For the first time, researchers have learned two cancer drivers are linked together, and some top University of Wisconsin scientists are taking the credit for the incredible discovery.
“It’s an emergent field,” lead author Dr. Mo Chen said as she explored how the two most mutated cancers markers actually work together.
“Science teaches you that you have to be open to things that are unexpected,” UW Health’s Dr. Vince Cryns said of what they found underneath the microscope.
Dr. Nathaniel Chin, who grew up in Watertown and got undergraduate and medical degrees from UW-Madison, planned to specialize in infectious diseases. But during his internal medicine residency at the University of California-San Diego, his father — a family medicine doctor in Watertown — was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease.
The event, taking place at Capital Brewery in Middleton on August 14, allows for participants to choose from a 50k, 25k or 5k bike ride as well as a 5k run or two-mile roll and stroll that is open to walkers, scooters, wheelchairs, skateboards and dogs!
While it may be clear that doom-scrolling may have a negative effect on your mental health, a new report out of UW Madison shows that it may not just be negative news, but any negative news in excess.
Earlier today, WORT Producer Nate Wegehaupt spoke with Markus Brauer, a psychology professor at UW Madison, about the report.
Written by Andrea Dutton, an international expert on climate change and sea level rise who is a MacArthur Fellow and a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison
Noted: A study by the Medical College of Wisconsin and The University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health in March 2021 reported that firearm-related homicides in Milwaukee among non-Hispanic African Americans were 14.6 times greater than among white residents. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has also reported that there has been more than a dozen juvenile homicides as of late June.
Eight years ago, as John Jartz and his wife drove home to Barrington Hills, Ill., after their first visit with kidney transplant specialists at UW Health, he suddenly became overwhelmed with emotion.
“We found our place,” Jartz told his wife. “It just hit me.”
“My research is [focused on] how to improve access, how to make sure that communities benefit from the research, and how to make life a little easier, at least on the healthcare side,” says Dr. Maria Mora Pinzón, a preventive medicine physician and scientist at the Wisconsin Alzheimer’s Institute at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who focuses her research on improving access to Alzheimer’s disease and related dementia (ADRD) services within the Latinx community.
Noted: Before the pandemic hit, 1 in 12 Wisconsinites were food insecure — meaning they couldn’t or were uncertain they could get the food they needed. Food insecurity is linked to children struggling more in school, worse health outcomes in all age groups and greater stress on families, according to the Wisconsin Food Security Project at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Quoted: “[Infected people] are shedding virus through those blisters during that period, until it sort of scabs over,” said Dr. Ajay Sethi, a population health scientist at the University of Wisconsin. “They’re itchy, they can be painful. When they scab over, you’re no longer infectious. But there’s a several week period when you are infectious. It’s not that different from chickenpox.”
Quoted: UW–Madison clinical professor in the School of Human Ecology Dr. Christine Whelan says this number will reduce the stigma attached to mental health care.
“This an incredibly important and frankly long overdue and much awaited necessary tool in the fight against suicide and to really raise awareness about mental health. So, when we break an arm or have a physical emergency, we might call 9-1-1, and now to have 9-8-8 for a mental health emergency is really finally sending the right message,” said Whelan.
Quoted: “Scientists are developing an Omicron-specific booster, and BA4 and BA5-specific boosters, but you know that process, they must finalize and test them, then get formal approval, so the exact timing is still unknown,” said Dan Shirley, the Medical Director of Infection Prevention at UW Health.
Dr. Jeff Pothof, chief quality officer with UW Health, joined FOX6 News Tuesday, July 19 to discuss the latest COVID-19 information, including the BA.5 variant.
UW Health’s chief quality officer Dr. Jeff Pothof joins Live at Four to talk about the latest COVID-19 headlines.
Noted: Djamali became a nephrologist himself and spent more than two decades practicing at the University of Wisconsin Health Transplant Center in Madison.
That’s where he met Jartz, among hundreds of other patients.
