November 29, 2023
When Dr. Linnie Golightly was a medical student at Weill Cornell Medicine in the early 1980s, the world was a very different place.
November 1, 2023
1. What is your current position?
I am chair of the Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences, and the John H. Panton MD Professor of Ophthalmology, at the Illinois Eye and Ear Infirmary at the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC) and UI Health. I am also director of the Pediatric Retina of Prematurity Service at the Illinois Eye and Ear Infirmary at the University of Chicago Illinois.
In addition...
October 17, 2023
Video of New Student Residence at Weill Cornell Medicine
NEW YORK (Oct. 17, 2023)—Weill Cornell Medicine is constructing a modern new student residence that, when it opens in 2025, will expand the scope of the institution’s Upper East Side campus and nearly double the existing student residential living space.
The new $260 million, 16-story, 173,000-square-foot residence is located on the northwest corner of East 74th Street and York Avenue, four blocks from Weill Cornell...
August 16, 2023
Video of Class of 2027 White Coat Ceremony Highlights | Weill Cornell Medicine
Watch the full Class of 2027 White Coat Ceremony on YouTube.
Nick Rosenfeld’s passion for medicine is profoundly personal, as is his desire for cultivating enduring relationships with patients.
In the summer of 2019, Rosenfeld was preparing to start his freshman year at Loyola University Chicago—the...
June 13, 2023
Nine Weill Cornell Medicine alumni with key health-care leadership roles served as mentors this spring in Weill Cornell Medical College’s inaugural Healthcare Leadership and Management (HLM) elective.
June 12, 2023
When Dr. Rafael Vazquez (M.D. ’06) was growing up, his parents stressed the importance of a solid education. Now, with a gift in support of Weill Cornell Medicine’s new student residence, Dr. Vazquez is honoring his parents’ values as he helps fulfill one of the institution’s primary campaign goals.
June 9, 2023
With an endowed gift in support of scholarship, Dr. Ricardo Gomez (M.D. ’10) is paying forward the assistance he received as a student, allowing others to pursue a top-tier medical education at their dream school without worrying about money.
May 19, 2023
Video of Congratulations to the Class of 2023 | Weill Cornell Medicine
Dr. Christopher Bourne’s journey to Weill Cornell Medicine’s 2023 Commencement was defined by two of his passions: science and social activism – both informed profoundly by the events of 2020.
Dr. Bourne graduated May 18 with a doctorate in immunology from Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences. But three years ago, when the COVID pandemic struck, his doctoral research, focusing on harnessing...
May 18, 2023
Dr. Cheryl Dreyfus, a distinguished professor and chair of the Department of Neuroscience and Cell Biology at Rutgers-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, has been awarded the 2023 Weill Cornell Graduate School Alumni Award of Distinction.
The Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences has been recognizing alumni with this award since 1997 in honor of their outstanding contributions to biomedical research in education, focusing on science and scholarship, leadership, mentoring...
May 18, 2023
Students from the Weill Cornell Medical College Class of 2023 were recognized for their outstanding achievements May 17 during Convocation. Medical students received special awards, prizes and certificates, acknowledging their exceptional academic achievement, scholarship, research, teaching and service. Convocation also honors other students, alumni, faculty and staff.
...
May 18, 2023
Dr. Margaret “Peggy” Bia, M.D. ’72, professor emeritus of internal medicine at Yale School of Medicine, has been awarded the Weill Cornell Medical College Alumni Association Award of Distinction.
The award, which was established in 1949, is presented each year to a Weill Cornell Medical College alumnus who has demonstrated outstanding achievement in research, education or patient care, and has brought acclaim to the institution. Dr. Bia was honored on May 17 at the alumni award of...
May 17, 2023
Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences honored students in the Class of 2023 for their academic achievements during its convocation ceremony on May 17.
The ceremony recognized students who are graduating with their master’s degrees, as well as those who earned special awards and prizes for their accomplishments in research, scholarship and service.
In addition to celebrating students, the ceremony also honored graduate school faculty as well as Dr. Cheryl Dreyfus (Ph.D...
May 15, 2023
By Emily Gaines Buchler
As a child, Chimsom Orakwue watched her father, a computer engineer, suffer a debilitating back injury that left him unable to work. Her family, having immigrated years earlier from Nigeria to California, couldn’t pay for the health care he needed, so her mother enrolled in nursing school, while an 8-year-old Chimsom pitched in to care for her younger siblings.
Orakwue, who will graduate from Weill Cornell Medical College on May 18 and start a residency this July...
