5/19
Health Sciences
Hands to hold on the path to surgery
The first-of-its kind Center for Surgical Health provides navigation and support to help under- and uninsured patients receive surgical treatment before it becomes an emergency.
HUP Food Pantry team innovates to address food insecurity
Between June 2020 and November 2021, the HUP Food Pantry gave out nearly 5,000 bags of food to postpartum families with food insecurity.
Correcting night blindness in dogs
Researchers in the School of Veterinary Medicine and colleagues have developed a gene therapy that restores dim-light vision in dogs with a congenital form of night blindness, offering hope for treating a similar condition in people.
COVID-19 turned everything upside down. What has Penn Medicine’s innovation team learned?
To many in health care—including those in Penn Medicine’s Center for Health Care Innovation—the COVID-19 pandemic is a crisis from which to find the next great learning opportunity.
From a pandemic, scientific insights poised to impact more than just COVID-19
Pivoting to study SARS-CoV-2, many scientists on campus have launched new research projects that address the challenges of the pandemic but also prepare us to confront future challenges.
Rapid adaptation in fruit flies
New findings from School of Arts & Sciences biologists show that evolution—normally considered to be a gradual process—can occur in a matter of weeks in fruit flies in response to natural environmental change.
New COVID-19 roadmap: Four takeaways
A report spearheaded by PIK Professor Ezekiel Emanuel, with input from other Penn experts, lays out a dozen priorities for the federal government to tackle in the next 12 months. The aim: to help guide the U.S. to the pandemic’s “next normal.”
The pandemic’s psychological scars
It’s been a long and uncertain road, with some groups shouldering a disproportionately greater burden of mental anguish from COVID-19. Yet now there’s a glimmer of hope. Has the page finally turned?
Feeling foggy? Your head is in the clouds for a reason
It may be because you’re languishing—a feeling of stagnation or emptiness. And naming it is a first important step to bringing clarity to one’s experiences, says Wharton’s Adam Grant.
Leonard A. Lauder talks game-changing gift to Penn Nursing, and more
Lauder, a Penn alumnus and emeritus Trustee, donated $125 million to the University, establishing a new program for aspiring nurse practitioners who intend to work in underserved communities.
In the News
Head injury: Higher risk of epilepsy later in life
Discussing traumatic brain injuries, Andrea Schneider of the Perelman School of Medicine says, “One head injury is associated with about 1.2 times increased risk, but having more than one head injury is associated with over two times increased risk.”
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Want to know which COVID variant you have?
Frederick Bushman of the Perelman School of Medicine comments on COVID variant tracking: “If we know what variants are involved, what their properties are, we can tell what to expect by sort of forecasting by the experience of other places that are ahead of us, based on our sequence and knowledge of the different variants.”
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Omicron infection produces better immunity response than booster shots: Report
John Wherry of the Perelman School of Medicine says COVID breakthrough infections should be thought of as essentially equivalent to another dose of vaccine and that, if someone had COVID recently, they could wait before getting another booster shot.
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Penn Medical School holds first in-person commencement since pandemic
Graduates of The University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine were honored during their 2022 commencement Sunday morning at The Kimmel Center. The graduating class of 169 people were able to receive their diplomas and take the Hippocratic Oath in person for the first time since the beginning of the pandemic.
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Burnt-out nurses push back as staff shortages strain hospitals
Linda Aiken of the School of Nursing comments that there is pressure to cut hospital nursing staffs, but fewer nurses mean more deaths.
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