Nidhi Kapoor, M.D., has joined the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) as its first neurohospitalist, combining advanced training in neurology with a specialized understanding of caring for patients while they are in the hospital.

Neurohopsitalists have advanced training in both hospital medicine and treating neurological conditions that can result in hospitalization, including intractable seizures, multiple sclerosis, myasthenia gravis, acute and chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy, and status migranosus.

“Neurological patients who are sick enough to be hospitalized or need to undergo tests that are best done in a hospital will want someone with Dr. Kapoor’s training overseeing their care,” said Robert L. “Lee” Archer, M.D., professor and chairman of the Department of Neurology. “Neurohospitalists can quickly spot neurological issues as they arise, provide the appropriate care, reduce length of stay, and increase patient safety and convenience while improving efficiency and cost-effectiveness for hospitals.”

Kapoor also serves as an assistant professor in the UAMS College of Medicine’s Department of Neurology. In addition to treating patients, she conducts research and trains residents.

Archer said that adding Kapoor to the neurology team lessens the hospital-based workload of some of her colleagues who specialize in treating particular types of neurological conditions so they can focus on providing specialized care at UAMS’ outpatient Neurology Clinic.

“She is another key piece of the puzzle as we build upon our ability to offer the most complete array of specialized neurological care in the state,” Archer said.

Kapoor cited UAMS’ comprehensive neurology specializations as one of the things that drew her to the position.

“Working in an academic setting is important to me,” Kapoor said. “It is a challenging yet exciting opportunity to treat neurological disorders, as new treatments are constantly emerging. It’s the kind of role where you can have a big impact.”

Kapoor obtained her medical degree from Dr. Vaishampayan Memorial Medical College in Solapur, India. She completed her neurology residency in the Department of Neurology at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center.

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UAMS is the state’s only health sciences university, with colleges of Medicine, Nursing, Pharmacy, Health Professions and Public Health; a graduate school; hospital; northwest Arkansas regional campus; statewide network of regional centers; and seven institutes: the Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute, Jackson T. Stephens Spine & Neurosciences Institute, Myeloma Institute, Harvey & Bernice Jones Eye Institute, Psychiatric Research Institute, Donald W. Reynolds Institute on Aging and Translational Research Institute. It is the only adult Level 1 trauma center in the state. UAMS has 2,834 students, 822 medical residents and six dental residents. It is the state’s largest public employer with more than 10,000 employees, including 1,200 physicians who provide care to patients at UAMS, its regional campuses throughout the state, Arkansas Children’s Hospital, the VA Medical Center and Baptist Health. Visit www.uams.edu or www.uamshealth.com. Find us on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or Instagram.

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By Amy Widner | October 16th, 2017

Oct. 10, 2017 | Researchers with the Myeloma Institute at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) have identified one reason myeloma patients respond differently to treatment — the cancer cells can vary in type and intensity depending on where in the bone marrow they are located.

The team headed by Leo Rasche, M.D., and Niels Weinhold, Ph.D., reported these findings in the Aug. 16 edition of the online publication Nature Communications in the article “Spatial genomic heterogeneity in multiple myeloma revealed by multi-region sequencing.”

The study highlights the need to investigate more than the standard biopsy site to obtain correct risk profiles.

For the study, which included 51 patients, the researchers tested several areas of the cancer including specimens from both the pelvis and from so-called focal lesions, which are nodular plasma cell accumulations present in most myeloma patients and which are found through radiology.

The authors, which include Rasche, Weinhold, the institute’s director Gareth Morgan, M.D., Ph.D., and the deputy director Faith E. Davies, M.D., showed that the most aggressive tumors frequently were only found in focal lesions. Weinhold is an assistant professor in the College of Medicine’s Department of Internal Medicine, where Morgan and Davies also serve as professors.

“The genomic profiles of the abnormal plasma cells could be very different between the sites of focal lesions and the pelvis, but the pelvis is the standard site where biopsies are taken for diagnostics,” said Rasche.

He added that the disease was not evenly distributed in the bone marrow but was instead a patchy disease with hotspots.

“In our study for the first time we describe that high-risk myeloma could be hidden somewhere in the skeletal system and not necessarily be present at the iliac crest, which is on the upper, outer edge of the pelvis. There’s only one institution in the world that routinely biopsies focal lesions, and that’s at UAMS,” Rasche said. “If there is a lesion that is suspicious in imaging, then it would be checked.”

Future research at the Myeloma Institute will investigate non-invasive techniques such as medical imaging or tests from the peripheral blood to better identify patients with aggressive tumors. Until then, suspicious focal lesions have to be biopsied.