Late last year, Djamali decided to leave the UW Health Transplant Center to take a job at Maine Medical Center. But he made another decision around the same time. He would donate his kidney to Jartz.
Beyond Hunger, a new series by Wisconsin Watch produced by University of Wisconsin-Madison journalism students, will launch on July 21 with an evaluation of how pandemic-related programs alleviated a lot of hunger — and what it means for Wisconsin now that those support systems are fading.
Quoted: IUD insertion pain may be another example of the gender pain gap, an adjacent topic that has recently been experiencing a swell of attention. It’s based on the understanding that there is an implicit bias in health care rooted in sexism and racism that has led to the underserving of women in medical settings. Even if your practitioner is another person with a uterus, and a person of color, they are working within a system that still doesn’t adequately legitimize pain experienced by women or marginalized folks.
“The pain gap is particularly pronounced when it comes to gynecological services, because for most of medical history, and up until now, women’s voices about what they are experiencing have been disregarded, minimized and trivialized,” says Leigh Senderowicz, a health disparities research scholar at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health.
Dr. Aji Djamali got to fulfill a unique dream last month. Since studying in France alongside a kidney specialist, Djamali had dreamed of donating a kidney to someone in need of a transplant. That dream continued on after he became a kidney specialist at UW Health.
The 9th annual Roll and Stroll for Pancreas Cancer event will kick off on August 14. Attendees can take part in a 50K, 25K or 5K bike ride, a 5K run or a two-mile roll and stroll.
UW Health explained that the dream started years ago during his medical training in France, where he worked under a kidney transplant specialist he admired. Dr. Djamali later became a kidney transplant specialist himself at UW Health, also serving as the chief of the division of nephrology at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health.
Noted: While the country as a whole is facing an obesity crisis, the problem is much more pronounced in some states. To identify the most obese states, 24/7 Tempo reviewed health data from the 2022 County Health Rankings & Roadmaps, a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute joint program.
One of the experts Frederickson enlisted to help chart that path was James Tinjum, the director of the geological engineering program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
In addition to helping the city develop an easy-to-understand guide to PFAS for residents, Tinjum and some of his graduate students also launched research in Rhinelander, putting together a map of how water flows and interacts in the water table beneath the city and its surrounding areas.
“It’s a way to draw analysis to what types of compounds are contributing to the ‘fingerprints’ of the wells, whether it’s an organic sludge, (firefighting foam), or a more dispersed pattern of PFAS typical of landfill situations,” Tinjum said. “If we don’t have this information, we don’t know how to fix the problem.”
Quoted: “By definition, chronic fatigue syndrome symptoms must be ongoing for at least six months,” says Dr. Srivani Sridhar, a family physician with UW Health Northern in Rockford, Illinois. “It can last several years or a lifetime without treatment. Symptoms can also wax and wane over months and years.”
Quoted: The ambiguity in Wisconsin’s state abortion ban, for instance, has left doctors like Abigail Cutler, an OBGYN in Wisconsin, in an impossible bind. Wisconsin’s law, written in 1849, allows abortions to “save the life of the mother.” “Where’s that line?” Cutler asks. “How close does a patient need to be? On the brink of death for me to step in and intervene? What if I wait too long and she dies in front of me? Or what if in the eyes of some prosecutor who’s not a doctor, not at the bedside, not staring at the patient bleeding or infected in front of them—to them, what if I intervene too soon, and I’m charged and risk going to prison?”
Quoted: Prof. Tiffany Green, a health economist at the University of Wisconsin who studies health equity, particularly in the area of obstetric and reproductive care, calls expanding access to reproductive health services “crucial and important in helping people to exercise their right to reproductive autonomy.”
At the same time, “it is not a substitute for abortion care access,” she said, adding that she believes that Madison and Dane County officials understand that as well.
Green said it will be important as agencies expand their services that they do so in ways that reach out to the communities they serve and take time to understand and respect their needs and preferences. That will include being careful about scheduling times when they provide their services. It will also include being culturally responsive and respectful to people of color and to other marginalized groups, including transgender and gender-non-conforming people, she added.
