School of Medicine Dean Selwyn Vickers, MD, recently shined a light on alarming health inequities revealed by the COVID-19 pandemic. He calls out disproportionate death rates among African Americans as attributable to racial and socioeconomic disparities in health and health care in America, creating a crisis within a crisis.

More Good News for April 15, 2020

DOM faculty have stepped up to serve in Employee Health to address COVID-19 cases. Drs. Starr Steinhilber and Sonya Heath (shown left), as well as Dr. Turner Overton, have helped triage employees with symptoms to get tested, call all employees who test positive, monitor them daily, and admit any who worsen. High Fives to you all!

Palaniappan Sethu, PhD (Cardiovascular Disease) is bioengineering a biomimetic tissue model—a miniature chamber that can put cardiomyocytes through the pressure and stretch conditions that induce them to mature. This could mean better drug tests, faster transplants and more accurate models of disease.

Dr. Sheetal Gandotra (Pulmonary, Allergy, and Critical Care) and Dr. Sonya Heath (Infectious Diseases) will present “The Clinical Spectrum of COVID-19 at UAB: Ambulatory to Critical Care” at Medical Grand Rounds next Wednesday, April 22, at noon, via Zoom. The session will be recorded for those who cannot join live.

When we experience periods of uncertainty and anxiety, what can we do to hold on? In this weekly wellness installment, Dr. Kennedy considers the timeless wisdom of singer/songwriter John Prine, the power of music, and our collective need of a muse to help us connect to others and process our emotions.