Penn State College of Medicine
Alumni Update
Issue #9June 2012

Stories This Issue

A Message from Dean Harold Paz  


A Miss America Contestant Fulfills Her Dream

Saving Lives One Ride at a Time    

 

Norman Barton, M.D./Ph.D., Receives PSU Distinguished Alumni Award

 

HOST Program Launch 

    

Commencement 2012

Making a Lasting Impact   

 

Medical Center, College of Medicine, and Penn State News

  

Share Your News

and Stay Connected 

Have you changed your email or mailing address recently? Did you get married, have a baby, or have you taken part in medical missions abroad? We want to hear from you, and so do your fellow alums! Send your updates to the Alumni Relations Office  

Suggested Links

 

 


Contact Us
 

Alumni Relations Office by email or 717-531-7063 

Upcoming Events

Friday and Saturday, Sept. 21-22
COM Alumni
Weekend
Penn State Hershey
Medical Center -
Hershey, PA
 

Monday, Oct. 1
Surgery Alumni & Friends Reception - Chicago, IL

Sunday, Nov. 4
AAMC Alumni & Friends Reception - San Francisco, CA 

Saturday, Nov. 10
Ophthalmology Alumni & Friends Reception -
Chicago, IL 

Tuesday, Nov. 13
Penn State Hershey Children's Hospital Dedication and Celebration - Hershey, PA 

Tuesday, Nov. 27
Radiology Alumni & Friends Reception - Chicago, IL


Friday, Dec. 7
Annual Dean's Reception - 
New York, NY 

For more information about the events, including locations and times, please email the Alumni Relations Office. 

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Share The News  

Please pass along the Penn State College of Medicine Alumni Update to friends and encourage them to join the mailing list. Forward this email by using the link at the bottom of the page.

Alumni Weekend 2012 

 

The two-day event is set for September 21-22. Please click here to view a copy of the Alumni Weekend brochure. Please click here to register online for Alumni Weekend.

If you have any questions please email them to the Alumni Relations Office.
 

     

Thank You Class Reunion Volunteers
The Alumni Office appreciates the efforts of the alumni volunteers who are helping to ensure that Alumni Weekend 2012 will be a celebration to remember. Those involved include:
 
Class of 1972 
Jack Cahn, MD 
Marianne Felice, MD 
Thomas Godfrey, MD 
Jane Petro, MD 
Tom Risser, MD 
Harris Stutman, MD 
 
Class of 1977 
James Caggiano, MD 
Robert Goldstein, MD 
John Messmer, MD 
Martin Scheinholtz, MD 
 
Class of 1982 
Debbie Durisek, MD 
Wayne Geller, MD 
Fred Harchelroad, MD 
Robert Schnarrs, MD 
 
Class of 1987 
Eric Bour, MD 
Michael Cummings, MD 
Margaret Donahue, MD 
John Duda, MD 
Dave Hulbert, MD 
Alberto Laureano, MD 
Bernie Moglia, MD 
Sue Nuber, MD 
 
Class of 1992   
Anne Dall, MD  
Elizabeth Lange, MD 
Andrea Murphy, MD
James Powell, MD 
 
Class of 1997 
Todd Campbell, MD 
Suzanne Van Ness
   Caccamese, MD
 
Gail Hertz, MD 
 
Class of 2002 
Heather Davies, MD 
Robert Gallo, MD 
Matthew Silvis, MD 
Josh Tice, MD 
 
Class of 2007 
Garrick Baskerville, MD 
Adriana Quinones- 
   Garcia, MD 
Ninad Pendharkar, MD 


Make a Gift

 

 

With the rising cost of a medical education, now more than ever scholarship support is a fundraising priority at Penn State College of Medicine. Please consider making a gift.


Aerial of Medical Center
A Message from the DeanDr. Paz June 2011

 

Greetings and welcome to the summer 2012 edition of our alumni e-newsletter, now in its third year of publication. I hope that these quarterly updates help you to feel connected to Penn State Hershey Medical Center and College of Medicine, as well as to your fellow alumni and the faculty whose stories are featured in each issue.

 

I'm pleased to report that the past academic year has been marked by many successes, including the launch of the Penn State Hershey Institute for Personalized Medicine, the 25th anniversary of Life Lion, and another very successful Match Day, just to name a few. The creation of the Penn State Hershey Center for the Protection of Children demonstrated that even in the face of tragedy, Penn Staters can come together and respond in ways that advance our mission and help the communities we serve.

 

This summer, the first cohort of students begin their clinical training at the Regional Medical Campus. These members of the class of 2014 will enjoy a unique educational experience, as well as access to dual degree programs such as the new M.D./M.B.A., offered in conjunction with Penn State's Smeal College of Business. Opportunities to focus on primary care and rural medicine are also an integral part of the Regional Medical Campus, as is addressing the health care workforce needs of central Pennsylvania. With that goal in mind, we are making good progress toward establishing a new family medicine residency program in State College, working with Mount Nittany Medical Center.

 

Penn State Hershey Medical Group and Penn State Hershey Health System continued to grow this year, with a new Heart and Vascular Institute outpatient office opening in Hanover and new or expanded partnerships with hospitals including Lancaster General Health, Carlisle Regional Medical Center, and Mount Nittany Medical Center. And finally, on our Penn State Hershey campus, preparations are under way for the grand opening celebration of the new Penn State Hershey Children's Hospital in November 2012.