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UAMS is the state’s only health sciences university, with colleges of Medicine, Nursing, Pharmacy, Health Professions and Public Health; a graduate school; a hospital; a northwest Arkansas regional campus; a statewide network of regional centers; and seven institutes: the Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute, the Jackson T. Stephens Spine & Neurosciences Institute, the Myeloma Institute, the Harvey & Bernice Jones Eye Institute, the Psychiatric Research Institute, the Donald W. Reynolds Institute on Aging and the Translational Research Institute. It is the only adult Level 1 trauma center in the state. UAMS has 2,870 students, 799 medical residents and five dental residents. It is the state’s largest public employer with more than 10,000 employees, including about 1,200 physicians who provide care to patients at UAMS and its regional campuses throughout the state, Arkansas Children’s Hospital, the VA Medical Center and Baptist Health. Visit www.uams.edu or www.uamshealth.com. Find us on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or Instagram.

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By Linda Haymes | October 10th, 2017

Oct. 12, 2017 | Led by UAMS researchers, a new clinical study called STAMPOUT aims to help a drug user stay in treatment by keeping the effects of the drug from going into the brain.

This month, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) National Institute on Drug Abuse awarded the InterveXion/UAMS research team an $8 million, three-year grant to fund STAMPOUT (Study of Antibody for Methamphetamine Outpatient Therapy). This will be the first clinical study in methamphetamine users of a medication developed specifically for patients who are meth users.

The study will be conducted by InterveXion Therapeutics, a BioVentures LLC company housed on the UAMS campus in Little Rock.

The treatment makes use of a monoclonal antibody, IXT-m200, that works to help a drug user stay in treatment. The antibody binds the methamphetamine and keeps it from going into the brain, so users don’t get the high they are expecting. The treatment is planned to be used together with behavioral therapies once approved by the FDA.

“We are thrilled to have the opportunity to test IXT-m200 in methamphetamine users for the first time,” said Misty Stevens, Ph.D., InterveXion’s operations director and co-principal investigator on the grant award. “By showing that an antibody can change the way meth acts and makes a person feel, we will have strong evidence that this type of treatment will work to reduce drug use.”

Brooks Gentry, M.D., is co-principal investigator on the new grant. He is a professor and chair of the Department of Anesthesiology in the UAMS College of Medicine and InterveXion’s chief medical officer. Michael Owens, Ph.D., a professor in the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology in the UAMS College of Medicine, is InterveXion’s chief scientific officer. Ralph Henry is InterveXion’s vice president of biopharmaceutics and Distinguished Professor of Biological Sciences at the University of Arkansas.

The grant includes a sub-award to UAMS and funds researchers who are both founders of the company and also prominent UAMS leaders.

The antibody was tested during an earlier Phase 1 study for safety in healthy, non-methamphetamine users. In 2015, InterveXion received a $5 million grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse to support production of the monoclonal antibody and to prepare research for the next clinical trial in methamphetamine users.

“The primary goal of this Phase 2a study is to show how IXT-m200 will alter methamphetamine’s effects in users and that it will reduce the reinforcing effects of methamphetamine that perpetuate its use,” Gentry said. “The study could also provide evidence that other immunotherapies can work, potentially changing clinical practice entirely. Understanding how this antibody works and how effective it is will help determine how other similar treatments could be used for substance use disorders.”

Also during the study, InterveXion will work with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration by planning for a Phase 2b/3 clinical study in larger groups of people who wish to quit using methamphetamine.

“STAMPOUT is a turning point,” Stevens said. “With data from this clinical study, plans can be made to study how effective IXT-m200 can be in the long term in helping meth users quit and move this game changing medication toward the market and the patients who need it.”

By Ben Boulden | October 12th, 2017

LITTLE ROCK — The UAMS Translational Research Institute has received funding for a Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA) totaling $3,497,558 through Aug. 31, 2018.

The 11 months of funding comes from the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). It will enable UAMS to continue its mission of accelerating scientific discovery with innovative programs that help researchers translate their findings into new knowledge and treatments, said Translational Research Institute Director Laura James, M.D., UAMS associate vice chancellor for clinical and translational research.

“This is a significant federal research award for Arkansas,” James said. “We are very excited and proud to receive this award so that we can expand translational research at UAMS and improve the health of Arkansans through collaboration with our partner institutions – the Arkansas Children’s Research Institute and the Central Arkansas Veterans Healthcare System.”

