By: Bill Snyder D Vanderbilt Health’s Annet Kirabo, DVM, MSc, PhD, will be honored this fall for her groundbreaking research on immune mechanisms that drive high blood pressure and cardiovascular disease. Kirabo, Professor of Medicine in the Division of Genetic Medicine and Clinical Pharmacology, will receive the Established Investigator Award for Clinical Hypertension, a new recognition from the American Heart Association’s Council on Hypertension and award sponsor Sky Labs Inc. The award will be presented Oct. 10 during the American Heart Association’s Hypertension Scientific Session in Arlington, Virginia. In his nomination letter, Thomas Kleyman, MD, a renowned kidney researcher at the University of Pittsburgh, wrote, “Dr. Kirabo…
Author: Vanderbilt
Dr. Levi Watkins, Jr., the first African American student to be admitted and graduate from Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, was a passionate mentor and advocate, serving as a role model for countless students, trainees, and faculty members pursuing careers in medicine and the biomedical sciences. During the Levi Watkins, Jr. Lecture on Oct. 5, 2026, awards will be given to honor at least one VUSM or VUMC faculty member, house staff member, professional degree student, and medical student who have made outstanding contributions through their mentorship of others to honor Dr. Watkins’ commitment to empowering the next generation of…
By: Christina Echegaray Early childhood is often shaped by community, family and the simple joys of books, birthday celebrations, music, movies, play and more. For Madisyn (Madi) Van‑Tull, those joys came wrapped in hospital gowns and medical routines. For nearly three years, Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt was her community and home, where she was surrounded by a surrogate family of doctors, trainees, nurses, care partners and a variety of therapists. Diagnosed with a rare and serious condition, congenital nephrotic syndrome, Madi was admitted to Monroe Carell just after her 1st birthday due to health-related complications, including a…
By: Christina Echegaray Jeffrey Upperman, MD, Surgeon-in-Chief and Chair of the Department of Pediatric Surgery for Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt, has been selected to Leadership Tennessee’s Signature Program Class XIII. Upperman, who joined Vanderbilt in 2019, is one of 52 individuals from business, government, education, medical and nonprofit sectors across the state to make up the 2026-2027 cohort. According to Leadership Tennessee, its flagship Signature Program is a 10-month, seven-session study for the state’s most influential leaders from every region and varying professional industries. The program aims to continue building a statewide network of proven leaders and…
By: Yolanda James Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center hosted its 27th Annual Scientific Symposium, themed “Cancer and Environment at Every Scale,” last month. More than 300 people attended, including faculty, trainees, staff, community advisory board members, and cancer survivors from across Vanderbilt, Meharry Medical College, Tennessee State University and the broader community. This year’s event highlighted research examining the many factors that influence cancer development, progression and patient outcomes — from molecular mechanisms to neighborhood-level data that reveal patterns across communities. For the second consecutive year, it was organized by a trainee-led steering committee and included four co-chairs: Yash Pershad, a student…
A large multisite study of older people with cognitive impairment finds that Black and Hispanic people, while known to be far more apt to have dementia, are significantly less apt than other racial and ethnic groups to show Alzheimer’s pathology on brain scans. The study, reported in Alzheimer’s & Dementia: The Journal of the Alzheimer’s Association, was led by researchers at Vanderbilt Health. “These results suggest that the yawning ethnoracial differences in dementia may be driven in part by group differences in underlying causes of dementia symptoms,” said corresponding author Consuelo Wilkins, MD, MSCI, the Mildred Thornton Stahlman Professor in Rural Health and…
COVID-19 continues to be a public health threat According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), between 380,000 and 540,000 people were hospitalized in the United States due to COVID-19 during the 2024-2025 season, and between 44,000 and 63,000 of them died. That’s why researchers at Vanderbilt Health and around the country continue to evaluate the effectiveness of vaccines approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to reduce the severity and lethality of respiratory infections caused by the ever-mutating SARS-CoV-2 virus. The latest case-control study found that adults who received the 2024-2025 COVID-19 vaccine and were…
By: Bill Snyder MBP091, an investigational, anti-Marburg virus antibody identified by Vanderbilt Health researchers and under development by San Diego-based Mapp Biopharmaceutical Inc., was provided to Ethiopian health officials during that country’s first outbreak of the deadly viral infection late last year. Nine people died and five recovered from Marburg virus disease during the outbreak, which began in mid-November in Ethiopia’s southern region. Successful containment of the outbreak was declared Jan. 26. A close cousin of Ebola, another hemorrhagic virus, Marburg is transmitted by fruit bats and exposure to body fluids from infected individuals. There currently are no approved treatments or vaccines to protect…
By: VUMC News and Communications Darcelle Skeete Burgess, JD, MHA, CHC, CHPC, has been named director of the HIPAA Privacy Office at Vanderbilt Health, effective Jan. 12. She succeeds Terri Hartman, the longtime director of the program, who retired Oct. 31. Skeete Burgess brings more than 10 years of health care privacy and compliance experience to Vanderbilt Health. Most recently, she served as director of Privacy at Bon Secours Mercy Health, beginning in 2024. Skeete Burgess also spent nearly a decade at Emory Healthcare from 2015 to 2024, where she held various leadership roles in compliance and privacy. “We are…
In celebration of her milestone 80th birthday on Jan. 19, global superstar Dolly Parton has released a powerful new rendition of her classic hit “Light of a Clear Blue Morning,” featuring Lainey Wilson, Miley Cyrus, Queen Latifah and Reba McEntire, on the 50th anniversary of writing the song. The single and music video, which also features David Foster on piano and The Christ Church Choir on backing vocals, released Friday, Jan. 16, just days before her birthday. This recording reimagines the song with a message of spreading love and hope. Originally written and recorded 50 years ago in 1976 during…