 

I hope that many of you will be able to return for College of Medicine Alumni Weekend, September 21-22, 2012, where there will be many opportunities to learn about all these developments and more. As always, I am grateful to our alumni for your continued support of Penn State College of Medicine and Penn State Hershey Medical Center.

 

Harold L. Paz, M.D.

 

Chief Executive Officer,
   Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center
Senior Vice President for Health Affairs, Penn State
Dean, Penn State College of Medicine 

Making the World a Better Place: A Miss America Contestant Fulfills Her Dream

Tuition for college and medical school can be daunting. As a senior facing her last term at Penn State and hoping to go to medical school, Charmaine (nee Kowalski) Rapaport, '83, had literally 10 cents in her bank account. So when she saw a billboard touting a free term of tuition as the prize for the Miss Penn State pageant, she decided to try out.

 

"I didn't want to wear a bathing suit, but I worked as a lifeguard and figured it wasn't much different," she said. Perhaps the outcome was inevitable: Charmaine grew up in State College, home of University Park, attended State College Area High School and chose Penn State for college, spending those years as a cheerleader. "You don't get more Penn State than me," she laughed.

 

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Life Lion: Saving Lives One Ride at a Time  


As a helicopter mechanic, Brian Sauselen never dreamed that his first ride on a Dauphin helicopter would be as a patient, with little memory of the experience.
 

 

But as a diabetic suffering sudden, severe abdominal pain that was quickly diagnosed as pancreatitis, Brian does know that the Life Lion medical transport from a Reading hospital to Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center saved his life.

 

"When they said they had to fly me, I knew it was serious," he said. Although it was just a ten-minute ride, he remembers thinking, "Why is this taking so long? It seemed like forever."


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Norman Barton, M.D./Ph.D., Receives
Penn State Distinguished Alumni Award

 

Norman Barton, M.D., Ph.D., who was the recipient of the Penn State Distinguished Alumni Award (the highest honor that the University bestows upon an outstanding alumna or alumnus) early in June at University Park, first became interested in metabolic disorders during college and was able to pursue this interest as a M.D. and Ph.D. student at Penn State Hershey. Several years later with colleagues at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Dr. Barton was able to deliver a breakthrough therapeutic innovation (enzyme replacement therapy) for Gaucher disease.

"This therapeutic approach has been life transformative for patients with Gaucher disease and also created a platform that has led to treatment for several other lysosomal storage disorders, including Fabry disease, Pompe disease, and Hunter, Hurler, and Maroteaux-Lamy Syndromes," Dr. Barton said.

        

HOST Program

 

If you graduated from the Penn State College of Medicine M.D. program, you can probably remember traveling the country for residency interviews. This can be a very exciting, slightly overwhelming, and rather expensive time during medical school.

 

To help our current students during this time, the Penn State College of Medicine Alumni Relations Office is looking for alumni volunteers to be a part of the HOST (Help Our Students Travel) program. This program connects College of Medicine alumni with fourth year medical students traveling for their residency interviews. Alumni hosts are asked to open their homes to students and their spouses or significant others for overnight stays. Hosts may also offer meals, transportation, and invaluable advice and insight into the community where the students are interviewing. With all of the debt our students incur, this program offers a means to help alleviate some of the financial burden they take on during this process.

 

This is a great opportunity for students, but for alumni as well. For those who live far from Penn State Hershey, this program offers a way to volunteer for the College of Medicine and see first-hand the caliber of students currently enrolled at your alma mater. If you are interested in participating in the HOST program, please email the Penn State College of Medicine Alumni Relations Office by clicking here.
College of Medicine holds 2012 Commencement Ceremony

  

Graduation 2012A new generation of doctors graduated from Penn State College of Medicine in Hershey on May 20 during the forty-second annual ceremony in Founders Hall on the Milton Hershey School campus.

 

Diplomas were presented to 130 medical students and sixty-six graduate students during the ceremony.

 

Catherine D. DeAngelis, M.D. delivered the commencement address. She is Editor-in-Chief Emerita of JAMA, the Journal of the American Medical Association, Professor of Pediatrics at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, and Professor of Health Services Administration at the Johns Hopkins University School of Public Health. 

 

In addition, College of Medicine Alumni Society President Wendy Braund, M.D., '01 attended the ceremony and offered the graduates words of welcome to the Penn State College of Medicine Alumni Society and the Penn State Alumni Association. 
Making a Lasting Impact at the College of Medicine

 

When looking to define the word passionate, look no further than Alan Bedrick, M.D. '78. He is passionate about many things in his life, but two that top the list are pediatrics and Penn State College of Medicine.

 

Bedrick's interest in working with children was sparked during his teenage years working as a camp counselor. That experience translated into a passion for pediatrics during his time at Penn State College of Medicine through the mentorship and guidance of Drs. Cheston Berlin, Ian Zagon and Roger Ladda. These physicians guided him on his journey through medical school and long after.

 

During his first year at the College of Medicine, Dr. Ladda helped Bedrick secure a March of Dimes Scholarship. Not only did this scholarship help ease the financial burden of medical school, it solidified his interest in pediatrics. Dr. Bedrick currently holds an endowed chair in neonatology research in the Steele Children's Research Center at the University of Arizona College of Medicine and is medical director and section chief of the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at the University of Arizona Medical Center.

 

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