The Translational Research Institute will apply for five years of CTSA funding in May 2018. If the May application is fully funded, the award would likely total more than $25 million. The first CTSA grant was awarded to UAMS in 2009.

Receipt of the $3.5 million award ensures that UAMS remains a member of the national CTSA consortium, made up of 62 academic research institutions across the country.

“In essence, the CTSA is the most important NIH grant an institution can receive,” said James, the award’s principal investigator. “Consortium members work very closely with each other to develop transferable solutions that address many of today’s greatest human health challenges.”

As a CTSA-funded site, UAMS directly helps researchers overcome long-standing obstacles to their work and provides patients tremendous opportunities to participate in cutting-edge clinical trials, in which they receive new medications and/or benefit from new treatments that are not available commercially. In addition, UAMS will continue to harness extremely large data sets, in concert with other institutions, to develop state-of-the-art solutions to health challenges. For example, these types of studies allow UAMS to use available data to understand if one treatment is better than another treatment for complex health care problems, such as mental illness, diabetes and other diseases that are common in Arkansas.

“The UAMS Translational Research Institute has been a significant contributor to the CTSA consortium in helping it meet its goals,” said Lawrence Cornett, Ph.D., UAMS vice chancellor for research. “This award ensures that UAMS clinical and translational investigators have ready access to diverse resources and approaches that the Translational Research Institute provides. Moreover, our researchers will benefit from resources available at over 60 other institutions within the consortium.”

In the last three years, the Translational Research Institute has launched or improved several research resources that are now being used by the UAMS research community:

• ARresearch.org, a volunteer research participant registry and website, was established in collaboration with lay members of the community so that researchers have access to a pool of over 3,600 individuals who have indicated an interest in hearing more about research volunteer opportunities.
• Arkansas Clinical Data Repository, a research data warehouse with de-identified patient data that researchers can use to understand patterns in data that will provide a framework to guide future studies testing new research treatments or approaches.
• UAMS Profiles, an online researcher-to-researcher networking/collaboration tool, which gives researchers a user-friendly way to locate potential research partners locally and nationally.
• TRI Portal, a cost-saving electronic request system for researchers, which allows the researcher to select from a menu of over 30 unique services and receive customized help with a research-related task in an efficient manner.

The Translational Research Institute partners with the UAMS Fay W. Boozman College of Public Health to provide a robust community engagement program to increase public involvement and participation in research at UAMS. Representative components of the program include:

• TRI’s Community Advisory Board, a diverse board whose members represent multiple grassroots segments of the state’s population. The board provides critical viewpoints, including their cultural and logistical perspectives that researchers need to make their studies operational.
• TRI’s Community Scientist Academy, which teaches the public how research is conducted and provides readiness training so that community members can serve as consultants to researchers and help plan the design and tools used in the research.

Additional components of the new CTSA award include funds to start a new informatics research consultation service, a new research subject recruitment program, and statistical services to ensure studies are properly designed to answer research questions. Other new programs that will be provided by the grant are dissemination services, so that the findings of research studies are communicated to numerous audiences, including research participants, the local community, other researchers, treating physicians and national audiences.

“The new grant allows us to get services to researchers, but more importantly, it allows UAMS, and our research partners, to tackle the health challenges we face here in Arkansas,” James said. “Our mission goes beyond research and really helps us as an academic community take better care of patients. The secondary effects of this grant will have a very important impact on Arkansas that includes benefits to our local workforce, economy and productivity as Arkansans.”

The NCATS/NIH award is under Award Number U54TR001629.

UAMS is the state’s only health sciences university, with colleges of Medicine, Nursing, Pharmacy, Health Professions and Public Health; a graduate school; hospital; northwest Arkansas regional campus; statewide network of regional centers; and seven institutes: the Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute, Jackson T. Stephens Spine & Neurosciences Institute, Myeloma Institute, Harvey & Bernice Jones Eye Institute, Psychiatric Research Institute, Donald W. Reynolds Institute on Aging and Translational Research Institute. It is the only adult Level 1 trauma center in the state. UAMS has 2,834 students, 822 medical residents and six dental residents. It is the state’s largest public employer with more than 10,000 employees, including 1,200 physicians who provide care to patients at UAMS, its regional campuses throughout the state, Arkansas Children’s Hospital, the VA Medical Center and Baptist Health. Visit www.uams.edu or www.uamshealth.com. Find us on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or Instagram.