It will also include heeding and respecting the contraceptive choices that their patients want to make, rather than “pushing a kind of contraception on them they do not want,” Green said. “There is a history of doing that with Black people.”
Quoted: Medical Director for Infection Prevention at UW Health Dr. Dan Shirley told CBS 58 BA.5, a subvariant of omicron, seems to be the dominant strain.
“It has a little bit better capacity to overcome our immunity,” Shirley said.
It’s hard to resist the urge to spend as much time outside as possible in the summer.
But, experts at UW Health in Madison say it is important to maintain skin safety while enjoying all that sunshine.
“Over the years, we’ve started to bring awareness about skin cancer in general and interestingly enough we are still seeing an increase in incidents of melanoma across the United States,” said Medical Oncologist at UW Health Dr. Vincent Ma.
When Katie Sullivan arrived as a first-year student at the University of Wisconsin at Madison last fall, she encountered one barrier after another to her college education: classrooms with limited accessibility for students in wheelchairs; an elevator that was broken for months, forcing some disabled students to take a freight elevator; buses with only two spots for students in wheelchairs; a professor who she said refused to accommodate her academic needs.
Quoted: “This one-size-fits-all approach is truly devastating for my patients and the doctors who take care of them,” said Dr. Abigail Cutler, a practicing OB-GYN and an assistant professor at the University of Wisconsin-School of Medicine in Madison.
Noted: Once regulations are changed, UW must provide its students with a method to learn abortion procedures out of state to remain an accredited by NACGME.
“While the OB-GYN residents previously had access to clinical training in abortion, that access is now significantly limited,” UW Health said in a statement. “It remains too soon to predict what options we will pursue, but we are focused on training OB-GYN physicians to provide the most comprehensive care possible.”
Noted: According to the study, which was conducted by researchers with the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the state Department of Health Services, 92% of the 4,452 adults surveyed said they had eaten fish within the last 12 months, with most of those surveyed reported eating fish they purchased. But because the fish were bought, instead of caught, those consuming the fish were likely to be less aware of the advisories.
Henry Anderson, one of the researchers involved in the study and a professor at the Nelson Institute of Environmental Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said to counter the lack of information, states in the Great Lakes region should focus on putting advisory information in areas they know people will be looking.
“You don’t go to the grocery store and go to the fish counter there and point to the salmon or sea bass or walleye and ask what the fish consumption advisory is,” Anderson said.
Noted: The adult smoking rate for Black people living in Wisconsin is 30%, or nearly three times higher than white people in the state at 12%. That 18 percentage point disparity is the widest gap between Black and white smokers in the nation, according to Dr. Michael Fiore, co-author and director of the University of Wisconsin Center for Tobacco Research and Intervention.
The statistics may give researchers clues about how to reduce those numbers and save lives, Fiore said.
Urologists at UW Health have seen roughly 30 vasectomies per week in the past month, double the number they saw during the same period last summer.
With funding from organizations such as WARF (Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation), CUNA Mutual Group, Dane Arts, and the Morgridge Center for Public Service, Karanja and her team were able to bring important conversations to the forefront regarding women of color in STEM fields. These are conversations that Karanja and the Represented Collective look to continue at an event tonight at the Goodman Community Center on Madison’s near east side titled “Legendary: An Evening of Celebration.” It will be a night of cocktails and conversation and commemoration of women in the STEM fields.
With a focus on women of color, the event will feature a group of panelists including Ana Hooker (Senior Vice President & Chief Laboratory Officer at Exact Sciences), Angela Jenkins (Technology Project Manager at American Family Insurance), Ponmozhi Manickavalli Sathappan (IT Manager at CUNA Mutual Group), and Dr. Jasmine Zapata (Chief Medical Officer for Community Health at Wisconsin Department of Health Services, Division of Public Health, and Physician and Assistant Professor at University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health) who will lead a community discussion regarding issues of representation, professionalism, visibility, microaggressions, macroaggressions, and many other topics that affect the experiences of women across the STEM fields.