April 21, 2023
Weill Cornell Medicine is celebrating more than a century of excellence in medical education, scientific discovery and patient care, commemorating 125 years since its founding. What began on April 14, 1898 as Cornell University Medical College in four temporary classrooms on the...
April 13, 2023
Dr. Joel Blankson first learned about M.D.-Ph.D. programs as he was finishing college. Now a leading expert on HIV pathogenesis and a professor of medicine at Johns Hopkins Medicine, he found the opportunity to create his own educational odyssey, culminating in both degrees—one in medicine, one in a laboratory science—irresistible.
“I applied to the Cornell/Rockefeller program because of the focus on...
March 31, 2023
Barely noticed scientific advances in the decades before the COVID-19 pandemic proved crucial to rapidly producing vaccines that—despite disappointing national uptake—are estimated to have prevented an additional 3.25 million American deaths from the virus, Dr. Anthony Fauci M.D. ’66 said.
Deftly blending hope and skepticism from serving on the front lines of the pandemic, Dr. Fauci shared 10 lessons from the global health crisis with Weill Cornell...
March 17, 2023
Video of Match Day 2023 at Weill Cornell Medicine
Chimsom Orakwue imagined life as a doctor for as long as she can remember. It is the thread that connected her childhood to high school to college and, four years ago, to Weill Cornell Medicine.
Now a graduating medical student, Orakwue on March 17 reached a milestone that brought her ever closer to attaining her goal: learning where she would complete her residency training. Unsealing an envelope that contained that news,...
March 15, 2023
When Dr. Anthony Fauci, former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, recalls his college summers working construction jobs around New York City, one memory stands out crystal clear: It was the summer before the start of medical school and he was on the team that built the Samuel J. Wood Library at Weill Cornell Medicine.
While on his lunch break, Dr. Fauci entered the building, looked down from the top of the library stairs and said to himself, “Oh my...
November 21, 2022
More than 300 medical college alumni, representing classes spanning more than six decades, were warmly welcomed back to campus by Dr. Augustine M.K. Choi, the Stephen and Suzanne Weiss Dean of Weill Cornell Medicine, as Reunion 2022 kicked off the morning of Friday, Oct. 7 – the first in-person alumni reunion since 2018.
Thanks to the hard work of volunteer leadership – Alumni Association Board president Dr. Joseph Habboushe (M.D. ’06), reunion chair Dr. Kathleen Foley (M.D. ’69),...
November 21, 2022
Three Weill Cornell Medicine alumni and three faculty members were recognized with alumni awards during Reunion weekend.
On October 7, the Alumni Association Board of Directors presented honorary fellowships to faculty members Dr. Yoon Kang, Dr. Joseph Safdieh and Dr. Mark Souweidane. A tradition since 1970, the honorary fellowships are awarded to outstanding non-alumni faculty whose scholarship, dedication and leadership have greatly enriched the medical college.
Dr. Kang, who...
August 16, 2022
Video of Overcoming the Odds: Rana Barghout's Journey to White Coat | Weill Cornell Medicine
WATCH the full Class of 2026 White Coat Ceremony on YouTube
Rana Barghout didn’t realize the power of her story until she shared it. It had been five years since she experienced homelessness, living in a car for months with her two younger siblings after a tragic house fire left her parents in the hospital. Her...
May 19, 2022
Dr. John MacMicking, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator and professor of immunobiology and microbial pathogenesis at Yale University School of Medicine, has been awarded the 2022 Graduate School of Medical Sciences Alumni Award of Distinction.
Since 1997, graduate school alumni have been recognized with this award for their outstanding contributions to biomedical research in education, focusing on science and scholarship, leadership, mentoring and teaching, and service to...
May 19, 2022
Dr. John Gallin ’69, the chief scientific officer for the National Institutes of Health Clinical Center, has been awarded the Weill Cornell Medical College Alumni Association Award of Distinction.
“This is a huge honor and really special,” said Dr. Gallin, who also serves as associate director for clinical research at NIH. “It was incredible to be able to go to medical school at Weill Cornell and be mentored to pursue a career of both patient care and research. And now to be recognized...
May 18, 2022
The Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences honored students in the Class of 2022 for their academic achievements during its convocation ceremony on May 18.
The ceremony recognized students who are graduating with their master’s degrees, as well as those who earned special awards and prizes for their accomplishments accomplishments in research, scholarship and service.
In addition to honoring students, the ceremony also recognized the 2022 Weill Cornell Graduate School...
April 29, 2022
Weill Cornell Medicine honored a dozen faculty, trainees, students and staff April 25 for their outstanding service and leadership in promoting diversity at the academic medical institution.