UAMS is the state’s only comprehensive academic health center, with colleges of Medicine, Nursing, Pharmacy, Health Professions and Public Health; a graduate school; a hospital; a northwest Arkansas regional campus; a statewide network of regional centers; and seven institutes: the Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute, the Jackson T. Stephens Spine & Neurosciences Institute, the Myeloma Institute, the Harvey & Bernice Jones Eye Institute, the Psychiatric Research Institute, the Donald W. Reynolds Institute on Aging and the Translational Research Institute. It is the only adult Level 1 trauma center in the state. UAMS has 3,021 students, 789 medical residents and two dental residents. It is the state’s largest public employer with more than 10,000 employees, including about 1,000 physicians and other professionals who provide care to patients at UAMS, Arkansas Children’s Hospital, the VA Medical Center and UAMS regional centers throughout the state. Visit www.uams.edu or www.uamshealth.com. Find us on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or Instagram.

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By David Robinson | October 11th, 2017

When Todd Maxson, M.D., worked to implement a trauma system for the state of Arkansas in 2009, he didn’t know that his own life would be among the many saved.

“It’s certainly different being on the opposite end of care,” Maxson said.

On Sept. 1, Maxson, a professor of surgery in the UAMS College of Medicine left Arkansas Children’s Hospital on his motorcycle after a long day in the operating room. Maxson is chief of pediatric trauma surgery and was on call.

A car hit him on Woodrow Street, minutes away from Children’s Hospital. Maxson flew off the bike, breaking his helmet. The vehicle dragged his motorcycle 150 feet. Fortunately, two bystanders stopped to help. One of them called 911. The other, at Maxson’s request, called Children’s Hospital. His work and his patients remained a priority even as he lie in the street with life-threatening injuries.

“As a trauma surgeon on call, my responsibility is for emergencies at the hospital,” Maxson said. “We can’t leave that uncovered for even a second.”

Maxson said Metropolitan Emergency Medical Services were quick to the scene and some of the EMS professionals recognized him from training.

“I may have provided a couple of suggestions,” Maxson said with a chuckle. “It’s in my nature. But they smiled and took care of me. They did everything right.”

That included transporting him to UAMS — the state’s only adult level one trauma center. Anna Privratsky, D.O., in the UAMS Department of Surgery, was in the Emergency Department that night. She says it had been relatively quiet when the trauma call came in.

“I saw it was a motorcycle accident. Minutes later the chief resident told me it was Dr. Maxson,” Privratsky said. “As a trauma surgeon, there’s not a lot that can shake you. But when someone you know comes in for trauma, that’ll do it.”

Privratsky, a former UAMS resident who worked under Maxson, says her training prepared her for even the most stressful situations.

“We all know Dr. Maxson. But when something like this happens you must tuck aside everything except focusing on getting him better. We do that for everyone who rolls through the doors.”

As a level one trauma center, UAMS had access to interventional radiologists who worked to stop the bleeding within an hour. Orthopeadic surgeons were immediately available. Maxson had a shattered pelvis, a shattered right femur, lots of bruises and significant blood loss. He had four major operations in four days.

“Doing the major surgeries together prevents complications,” Maxson said.

Maxson left the hospital two weeks later. He’ll have to keep weight off his legs before a few more surgeries. Then he’ll begin physical and occupational therapy. He hopes to be back to work summer 2018.

“I’m coming back,” Maxson said. “I’m absolutely coming back. And I’ll be a better surgeon after this. I now have a level of empathy that I couldn’t have gained before this.”

Before 2009, Arkansas had the highest injury-related mortality rates in the country. After the trauma system was established, the state saw a 50 percent reduction in preventable deaths.

“The gift given by the Legislature in the form of a trauma system has paid unbelievable dividends,” Maxson said. “Had that system not been in place, I think I would’ve died. And if I lived, I wouldn’t be in the shape I am today. The investment has a positive return.”

By Katrina Dupins | October 3rd, 2017

Oct. 4, 2017 | By being effective advocates for science funding, researchers can help the U.S. lead the world in science and help their own careers, UAMS students and faculty were told at a recent lecture.

“The public does not understand what we do and they don’t understand why we do it,” said Richard L. Eckert, Ph.D., from the University of Maryland, School of Medicine, where he is a professor and chair of the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology.

The Sept. 27 lecture was sponsored by the Office of Interprofessional Education and the College of Medicine Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology.

Knowing how to talk to nonscientists about the importance of research is an important skill for researchers, Eckert said.  “Leave out the calcium concentrations. Tell the big picture.”

Whether talking to family or friends at a party, the importance of science and the threats to funding must be communicated clearly.

