yale medicine A fallen student’s Paul MacLean’s A Yale alumna in autumn 2008 endearing legacy triune brain theory the rain forest 4 16 30 A huge nih grant boosts bench-to-bedside research, but many scientists still want to follow their noses 18 yale medicine autumn 2008 CONTENTS on the cover 2 Letters Illustration by Jeffrey Fisher 4 Chronicle 8 Rounds 10 Findings 12 Books & Ideas 16 Capsule 18 Mapping the future of medicine With its largest grant ever, Yale is assembling resources to help clinical scientists focus on ideas—and leave the red tape to others. By Jill Max 24 Is the straight road too narrow? Demands for cures and a flat NIH budget are putting pressure on scientists to produce findings that go right to the bedside. Still, there’s value in finding what you’re not looking for. By Pat McCaffrey 30 A life’s work in Indonesia Even as a medical student, Kinari Webb knew where she wanted to practice medicine. Now, she and her ecologist husband are working to bring health care to Borneo— while preserving the rain forest. By Jill Max 35 Faculty 38 Students 46 Alumni 62 In Memoriam 64 Follow-Up 64 Archives 65 End Note On the Web yalemedicine.yale.edu On our website, readers can submit class notes or a change of address, check the alumni events calendar, arrange for a lifelong Yale e-mail alias through the virtual Yale Station and search our electronic archive. 2 letters We should expect our yale medicine students to be literate Alumni Bulletin of the Yale University School of Medicine It was with some sadness that I Autumn 2008, Volume 43, No. 1 read of the teaching of ethics by Editor in Chief my colleague, Alan A. Stone, m.d . Michael Kashgarian, m.d. ’58, hs ’63 ’55, to his students at Harvard Professor of Pathology and of Molecular, Law School. [“A Passport to the Cellular and Developmental Biology Young,” Yale Medicine , Spring Editor 2008] Stone felt obliged to turn Michael Fitzsousa Director of Communications to the movies because “few stu - dents had read Sophocles or Managing Editor yale medicine Dostoevsky, Austen or Flaubert.” John Curtis A new cancer hospital Anna Deveare Smith Harvey Cushing’s spring 2008 on the rise returns to New Haven photographic legacy Contributing Editors 4 6 26 I was reminded of how startled How the West was won: A former pharmaceutical plant’s new life Janet Emanuel, ph.d. as part of the Yale campus I was some years ago to discover 18 Peter Farley Main Campus that one of my patients, a gradu - William Hathaway ate student in literature at Yale Jennifer Kaylin and a magna cum laude gradu - Karen Peart ate of Yale College, had never Cathy Shufro read a work by Shakespeare. Marc Wortman, ph.d. 95 te sta er Int k ra Contributors t m Should our top law and A medical schools be admitting Jenny Blair, m.d. ’04 Terry Dagradi West Campus people who haven’t even a John Dillon rudimentary reading knowl - Charles Gershman edge of the Western canon? Jill Max Perhaps what is needed is not Pat McCaffrey how to reach us a “new passport to the young,” Melinda Tuhus Yale Medicine welcomes news but a reactivation of the old Copy Editors and commentary. Please send one. And perhaps we cannot Rebecca Frey, ph.d. Michelle Komie letters (350 words or less) and absolve ourselves of some of Anne Sommer news items to Yale Medicine , the blame for the illiteracy of Mailing List Inquiries 300 George Street, Suite 773, the young until we make it Claire M. Bessinger clear to them that we expect New Haven, CT 06511, or via Communications Coordinator e-mail to [email protected], and them to be literate. Cheryl R. Violante include a telephone num ber. Victor A. Altshul, m.d . ’60 Website Coordinator Submissions may be edited for Associate Clinical Professor Printing length, style and content. of Psychiatry The Lane Press visit us on the web Yale Medicine is distributed to alumni, yalemedicine.yale.edu Med school missing faculty, students and friends of the from cover School of Medicine, as well as to leaders in Yale University alumni activities. I find an interesting example of the complex relationship Abbreviations commonly used in Yale Medicine include hs to denote the final between the School of Medi- year of residency for house staff, fw for cine and the main campus the final year of a fellowship, eph for the represented by the absence of Department of Epidemi ology and Public the topography of the medical Health and the School of Public Health campus on the cover of last and ynhh for Yale- New Haven Hospital. spring’s issue of Yale Medicine . Postal permit held by Yale University, Robert