Along with being able to hear from the panelists, event-goers will also be able to partake in celebrating the accomplishments of Erika Bullock and Maxine McKinney de Royston who are both assistant professors in the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Education.
New variants of COVID-19 are reminding us that the pandemic is not over. UW Health’s Chief Quality Officer Dr. Jeff Pothof, said two new variants are much more transmissible – even among those fully vaccinated or with prior infection.
“It’s really easy to catch COVID-19 with, you know, BA-5 or BA-4,” Pothof said. “With these variants that are so contagious, it really probably comes down to a matter of, you know, minutes, or maybe even seconds of being in close proximity to someone who’s shutting this virus for you to get infected.”
Dr. Bill Hartman from UW Health says the main symptoms of this variant are sore throat and nasal congestion.
Quoted: Dr. Dan Shirley, medical director of infection prevention at UW-Health, says the Naegleria fowleri amoeba thrives in warm water, you aren’t likely to contract it in Lake Michigan. “Usually late in the summer, in smaller bodies of water like ponds and small lakes where the water temperature can get warmer than usual,” he said.
Noted: A recent study from the University of Wisconsin-Madison showed that adults’ habits also heavily influence how their kids behave, especially around technology.
Noted: In a written statement, a representative from UW Health said IVF is continuing as normal.
“The Dobbs decision does not affect fertility treatment in Wisconsin,” the statement said. “UW Health will notify patients directly should anything about their fertility treatment change, including future changes in the law.”
Fish is a popular food in Wisconsin whether it’s part of a Friday night fish fry or a staple for Wisconsin tribes. However, a new study finds around only half of people surveyed in the Great Lakes region know about fish advisories that set limits on how much is safe to eat.
The study was published in June in the journal Science of the Total Environment. Researchers from the Wisconsin Department of Health Services and University of Wisconsin-Madison found around 5 million people ate more fish than recommended by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The agency recommends no more than two meals or 12 ounces of fish per week.
Only about half the people living in the Great Lakes region are aware of fish consumption advisories that warn people to limit their meals of fish, according to a study from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
The study, published in the journal Science of the Total Environment, also found that an estimated 5 million people across the region exceeded the general recommended fish intake of two meals, or 12 ounces per week, as suggested by the Environmental Protection Agency for all fish, including those purchased in stores.
“In the general population, for commercial use, I would question the need for (IV therapies),” said Adam Kuchnia, an assistant professor of nutritional sciences at UW-Madison. “If you’re getting mega-doses, potentially on a regular basis, there could be harmful toxicity effects.”
Letter to the editor: Current COVID policy is bad for her mental health because she is restricted to two parents per day supporting her in the hospital. These unnecessary restrictions are putting undue stress and burden on families.
“Firework fuses tend to be pretty short and they burn pretty quickly but this doesn’t seem to stop some people from lighting one while still holding onto it and unfortunately just about any firework that detonates in the hand is going to pack enough energy to cause some damage” said UW Health Pediatric Emergency Medicine Specialist Dr. Greg Rebella.
Shekeba Samadzada and Dan Hess’ vegetable korma, a traditional afghan stew, recently earned national recognition by winning the Health Care Culinary Contest. The stew consists of garbanzo beans, peppers, potatoes, onions, tomatoes, and green beans, and is seasoned with cilantro, turmeric and coriander. It is served with basmati rice and naan bread
Shekeba Samadzada and Dan Hess are chefs at UW Health who have a very special recipe for a traditional Afghan stew called vegetable korma, says UW Health.
Molly Wecker, a second-year medical student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, had long planned to be an obstetrics-gynecology doctor in her home state. But with the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision overturning the landmark Roe v. Wade ruling last week, the Rock County native is rethinking her plan.
“We’ll help them navigate those in the same manner we have throughout the whole period before this decision was released; obviously, some choices are more complicated than they were in the past,” said executive director Jake Baggott.