He noted that the U.S. share of worldwide research and development has fallen in recent years from 35 to 27 percent, while Asia’s share has climbed from 27 to 40 percent.

The good news is that Congress has started to increase funding for research, but current funding levels for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) remain below 2003 levels in inflation-adjusted dollars.

Funding stability is especially critical in science, he said, because a sudden cut in funding such as occurred in 2013 can sabotage years invested in science programs.

“This will be very important to your careers because you’re going to be funded by the federal government to do research, and you’ll want to pursue your work,” Eckert said.  “Very few Americans know what the NIH is, and that’s why you have to make an effort to tell them.”

Eckert leads delegations of researchers to Capitol Hill in Washington D.C. to speak directly to members of the House and Senate.

“In the years to come you’re going to have to increasingly engage with this kind of activity because lots of people are asking for support from government and sometimes budgets are limited so we have to be there and we have to lobby with our congressmen and senators to do things that are in the interest of science progression,” he said.

At UAMS, such outreach is led by Maurice Rigsby, J.D., vice chancellor for Institutional Relations.

By David Robinson | October 4th, 2017

Oct. 3, 2017 | It’s a subject that Germaine Odenheimer, M.D., finds harder to talk about to patients than having a terminal illness: impaired driving, and that’s what she wanted to speak about to the audience at the 18^th annual Geriatric Update and Long-term Care Conference held at UAMS.

“One of the reasons I got interested in this area is because I found this topic of driving was the most difficult topic I have to deal with,” Odenheimer said recently to a conference audience. “It was harder than telling them they have Alzheimer’s disease and even harder than telling them they were going to die. There’s something about this topic that is so powerful. I felt I needed to learn more about it and how to deal with this issue. It became the focus of my research interest.”

Odenheimer, an associate professor in the Donald W. Reynolds Department of Geriatric Medicine at the University of Oklahoma’s College of Medicine, was a guest speaker at the conference held from Sept. 21-23 at the UAMS Donald W. Reynolds Institute on Aging.

Throughout the three days, speakers, presentations and expert panels covered a range of topics from trauma in the elderly, infection control and food disparities to legal and social issues in geriatric care. More than 120 people attended the conference, which was sponsored by the Arkansas Geriatric Education Collaborative at UAMS.

The conference has been supported annually by Jeanne Wei, M.D., Ph.D., executive director of the Reynolds Institute, to provide the latest information to physicians and other health professionals, as well as caregivers to the aging population.

“The updates are giving important and practical information to professionals directly involved in senior care,” Wei said. “Update speakers aren’t presenting abstract concepts. They’re communicating the latest findings and best practices. Feedback over the years has shown the tremendous value our attendees find in the information communicated at the update. Dr. Germaine Odenheimer’s presentation is a great example of that.”

Odenheimer said as young drivers mature, they progress from being high-risk drivers with a high fatal crash rate to lower-risk experienced drivers through early and middle adulthood. Drawing further on vehicle collision data, she said the crash rate doesn’t increase again until age 75 when it starts slowly and steadily rises again. At 85 and older, it exceeds the fatal crash risk for teenagers.

In almost every state, the driver is held responsible for accidents that occur when driving is impaired. But several years ago, the American Medical Association determined that physicians need to play a role in deciding when a patient is fit to drive or not and even have an ethical obligation to do so, Odenheimer said.

Odenheimer said a physician can refer the patient to an occupational therapist for evaluation. In some cases, a change in medication, treating an underlying condition that is contributing or causing the impairment or limiting the patient’s driving can be enough to resolve the impairment or reduce the risk.

“Most people wait until there is a crisis,” she said. “The time to start that conversation is early. If they have a diagnosis that is likely to lead to loss of driving, like dementia or Parkinson’s or other similar conditions, then you need to have that conversation early. It’s much easier to start the conversation before they have to stop.”

Following Odenheimer’s presentation, she also took part in a four-person panel discussion on the topic that included Little Rock District Court Judge Vic Fleming, who oversees a traffic court; Lou Ann Eads, M.D., a geriatric psychiatrist at the UAMS Psychiatric Research Institute; and Masil George, M.D., a geriatrician and pain management specialist at the Reynolds Institute.

As part of the panel, Fleming reviewed the legal processes that can be used to determine whether or not someone’s driving is impaired and unsafe.

He said he too had to work through the issue with a family relative, who passed a driving test and then had three car accidents in two years.