The annual Diversity Awards, this year hosted virtually, honor exemplary contributions through research, clinical care, community service and advocacy to improve the health of populations that historically have had unequal access to care. They also recognize excellence in mentorship and fostering...
March 18, 2022
Video of Match Day 2022 at Weill Cornell Medicine
Yuna Oh has called Weill Cornell Medicine home for the past five years, discovering a passion for dermatology through her medical studies, her professors and a year dedicated to research. On March 18, the 28-year-old graduating student was thrilled to discover that her journey with the institution will extend another four years, now as a dermatology resident at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center.
“I’ve always...
February 7, 2022
When Dr. Pradeep Ambrose, Ph.D. ’20, flew to Bermuda last fall to assist the island’s government in ramping up its COVID-19 testing, he had no idea his training at Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences would play such a significant role in the fight against the pandemic.
Dr. Ambrose was enlisted to help out at Bermuda’s sole COVID-testing laboratory in September 2021 through a friend who was aware of the island’s dire need for scientists. His studies at Weill Cornell...
February 4, 2022
Dr. Winston Price, M.D. ’74, a Georgia pediatrician and the president and chair of the National African American Drug Policy Coalition, has been named the National Medical Association’s 2021 Practitioner of the Year.
The annual award recognizes Black physicians who have made major contributions in support of the mission of the NMA, which advocates for the elimination of health disparities and the advancement of the art and science of medicine for people of African descent.
Dr....
February 1, 2022
Dr. Dakotah Lane, M.D. '13, and Dr. Cristina Toledo-Cornell, M.D. '13, have spent the pandemic partnering to reduce the toll of COVID-19 in one Native American tribal community, their efforts helping to minimize hospitalization and death and encourage high vaccination rates among the Lummi Nation of Northwest Washington State.
Dr. Lane, director of the tribe’s health clinic, and Dr. Toledo-Cornell, public health director of the Lummi Tribal Health Center until...
December 17, 2021
Building on their longtime commitment to social justice, equity and diversity, Louise and Leonard Riggio have made a $5.6 million gift to Weill Cornell Medicine to establish a named scholarship for medical students with financial need who are Black. This scholarship, which will be awarded as part of Weill Cornell Medicine’s debt-free scholarship program for all financially eligible medical students, will cover the full cost of attendance for all four years of medical school.
The...
November 19, 2021
Nursing homes acquired by private equity companies saw an increase in emergency room visits and hospitalizations among long-stay residents and an uptick in Medicare costs, according to a new study from Weill Cornell Medicine investigators. The findings, published Nov. 19 in JAMA Health Forum, suggest that quality of care declined when private equity firms took over the facilities.
“Our findings indicate that private equity firm-owned facilities offer lower quality long-term care,”...
August 27, 2021
When Dr. Sri Palanisamy (MD ’20) graduated from Weill Cornell Medicine in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, he, along with other recent graduates, worked virtually to assist in the community.
“New York City was the epicenter of the epicenter,” says Dr. Palanisamy. “At that time, there were a lot of different roles for students, such as data gathering and data reporting. Weill Cornell Medicine did a great job of protecting its students, by utilizing students in various ways that weren...
August 20, 2021
Video of Class of 2025 White Coat Ceremony Highlights | Weill Cornell Medicine
As a child, Noelle Desir, 23, suffered from severe eczema. She and her family tried everything to bring the skin condition under control, but without insurance, all they could do was visit the emergency room when she had a flare-up. Finally at age 12, her father, an immigrant from Haiti, secured health insurance for both of his daughters, making it possible for Noelle Desir to...
June 17, 2021
Video of We're Changing Medicine - Campaign Launch Event
NEW YORK (June 17, 2021) — Building on a legacy of groundbreaking advances in medicine and science, Weill Cornell Medicine today launched an ambitious $1.5 billion campaign—with more than $750 million already raised—that will harness emerging biomedical innovations to bring exemplary care to patients and create enduring change in medicine.
The We’re Changing Medicine campaign is the...
April 9, 2021
NEW YORK (April 9, 2021) — Dr. Katharine Hsu, an esteemed physician-scientist who specializes in immunology research and treatment of blood cancers, has been named director of the Tri-Institutional M.D.-Ph.D. Program, a joint program between Weill Cornell Medicine, The Rockefeller University and Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.
Founded in 1972, the Tri-Institutional M.D.-Ph.D. Program awards a medical degree from Weill Cornell...
