2004, Wilson established the Center for Health Disparities to help identify and eliminate ethnic, racial, and geographic differences in the diagnosis and treatment of illness. The National Institutes of Health-funded center coordinates patient care, research, education, and outreach initiatives in Maryland's underserved urban and rural communities.
Wilson has influenced the development of health care policy at both the state and the national level. From 1994 to 2004, Wilson chaired the Maryland Health Care Commission, which monitors health care costs and evaluates the quality of health maintenance organizations, nursing homes, and hospitals. In 2004, he served as chairman of the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC). Prior to that, he was chairman of the AAMC Council of Deans. Wilson is a member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences.
Wilson graduated from Harvard and received his medical degree from Tufts University. He was the youngest person to make full professor at the University of Illinois Medical School, where he later became chief of gastroenterology. He then served as professor and chairman of the Department of Medicine at the State University of New York Health Science Center at Brooklyn. Before joining to the University of Maryland, he was physician-in-chief of the University Hospital and Kings County Hospital Center in Brooklyn.