Quoted: That is a concern shared among some health professionals, according to UW-Madison expert Jenny Higgins.
“We will see increases in maternal morbidity and mortality due to people being forced to carry to full term. We also know that compared to people who receive desired abortions, people who are denied abortions are more likely to stay in abusive relationships,” Higgins said.
It’s been more than a week since COVID-19 vaccinations were approved for kids ages 6 months to 5 years old, but some hospitals are still waiting to schedule appointments. Meanwhile, the Wisconsin Department of Health Services is urging parents to be patient as vaccinators get up to speed on new guidelines.
Quoted: “I hadn’t heard much about the ban until quite recently,” said Jenny Higgins, a professor of gender and women’s studies and obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Medicine and Public Health. “Folks didn’t really believe that overturning Roe was possible, or palatable, until recently.”
Quoted: Jenny Higgins, a professor and director of the Collaborative for Reproductive Equity at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said their research has also shown an increase in birth rates in Wisconsin in recent years due to abortion clinic closures. Higgins said Wisconsin’s abortion ban will have devastating impacts on people’s health and wellbeing in Wisconsin.
“Either people will travel out of state to get abortion care in Illinois and Minnesota, for example, which will take significant time, money and logistical resources,” said Higgins. “Some people will self-manage their abortions here in Wisconsin … and then, of course, some people will not be able to access abortion care at all.”
Pediatric infectious disease specialist Dr. James Conway comments on the new COVID-19 vaccines for children ages six months to five years.
Tiffany Green, a professor of health sciences, obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, joins Live at Four to talk about what the Supreme Court’s ruling to overturn the landmark Roe v. Wade case means for Wisconsin.
Noted: UW Health on Friday said the loss of safe, legal abortion access would be predominantly felt by underserved rural areas and marginalized populations.
“As we enter a time of rapid change and uncertainty, UW Health will put the needs of our patients first and foremost to ensure they receive not just the best care but the best medical advice related to their care options,” the statement read.
Quoted: Wisconsin’s abortion ban makes the procedure illegal unless deemed medically necessary to save a patient’s life.
Abby Cutler, an OB-GYN on faculty at UW Health said that definition is impossible to pin down.
“Knowing when that line is, when does a patient, when does a mother or a future mother become sick enough or is in enough danger to require life-saving treatment immediately,” Cutler told Wisconsin Public Radio. “I think that’s a really difficult line. There is no line, really.”
Some hospitals also perform abortions if the fetus has a lethal condition or the mother’s life is at risk. In a statement Friday, UW Health said, “While reverting to a 173-year-old state law on abortion will create some legal uncertainties, we recognize that this court decision has effectively banned abortions in Wisconsin except to save the life of the mother, and UW Health will continue to comply with the laws related to reproductive health care.”
Quoted: Donated milk is a safe and nutritious formula alternative for families who aren’t able to supply their own milk, according to Dr. Anne Eglash, a clinical professor in the Department of Family Medicine and Community Health at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Eglash has long been a proponent of breastfeeding through her medical practice at UW Health, where she leads the healthcare system’s lactation clinic.
“We know that in the short-term, using donor milk for premature infants is a game-changer,” Eglash said. Donor milk helps stave off a type of gut inflammation that commonly affects infants born prematurely called necrotizing enterocolitis. The condition can lead to tissue death, forcing doctors to remove a large part of the baby’s intestinal tract.
“That has a huge impact on growth and development,” Eglash said, adding that when mother’s milk is unavailable, donor milk can also play a role in preventing other negative outcomes common among premature infants, including eye and lung disease and sepsis.
Noted: The Kern Institute collaborates and shares ideas on new approaches to medical education with a number of other schools through what’s called the Kern National Network.
The other founding members of the network are the Dell Medical School at the University of Texas at Austin, Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth, Mayo Clinic Alix School of Medicine, University of California San Francisco School of Medicine, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, and Vanderbilt University School of Medicine.