March 19, 2021
Video of A Virtual Celebration for Match Day 2021 at Weill Cornell Medicine
For Rana Khan, earning a residency in obstetrics and gynecology at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center was more than just realizing a milestone in her medical education. Match Day was the culmination of a personal journey that transported Khan from medical student to cancer patient to future physician.
...
November 23, 2020
From left: Victor Metoyer III, Cecile Garcia, Marie Metoyer, MD '51, Eric Metoyer, Adrienne Metoyer Eng, and Stephen Metoyer (Cornell BA '71, JD '74)
The Reverend Eric Metoyer recently recalled a time as a young boy when riding in a rural country area of Vermont with his mother, Dr. Marie Metoyer (MD ’51), and his sister, Adrienne, they spotted a lone man walking on the shoulder.
“My mother recognized him as one of her community mental health patients and pulled over to chat...
September 4, 2020
During the height of the COVD-19 pandemic, Dr. Louise Wong, a Weill Cornell Medical College graduate of 2010, regularly drove from her home in Washington, D.C. to New York City to visit her mother, Xiao Wong, and be close to her ailing father, Kin Wong, who had been diagnosed with COVID-19 and hospitalized. Dr. Wong, a pediatrician with two toddler sons, felt confident that the institution where she received her medical education would take the best care of her father. Here, Dr. Wong tells the...
July 20, 2020
Dear Alumni, The Weill Cornell Medical College Alumni Association Board of Directors would like to take this moment to affirm the importance of letting science guide our response in the COVID-19 pandemic. We believe that in order for the United States to overcome COVID-19, we must comply with public health recommendations. Data-driven and evidence-based measures successfully flattened the curve in New York and elsewhere, preventing untold hospitalizations and deaths and preventing our health...
March 20, 2020
Video of A Virtual Celebration for Match Day 2020 at Weill Cornell Medicine
National Match Day is a milestone moment for graduating medical students, during which they learn where they will spend the next three to seven years completing their internship and residency training. And while the annual rite had a different tenor this year, the COVID-...
March 4, 2020
Video of Weill Cornell Medicine Honors Dr. Barbara Hempstead
Dr. Barbara Hempstead, dean of the Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences, has been awarded Weill Cornell Medicine’s Joan and Sanford I. Weill Exemplary Achievement Award.
The Weill Award was established in 2018 to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the medical college’s renaming in honor of the...
January 6, 2020
Weill Cornell Medicine scientists have built the first global database of clinical trials testing a rapidly expanding approach to cancer treatment that involves genetically modifying immune cells to recognize specific targets on a patient’s cancer cells and attack them. By analyzing the approach, called chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) therapies, the scientists designed a “therapeutic roadmap” that identifies all current therapies as well as additional cancers that can be treated with them....
December 30, 2019
Medical schools evaluating the merits of eliminating tuition, as opposed to pursuing debt-free initiatives, should approach the debate in the same way physicians and scientists engage in medicine: with empirical data, according to new commentary by leaders at Weill Cornell Medicine.
The paper, published online Dec. 31 in the Annals of Internal Medicine, lauds...
December 18, 2019
Dr. Yoon Kang, an esteemed medical educator, has been appointed senior associate dean for medical education at Weill Cornell Medicine, effective Dec. 9.
Dr. Kang will lead Weill Cornell Medicine’s Office of Medical Education, driving new advances in the curriculum of the top-10 ranked institution to ensure that outstanding cadres of diverse, aspiring physicians receive the finest training. She will employ modern learning techniques and...
December 2, 2019
Dr. Mildred Rust, a graduate of Weill Cornell Medical College’s class of 1956, doesn’t often attend Weill Cornell Medicine events, but says it was important that she attend the first-ever National Conference on Medical Student Mental Health and Well-Being. Over the course of two days in September, the symposium drew more than 350 medical school students, educators and researchers who met at the Grand Hyatt in New York City to address the increasing rates of psychological distress among...
November 26, 2019
A new technology developed by Weill Cornell Medicine and Max Planck Institute for Medical Research scientists allows the controlled, on-and-off “switching” of neural receptors with unprecedented efficiency and precision. The technology is likely to be widely adopted for studying these receptors and their links to behavior, and potentially will enable the development of better drugs for treating depression,...
November 5, 2019
As chief of the Limb Lengthening and Complex Reconstruction Service at the Hospital for Special Surgery, Dr. S. Robert Rozbruch (MD '90) really gets to know his patients and their families. Treatment for their conditions often involves multiple surgeries and follow-up appointments over the course of several years. But his relationship with patient Amber Hamilton, WCM class of 2022, takes on new life as he mentors her through her orthopedic surgery residency.
