Letter From The Dean

Dear Colleague,

The articles in this issue of Robert Wood Johnson Medicine reflect the breadth of our endeavors at UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School. Individually, each feature brings new insights into our programs. Together, the articles demonstrate our quest for excellence in four intersecting missions: education, clinical care, research, and community health.

I hope that as you read this issue, you will share my deep appreciation for the people who work to advance our medical school. Their dedication, skills, and spirit make RWJMS a wonderful place to teach, study, and learn.

Our cover story on global medicine, The Neighborhood 8,000 Miles Away, explores an RWJMS campus that stretches across the world. Here, you will meet our faculty who provide much-needed care in Africa, India, and Latin America. And you will meet our students, as they gain the skills of culturally competent physicians and prepare to care for patients worldwide.

New Frontiers in Cardiac Surgery examines our cardiac programs, which offer the full range of cardiac support, from simple catheter-based assistive devices to artificial-heart implantation. Completing that spectrum of programs, our heart-transplantation team, led by Mark Anderson, MD, was among the first in the United States recently approved to implant the artificial heart.

I was pleased, in Rx for Excellence, to have the opportunity to reflect on my experience in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine. We found that good business decisions can drive academic growth, which we are attempting to achieve school-wide.

At RWJMS, we continue to conduct world-class translational research in the basic sciences. Patient-focused research is also under way in our clinical departments. A Cornerstone of Orthopaedic Surgery presents the research of Charles Gatt, Jr., MD ’89  — a department chair and physician-scientist who is making impressive strides in tissue engineering.

Family medicine is another area in which we are conducting important patient-centered research. Social Science Evolves into Practice Jazz introduces you to Benjamin Crabtree, PhD, who leads his department’s research division in work that is improving the dynamics of family practices nationwide.
Our alumni profile, Comrade-in-Arms, portrays Joseph S. Costabile, MD ’86, a vascular surgeon who led a U.S. Navy Medical Reserves surgical unit in the Iraq War, helping to save the lives of many coalition soldiers.

As always, we are pleased to recognize the outstanding people who make us proud of this school. I hope you will enjoy learning about their achievements in medicine here and across the world.

Sincerely,

Peter S. Amenta, MD, PhD

Interim Dean