April 2010
The Kansas City Area Life Sciences Institute provides this news brief for civic, corporate, political and scientific leaders to update you on the progress of the life sciences initiative in the Kansas City area. To unsubscribe, please contact Sharon Newman at 816-753-7700.
KCALSI Annual Dinner and Morning Symposium
Truman CEO named one of top 25 minority
executives in healthcare
Obama Selects KU’s Atkinson for
presidential committee
Saint Luke’s Hospital opens two facilities for women
Children’s Mercy receives cancer care award
Officials break ground on new KU Edwards
BEST building
K-State scientist to receive $1 million
NSF CAREER Award
Sigma-Aldrich Group plans $6.25M expansion
KU awarded $2.3M grant for women’s health
and research center
Health care reform law could boost bottom line
for local companies
AgriLabs to market American Animal Health vaccines
KU expands to address physician shortage
UMKC gets $1M donation pledge
Saint Luke’s Hospital has new treatment
for brain aneurysms
MU researcher gets NIH grant to study
swallowing disorders
Two Kansas Hospitals Perform New Heart Surgery
KCALSI Annual Dinner and Morning Symposium
Thanks to all who sponsored KCALSI’s eighth Annual Dinner held on April 21, 2010 at the Hyatt Regency Crown Center. The theme for the event was: “Translational Medicine: Critical Link Between Discovery & Patients”. From the music of the Jazz Disciples to Dr. Christopher Austin’s keynote speech, “Translating genomics into potential new therapies: opportunities and challenges,” the event was a huge success. Dr. Daniel Getman recapped the past year’s regional activities. Approximately 560 attended the event emceed by KCALSI incoming Chairman of the Board Dr. Patrick James. This year’s Platinum Sponsor was Bayer Animal Health and Kansas City University of Medicine and Biosciences was the Gold Sponsor.
The Translational Medicine theme carried over to the morning symposium held at the Ewing Marion Kauffman Conference Center on April 22. The approximate 120 attendees enjoyed a keynote session by Dr. Austin entitled: “Translating the genome into chemical probes and new therapeutics for rare and neglected diseases.” Dr. Austin’s presentation set the tone for six regional translational medicine scientists that presented throughout the morning. St. Luke's Health System sponsored the Symposium.
A recap of the two-day events will be placed on the website soon under “Interactive Event Recaps”. We look forward to seeing you at next year’s event!
Truman CEO named one of top 25 minority
executives in healthcare
Modern Healthcare magazine named John W. Bluford, president and CEO of Truman Medical Centers, as one of the 2010 Top 25 Minority Executives in Healthcare. Bluford can be seen in the April 19 issue.
Obama selects KU’s Atkinson
for presidential committee
Dr. Barbara Atkinson, executive vice chancellor of the University of Kansas Medical Center and executive dean for its school of medicine, is one of 10 new members of the Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues. The commission will advise President Barak Obama on bioethical issues that may emerge from advances in biomedicine and related areas of science and technology. More info
Saint Luke’s Hospital opens two facilities for women
Saint Luke’s Hospital is putting a strategic emphasis on women’s and children’s services with two new facilities: The Ellen Hockaday Center for Women’s Care and the Muriel I. Kauffman Women’s Heart Center. The facilities are phase one of a $330 million capital improvement plan. More info
Children’s Mercy receives cancer care award
The American College of Surgeons Commission on Cancer awarded Children’s Mercy Hospitals and Clinics its second Outstanding Achievement Award. Children’s Mercy is the only free-standing pediatric hospital to receive this year’s honor, awarded to fewer than one in five U.S. cancer programs. More info
Officials break ground on new KU Edwards’
BEST building
University of Kansas and Johnson County officials broke ground on KU Edwards’ new $25 million, 75,000-square-foot business, engineering, science and technology (BEST) building. The facility will increase the current campus space at Edwards by more than 50 percent and expand graduate and undergraduate programs. The building is funded by revenue from the educational triangle sales tax approved by voters in 2008. It is estimated that by 2023 the campus will have a $1.3 billion economic impact on Johnson County. More info
K-State Scientist to receive $1M NSF CAREER Award
Dr. Anna Whitfield, Assistant Professor of plant pathology at Kansas State university was awarded a $1M National Science Foundation CAREER Award to study how insects that serve as vectors in carrying viruses from one plant to another, respond to the virus themselves. More info
Sigma-Aldrich Group plans $6.25M expansion
St. Louis-based Sigma-Aldrich Group announced a $6.25 million expansion of its SAFC Biosciences manufacturing facility in Lenexa. The expansion, backed by a $250,000 economic development grant from the Kansas Biosciences Authority, is expected to increase by nearly a third the plant’s production capacity. SAFC Biosciences specializes in providing cell cultures used by biopharmaceutical companies in developing new products. More info
KU awarded $2.3M grant for women’s
health and research center
The University of Kansas Medical Center received a $2.3 million, five-year grant from the National Institutes of Health to establish a Women’s Reproductive Health Research Career Development Center. The center will provide physicians the opportunity to train in women’s reproductive health. More info
Health care reform law could boost bottom line
for local companies
Local life sciences boosters say an arcane health care reform provision could spur more business for local companies that specialize in running clinical trials for biologics as well as give would-be biotech entrepreneurs reasonable assurance that they can earn a return on their investment into biological drugs. The law establishes 12 years of data exclusivity, which gives entrepreneurs an extra layer of protection beyond a patent. More info
AgriLabs to market American Animal Health vaccines
St. Joseph-based AgriLabs announced it will market American Animal Health vaccines for cattle – a multimillion-dollar opportunity. AgriLabs also recently acquired the exclusive sales, marketing and distribution rights for the Pulmo-Guard family of pasteurella cattle vaccines previously sold by Boehringer Ingelheim Vetmedica Inc. More info
KU expands to address physician shortage
The University of Kansas Medical Center will start a four-year medical program in Salina and grow its Wichita program to help address the physician shortage in the state of Kansas. More info
UMKC gets $1M donation pledge
The University of Missouri-Kansas City received an anonymous donation of nearly $1 million to support the E. Grey Dimond, M.D., Program of International Medicine and the UMKC Vision Research Center. The pledge came from a graduate of the medical school and is a future gift commitment from the donor’s estate. More info
Saint Luke’s Hospital has new treatment
for brain aneurysms
Saint Luke’s Brain and Stroke Institute in Kansas City is one of only 25 hospitals in the United States that can now treat wide-necked brain aneurysms with Onyx® HD 500. Onyx is a glue-like liquid that hardens almost immediately after injected into the brain. It then seals off blood flow to the aneurysm and can help save a person from stroke and/or death. More info
MU researcher gets NIH grant to study
swallowing disorders
The National Institutes of Health awarded Teresa Lever, an assistant professor at the University of Missouri School of Health Professions, a grant to continue her work on understanding swallowing impairment in patients with neurodegenerative diseases. Lever’s research thus far has been published in the journal Dysphagia. More info
Two Kansas Hospitals Perform New Heart Surgery
St. Francis Health Center and The University of Kansas Hospital are the only two medical facilities in Kansas doing a new minimally invasive heart surgery for patients. Instead of cutting the full length of a patient’s chest, surgeons at these hospitals are making a 2-inch incision on the patient’s side to make the needed repairs. The new technique is proving to cut the recovery time in half and have fewer complications. More info
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