Hamilton was born with X-...
November 4, 2019
A protein that breast, lung and other cancers use to promote their spread—or metastasis—to the brain, has been identified by a team led by Weill Cornell Medicine and New York-Presbyterian investigators. The protein, CEMIP, will now be a focus of efforts to predict, prevent and treat brain metastases, which are a frequent cause of cancer deaths.
In their study, published Nov. 4 in Nature Cell Biology, the scientists found...
October 29, 2019
Dr. Randy Longman, an accomplished physician-scientist, has been appointed director of the Jill Roberts Center for Inflammatory Bowel Disease at Weill Cornell Medicine and NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center.
Under Dr. Longman’s leadership, the Roberts Center is expanding its clinical services offered by Weill Cornell Medicine and NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center. The center’s physicians are continuing to...
October 25, 2019
Members of the Weill Cornell Medicine community gathered on Oct. 25 in Griffis Faculty Club to celebrate the unveiling of a set of paintings depicting four icons of diversity and inclusion efforts at the institution. Dr. Daniel Laroche, M.D. ’92, his wife Marjorie Laroche and his cousin Marie Claude Brutus commissioned the paintings from the Haitian artist Junior Jacques to recognize the seminal contributions of Drs. James Curtis, Elizabeth Wilson-Anstey, Bruce Ballard, and Carlyle Miller, M...
October 24, 2019
In many ways, A.J. Henwood is a typical seven-year old. He loves his family, nurtures big dreams of playing professional baseball and has a penchant for bringing home stray animals. Aside from slightly imperfect vision and some occasional pain in his left leg, he has always led an ordinary life—which is why his diagnosis came as such a shock. During an eye exam in March 2018, an ophthalmologist saw a freckle-like spot on A.J.’s retina. That, combined with some irregular pigmentation on his...
October 23, 2019
New cellular and molecular processes underlying communication between gut microbes and brain cells have been described for the first time by scientists at Weill Cornell Medicine and Cornell’s Ithaca campus.
Over the last two decades, scientists have observed a clear link between autoimmune disorders and a variety of psychiatric conditions. For example, people with autoimmune disorders such as inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), psoriasis and multiple sclerosis may also have depleted gut...
October 18, 2019
Gary George just started his third year of medical school at Weill Cornell Medicine, but he’s already constantly on the go. When not in his clinical rotation, he’s meeting up with fellow classmates before setting aside time to get work done outside the hospital. He said he was always frustrated in past years by the lack of space dedicated to study groups, student activities or even a place to just grab a quick bite to eat in between.
That’s why he was excited to be at the unveiling of...
September 27, 2019
Turning a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) procedure into an entertaining superhero adventure helps prepare young children for the test and reduces the need for sedation, according to new research by investigators at Weill Cornell Medicine and NewYork-Presbyterian.
The MRI-am-a-Hero kit includes a one-of-a-kind comic book, cape, Captain America and Iron Man plush toys, an educational DVD and a mini-model of a Siemens Healthineers MRI scanner.
...
September 27, 2019
Dr. Augustine M.K. Choi, the Stephen and Suzanne Weiss Dean of Weill Cornell Medicine, opened the first-ever National Conference on Medical Student Mental Health and Well-Being with a call to action.
“Arguably, medicine is the most noble profession, and we have to intervene so we’re not placing so much stress on our students and preventing them from becoming the best doctors they can be,” said Dr. Choi, as he stood in front of an audience of more than 350 medical school educators,...
September 16, 2019
Video of Medical Student Scholarship Announcement Highlights | Weill Cornell Medicine
Weill Cornell Medicine medical students react to the institution's scholarship announcement on Sept. 16. Credit: Ashley Jones
Watch a video of the full announcement here.
September 11, 2019
Cornell Tech and Weill Cornell Medicine have been awarded a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) grant that will fund interdisciplinary research on the role of technology among home health aides caring for adults with heart failure.
The two-year $358,636 grant, is part of an RWJF initiative exploring how technology’s impact on infrastructure could help or hinder efforts to improve health equity in the United States.
Dr....
September 11, 2019
These days, everyone seems to be talking about stress, burnout and wellness. Nowhere is this more a topic of conversation than in medical schools, and for good reason: medical students face unique stresses and suffer from higher rates of depression than their age-matched peers. For example, it’s estimated that up to 27% of medical students experience clinically significant depression, compared to nine percent among 18- to 25-year-olds in the general population.
What makes medical...