“If your loved one has an offense pending in front of a traffic judge, and you know that, by golly, just go with them,” Fleming said. “We judges get it. If the defendant is in his or her nineties and there are a couple of people with them who are in their forties or fifties, then it’s usually a niece or nephew, son or daughter who wants to make a comment to get a license revoked. We’ll listen.”

In dialogue with members of the audience, the panel engaged in an in-depth discussion of the role physicians play in helping patients and families wrestle with the issue of impaired driving.

Eleven geriatrics research posters also were on display at the conference. A number attended from out of state, including some who have participated for as many as 13 consecutive years.

By Ben Boulden | October 3rd, 2017

Oct. 2, 2017 | Stavros Manolagas, M.D., Ph.D., who holds several roles at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) and the Central Arkansas Veterans Healthcare System, received the American Society for Bone and Mineral Research’s oldest and most prestigious honor – the William F. Neuman Award – at the ASBMR’s annual meeting, Sept. 8-11 in Denver.

The Neuman Award honors an ASBMR member for outstanding and major scientific contributions in the area of bone and mineral research and for contributions to associates and trainees in training, research and administration.

“Art is I. Science is we,” Manolagas said during his acceptance speech. “The Neuman award is, at least as much, a recognition of a team as it is of the individual awardee. The most important job of the leader is to find and hire people who are smarter than she or he. By that measure, I believe that I succeeded with each one of my current and former UAMS co-workers with whom I had the joy to work with. To all of them, I am indebted for sharing their talents and scientific journeys.”

Manolagas also delivered the Louis V. Avioli Lecture during the meeting, the only invited plenary lecture presented by an ASBMR member at the annual conference, which draws as many as 4,000 physicians, scientists and other participants from around the world. This was the first time since the ASBMR’s founding 40 years ago that the Neuman Award and Avioli Lecture went to the same individual.

Manolagas is a distinguished professor of medicine, professor of orthopaedics and director of the Division of Endocrinology and Metabolism in the Department of Internal Medicine in the UAMS College of Medicine. He is director of the UAMS and Central Arkansas Veterans Healthcare System Center for Osteoporosis and Metabolic Bone Diseases – one of the largest and longest-funded osteoporosis research centers in the world.

In his lecture, Manolagas discussed the dramatic progress that has been made in understanding bone biology and the underlying mechanisms of osteoporosis over the past 40 years. He traced the advancement of pharmaceutical drugs for osteoporosis, as well as the work that remains to be done to develop therapies that continue to be both effective and safe with long-term use.

“The overarching cause of osteoporosis is aging, and bone-intrinsic mechanisms are the primary culprits of the disease in both women and men,” Manolagas said. “Bone-extrinsic mechanisms such as menopause are only contributory. Several new classes of drugs targeting age-related mechanisms have shown the potential to treat more than one age-related disease, including osteoporosis, simultaneously. The future of research and patient care in this area is bright.”

Manolagas also serves as vice chair for research and holds the Thomas E. Andreoli, M.D., M.A.C.P. Clinical Scholar Chair in the Department of Internal Medicine at UAMS. In addition, Manolagas is chief of the Endocrinology Section in the Central Arkansas Veterans Healthcare System.

His scholarly contributions have been recognized over the years with induction to the Association of American Physicians in 1996; the AlliedSignal award for research on aging in 1999; the inaugural Louis V. Avioli Award of ASBMR, 2000; a Doctor Honoris Causa from the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece, 2007; the International Bone and Mineral Society (IBMS) D. Harold Copp award, 2013; and the William S. Middleton Award of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) for achieving international acclaim for research accomplishments in areas of prime importance to VA’s research mission, 2016.

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UAMS is the state’s only health sciences university, with colleges of Medicine, Nursing, Pharmacy, Health Professions and Public Health; a graduate school; a hospital; a northwest Arkansas regional campus; a statewide network of regional centers; and seven institutes: the Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute, the Jackson T. Stephens Spine & Neurosciences Institute, the Myeloma Institute, the Harvey & Bernice Jones Eye Institute, the Psychiatric Research Institute, the Donald W. Reynolds Institute on Aging and the Translational Research Institute. It is the only adult Level 1 trauma center in the state. UAMS has 2,870 students, 799 medical residents and five dental residents. It is the state’s largest public employer with more than 10,000 employees, including about 1,200 physicians who provide care to patients at UAMS and its regional campuses throughout the state, Arkansas Children’s Hospital, the VA Medical Center and Baptist Health. Visit www.uams.edu or www.uamshealth.com. Find us on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or Instagram.

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By Amy Widner | October 2nd, 2017