–submitted by Stan Inhorn
Dr. Mark Markel, Dean of the UW School of Veterinary Medicine (SVM) described the current status of the School, as well as the plans for expansion currently underway. One of the newer veterinary schools in the U.S., the SVM has become one of the premier schools in the country. During the past 10 years, the SVM has been rated in the top five research schools in the country. The SVM is particularly known for its research in infectious diseases – viral, bacterial, and parasitic.
The SVM is also highly rated for its teaching innovations. Each year, the School receives over 1,300 applications and selects 90 bachelor-degree students into the four-year program. It also maintains a large graduate-degree program. Over half the veterinarians in Wisconsin are graduates of the UW School. About 50% of graduates limit their practices to small animals, 25% include large animals, and 25% go into other aspects of practice, including government service, research, and industry. The SVM is an innovator in creating close to 200 teaching modules that permit self-learning, which will be made available to other schools
The SVM operate a large clinical facility, as it sees more than 25,000 patients a year from throughout the Midwest and beyond. With practitioners in more than 20 specialties, an animal with a primary disease may also be seen for other medical conditions at the same hospital visit.
Since clinical space is not adequate, the SVM is planning a $150 million expansion. More space is also needed for research and teaching in order to bring all parts of the School’s mission into one facility and to allow new teaching and research programs to expand. An example of a new service-teaching program is called WisCare, which offers animal care to homeless people. An expanding research program is one that permits the influenza and viral disease experts to study zika and other emerging viral epidemics.
Did you miss our meeting this week? CLICK to watch the video.
At our April 27 meeting, Dr. Noelle LoConte of the UW gave us some frightening, but also some hopeful information and a call to action during a presentation entitled Pancreatic Cancer Research: A Medical Oncology Perspective. As many know, often because of personal experience, pancreatic cancer is a particularly virulent disease, with a five year survival rate of less than 5%. With the exception of a rising incidence in the African American population, the incidence of this disease has remained relatively stable in our population. Nevertheless, pancreatic cancer is expected to be the second most common cause of cancer mortality by 2020. These numbers reflect the fact that there is no current method to screen for pancreatic cancer, and therefore, patients are typically diagnosed well into the disease process, when it is too late for effective surgical or drug intervention. In addition, the risk factors are not well established, although age is clearly the most important factor, with smoking, heavy alcohol consumption, and other contributors playing a role.
Kathy Cramer is not your typical ivory tower professor. Instead of conducting research in libraries, she drives to small towns far from Madison and Milwaukee. She finds out where people meet for coffee—café’s, gas stations, and stores—and then just shows up. “Hi, I’m Kathy Cramer, I’m a professor from Madison and I study public opinion. May I join you?” Almost everyone she met during her impromptu visits were gracious, she told Rotarians on Wednesday. Then she passed out her business card—she’s a professor in the Department of Political Science—and got permission to turn on her recorder. “What issues concern you?” she asked. What she heard surprised her.
Rotarians heard from David M. Gamm, Associate Professor of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, how new research in gene and stem cell based therapies are helping cure blindness.
Rotary Club of Madison, Wisconsin 