August 29, 2019
Medical conditions and health habits that affect blood flow in the brain—or cerebrovascular risk factors—are associated with a subsequent diagnosis of Parkinson’s disease, according to a new study from Weill Cornell Medicine and NewYork-Presbyterian investigators.
The findings, published Aug. 29 in the Annals of Neurology, opens the door to investigating whether better management of cerebrovascular risk factors...
August 22, 2019
Indrani Guzman Das discovered a passion for medicine through her parents: her mom a nurse, her dad a doctor. They instilled in her the importance of giving back to the community and modeled healthcare delivery as one way to achieve that.
Guzman Das, 25, of New York City, also saw patient care first-hand. She lost her mom to cancer when she was 14, and her dad had a stroke while she was in college that forced him into early retirement. That experience—coupled with her very first job as...
July 31, 2019
Chemical modifications that appear on some RNA transcripts may have evolved in part to help cells repair themselves after damage, and may also be a key to understanding important human diseases, according to new research from scientists at Weill Cornell Medicine and Cornell’s Ithaca campus.
Modifications called N6–methyladenosine, or m6A marks, are made by enzymes on the RNA transcripts of some human genes under certain conditions, but the functions of these marks have been largely...
July 23, 2019
NewYork-Presbyterian and Weill Cornell Medicine have received a grant for more than $2 million from the New York State Office of Victims Services to sustain and grow an innovative emergency department-based program that improves care for victims of elder abuse. The funds will support the Vulnerable Elder Protection Team (VEPT), primarily based at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center’s emergency department.
Dr. Rahul Sharma
July 17, 2019
By Alexandra Bond
Dr. Ricardo Rosenkranz is a successful professional magician—but one of his greatest feats is giving medical students valuable insights into the doctor-patient relationship. For the past decade, Dr. Rosenkranz M.D. '90—a neonatologist and assistant professor of clinical pediatrics at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine—has tapped his prestidigitation skills to teach a course he designed entitled Medicine and Magic. Offered to first- and second-years and...
May 31, 2019
Dr. Allan Ropper with Dr. Augustine M.K. Choi and Dr. Natasha I. Leibel, M.D. ’98, president of the Weill Cornell Medical College Alumni Association.
Dr. Allan Ropper, M.D. ’74, the Raymond D. Adams Master Clinician and executive vice chairman of the Department of Neurology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, has been awarded the Weill Cornell Medicine Alumni Association Award of Distinction.
The award, which was established in 1949, is presented each year to a Weill Cornell Medical...
May 31, 2019
Dr. Katharine Hsu and Dr. Barbara Hempstead. Credit: Studio Brooke
Dr. Katharine Hsu, M.D. ’94, Ph.D. ’93, professor of medicine and attending physician at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, has been awarded the Weill Cornell Graduate School Alumni Award of Distinction.
Since 1997, graduate school alumni have been recognized with this award for their outstanding contributions to biomedical research in education, focusing on science and scholarship, leadership, mentoring and...
December 10, 2018
A recent scholarship endowment has been made in honor of Dr. Mervin G. Olinger (MD ’43). Dr. Olinger graduated from Cornell University in 1939 and was a member of the Phi Beta Kappa National Honor Society and an accomplished pole vaulter, earning his letter and participating in the Penn Relays. He received a medical degree from Weill Cornell Medical College in 1943, where he was a member of Alpha Omega Alpha Honor Medical Society.
Dr. Mervin and Renee Olinger...
December 10, 2018
With a $7.5 million gift from the Friedman Family Foundation, endowed by Stephen and Vice Chair Overseer Barbara Friedman, Weill Cornell Medicine has established an innovative cross-campus center dedicated to improving human health through research in the complex relationship between nutrition, inflammation and the development of disease.
The Friedman Center for Nutrition and Inflammation will create new programs across Weill Cornell Medicine and Cornell’s Ithaca campus, harnessing key...
December 10, 2018
In Sight: Dr. Schwartz doing an exam at the main clinic in Riobamba, the capital of Ecuador’s Chimborazo Province. Photo provided.
Two years ago, in a remote region of Ecuador, ophthalmologist Dr. Elwin Schwartz, MD ’76, helped give a six-year-old girl the gift of sight. The child had been blind since birth because of a clouding in the lens of her eyes, known as congenital cataracts; Dr. Schwartz and a colleague performed a 15-minute surgery that reversed the condition. “Within a...
December 10, 2018
For most of his life, Vishal Patel wanted to be a teacher. But midway through college, he discovered a love for medicine and realized he could combine those two passions by becoming a physician. That journey reached a milestone on May 31 with Dr. Patel’s graduation from Weill Cornell Medical College in front of his family—12 members in all—who celebrated his crossing Carnegie Hall’s iconic stage by brandishing large cardboard cutouts of his face.