B. Duckrow, m.d . ’75, hs ’79 155 Whitney Ave., New Haven, CT 06520 Associate Professor of Neurology Copyright © 2008 Yale School of Medicine and Neurosurgery All rights reserved. address correspondence to Editor, Yale Medicine 300 George Street, Suite 773 8 0 New Haven, CT 06511 0 2 Telephone: 203-785-5824 n Facsimile: 203-785-4327 m u Electronic mail: [email protected] t u Online: Yale Netcasts Website: http://yalemedicine.yale.edu a e Additional content for articles n i c i in this issue of Yale Medicine d e is available online at iTunesU, m e or by pointing your browser to l a y yalemedicine.yale.edu. starting point 3 Basic science vs. translational research, and medicine and rain forests In the autumn of 2006, Yale became one of a handful of More than two years ago, in May 2006, we heard medical schools to receive a ctsa grant from the National from Kinari Webb, m.d. ’02, who asked if we’d be interested Institutes of Health ( nih ), a boon to translational research in an article about her work in Indonesia. Four years out here and around the country. Once the program was up of medical school, Webb had laid the groundwork to open and running we asked writer Jill Max to take a look at the a clinic in a remote area of Borneo. In addition to her desire new Yale Center for Clinical Investigation, created and to provide medical care to an underserved area, she and funded with the goal of supporting clinical research. This her husband, a Harvard ecologist, wanted to link that to pre - enhanced emphasis on translational research also prompted serving the region’s rain forests. For more than a year Jill us to explore the tension between basic-science research— Max has been in contact with Webb, following the progress knowledge for knowledge’s sake—and the bench-to-bedside of the clinic, which opened in the summer of 2007. Her goals of those who start out with a cure or treatment in report begins on page 30. mind. Boston-based science writer Pat McCaffrey talked to scientists at Yale and found that, largely due to a flat nih John Curtis budget, scientific research is going through hard times. Managing Editor But some scientists also worry that basic research is taking a back bench to translational research. SECOND OPINION BY SIDNEY HARRIS 4 chronicle news from cedar street for Women in Medicine and a mentor to Rainof, that their daughter loved Yale and was happy here. Her phone calls, they told Waxman, were always filled with her enthusiasm for her classmates, teachers and patients. What friends remember best about Rainof is her warm and welcoming smile. “Like everyone else,” her A student’s warm heart boyfriend and classmate James Troy said at the Rose Garden memorial, and “amazing” smile “I was instantly won over by her amaz - Mila Rainof’s embrace of others ing smile.” A friend and classmate, has inspired an enduring memorial Ellen House, recalled sharing clinical at the medical school. rotations with Rainof and all the patients asking for “the smiley one.” As the 96 members of the Class of Margaret A. Drickamer, m.d. , associ - 2008 processed to Old Campus for ate professor of medicine, recounted a Commencement on May 26, they trip to Seattle with Rainof to attend a paused at the corner of York Street and conference. They walked all over the South Frontage Road. One by one, each city, she said, talking and telling stories. graduate placed a carnation in memory “We laughed, we cried—and we did of Mila Rainof, a classmate who was not go to some poster sessions.” Beyond with them in the procession. Rainof’s warm and friendly demeanor, On April 19 Rainof was struck by a Drickamer said, was a determination s i t r car as she crossed the intersection. She to help people. “Mila really cared u c n died the next day of her injuries. At a about people, especially when she felt a h o j medical school town meeting called by responsibility for their welfare, and she m.d The death of Mila Rainof, a month before her Dean Robert J. Alpern, ., on the steadfastly refused to let anything get in graduation, sent a shock throughout the medi - Monday after Rainof died, Alpern said, the way of that caring,” Drickamer said. cal school. Her classmates posted her photo and “The medical school family h as lost a Karen J. Jubanyik, m.d ., assistant left flowers at the site of the accident. member way too young in age.” professor of surgery (emergency medi - In the wake of her death, Rainof’s cine), described a difficult shift at friends and classmates have found many Yale-New Haven Hospital the day after ways to honor her.