Soon, Dr. Patel will head back to his...
June 4, 2018
Dean Augustine M.K. Choi and Dr. Stuart Mushlin MD'73, president of the Weill Cornell Medicine Alumni Association, join Dr. Thomas Lee as he accepts his award on May 30. Photo credit: Studio Brooke
Dr. Thomas Lee, MD ’79, chief medical officer of Press Ganey Associates Inc. and a member of the Weill Cornell Medicine Board of Overseers, has been awarded the Weill Cornell Medicine Alumni Association Award of Distinction.
Established in 1949, the accolade is presented annually in...
June 4, 2018
Dr. Janet Braam accepting her award from Dr. Carl Nathan, dean of the Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences, on May 30. Photo credit: Studio Brooke.
Dr. Janet Braam, PhD ’85, chair of the department of biosciences at Rice University in Houston, has been awarded the Weill Cornell Graduate School Distinguished Alumnus award.
Established in 1997, the award recognizes outstanding contributions to biomedical research in education, focusing on science and scholarship,...
April 27, 2018
Dr. Gunisha Kaur, B.S. ’06, M.D. ’10, understands first-hand what it means to be a refugee: Some 30 years ago, she and her family came to the United States as refugees, escaping political violence in India. Now an anesthesiologist and human rights researcher, Dr. Kaur is training the next generation of physicians on how to treat foreign-born patients.
“When people ask me why I’ve stayed in the Cornell system as...
April 5, 2018
Dr. Grace Sun. Photo credit: John AbbottIn college, I wasn’t certain that I wanted to become a physician. But as a Peace Corps volunteer, I worked as a community health promoter in a small village in Nicaragua and realized that I could have a real impact on people’s lives. One of the main reasons I chose Weill Cornell Medical College was its strong global health program, and that remains a big part of what I do. Worldwide, there are about 37 million people who are blind—who can’t see the big ‘E...
March 6, 2018
Dr. Joseph Heitman. Photo credit: Megan Mendenhall, Duke Photography
As a student in the Tri-Institutional MD-PhD program, Dr. Joseph Heitman, MD ’92, was thrilled to be training as a physician-scientist—someone who would be, as he puts it, an “ambassador” to bridge the sometimes disparate worlds of medicine and basic research. Yet in 1989, with his...
February 6, 2018
Dr. Kevin O’Rourke. Photo credit: John Abbott
Many successful researchers cite the influence of a mentor who inspired and advised them—and that’s especially true for Dr. Kevin O’Rourke, PhD ’17. Even though he’s still an MD-PhD student, Dr. O’Rourke cites numerous people who have helped guide him on his path. They include an AP biology teacher at his Massachusetts boarding school who sparked his interest in science; a Harvard geneticist who let him shadow her for two days, showing how...
June 1, 2017
Established in 1949, the annual Weill Cornell Medical College Alumni Association (WCMCAA) Award of Distinction recognizes an alumnus/a who has demonstrated exceptional achievement in academic medicine, in the areas of education, research, or patient care, and who has brought honor and acclaim to the Medical College. This year's recipient, Michael Scheld, MD, Class of 1973, perfectly embodies the spirit, character, and qualities of this prestigious award. Dr. Scheld is currently the Bayer-Gerald...
May 8, 2017
Dr. Carol Storey-Johnson, senior advisor for medical education and a professor of medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine, has won the 2017 Distinguished Educator Award from the Northeast Group on Educational Affairs (NEGEA).
The NEGEA is a regional group of the Association of American Medical Colleges’...
April 24, 2017
Dr. Rees Pritchett, a consummate physician who spent seven decades at our medical center as a student, resident, and faculty member, died on March 27, 2017. He was 93.
Dr. Pritchett entered medical school in 1944 and remained strongly tied to what is now known as NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center for the rest of his life. After graduating from Weill Cornell Medical College in 1948, he became a cardiac resident at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, living in a small six-...
January 23, 2017
The Medical Center Archives of NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell is pleased to present an 1300 York Avenue Lobby Exhibit: “We Heard the Call” Our Doctors and Nurses in World War I
This exhibit celebrates the 100th anniversary of our doctors and nurses affiliated with The New York Hospital, Cornell University Medical College, and New York Hospital Training School for Nurses service in World War I. 417 (260 were CUMC alumni) doctors, 201 nurses, and 29 Bloomingdale Hospital...
January 17, 2017
Dr. Augustine M.K. Choi, an internationally renowned physician-scientist in the field of lung disease, has been named the Stephen and Suzanne Weiss Dean of Weill Cornell Medicine and Cornell University’s provost for medical affairs. Choi has served as interim dean of Weill Cornell...
December 19, 2016
Dr. Henry Heimlich B.S. ’41, M.D. '43, who developed the famous Heimlich maneuver, died Saturday morning of a heart attack in Cincinnati. He was 96.
Heimlich received his bachelor’s degree from Cornell University in 1941 and his M.D. from Weill Cornell Medical College in 1943.
Before the invention of the Heimlich maneuver, it was widely believed that slapping a choking victim’s back would save his life, but this action actually lodges the blockage deeper in...
December 13, 2016
Patients with depression can be categorized into four unique subtypes defined by distinct patterns of abnormal connectivity in the brain, according to new research from Weill Cornell Medicine.
In a collaborative study published Dec. 5 in Nature Medicine, Conor Liston, MD '08, an assistant professor of neuroscience in the Feil Family Brain and Mind Institute and an assistant professor of psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medicine, has identified biomarkers in depression...
December 12, 2016
Alumni Welcome New Students to Campus (page 2)
Alumni Giving at Weill Cornell Medicine (page 4)
Alumni News (page 42)
Alumni in Memoriam (...
December 2, 2016
Natasha Leibel, MD ’98, looks back to her time at Weill Cornell Medicine with fondness – especially since that was where she met her husband, Harlan Levine, MD ’98.
When Dr. Leibel and Dr. Levine graduated from medical school, they were fortunate enough to not have to worry about paying off a tremendous amount of debt. But they knew that many aspiring doctors could not afford the same luxury, and so they decided to create the Harlan B. Levine, MD ’98 and Natasha I. Leibel, MD ’98...
November 30, 2016
Every other fall, hundreds of Weill Cornell Medicine alumni fill the halls of 1300 York Avenue for their class reunion. They’re there to reconnect with friends, visit their old stomping grounds and learn about some of the latest advances in medicine from their colleagues. The energy and excitement at the Reunion events are palpable – these former students are back where it all began, where they learned the skills to become some of the finest physicians in the country and where they first...
November 28, 2016
For John Zebala, MD ’93, PhD ’92, the years he spent training to become a physician-scientist at Weill Cornell Medicine were some of the most enjoyable and transformative years of his life. “I had the freedom to find my life passions as an inventor and biomedical entrepreneur. All of the business and personal successes I have achieved today would never have been possible without the MD-PhD program,” Dr. Zebala says.
Dr. Zebala was inspired to make a $25,000 gift to the Olaf S. Andersen...
November 15, 2016
On August 18th, the Weill Cornell Medical College Alumni Association hosted its third annual Alumni and Students Reception during new student orientation week. The event was a wonderful opportunity to introduce the next generation of Weill Cornell Medicine physicians to the alumni network and welcome them to campus. The Alumni Association was pleased to have an excellent turnout from the Class of 2020, as well as a number of alumni and faculty who welcomed this newest group of Weill Cornell...
November 14, 2016
The Cornell University Board of Trustees today unanimously elected Martha E. Pollack, provost and executive vice president for academic affairs at the University of Michigan, Cornell’s 14th president. Pollack will assume the presidency April 17, 2017.
The board’s vote followed the selection of Pollack by a Presidential Search Committee that was formed in April 2016 following the death on March 6 of President Elizabeth Garrett....
October 14, 2016
We are excited to announce the following alumni were elected to serve on the...
October 6, 2016
As a star high school football player, Dr. Leonard Girardi considered a college athletic career. Instead, he chose to practice cardiothoracic surgery at Weill Cornell Medicine, where his team in the operating room must be on their game every day to ensure each patient's surgery is a success.
"Athletes love working in a team environment," said ...
September 30, 2016
During Reunion 2016, Anthony Fauci, MD '66 was interviewed by Michael Specter of The New Yorker about his remarkable career and the vital contributions he has made to the discovery and treatment of infectious diseases worldwide.
Following his intervew, Dr. Fauci was surprised by a fellow alumnus who obtained letters from former President Bill Clinton and George W. Bush congratulating him on his 50th Reunion with Weill Cornell Medicine!
As Director of the National Institute of...
September 30, 2016
Congratulations to Dr. Tony Rosen, MD ’10, who was recently awarded the Paul B. Beeson Emerging Leaders Career Development Award in Aging (K76) for his groundbreaking research to recognize elder abuse. Dr. Rosen completed medical school and his residency at Weill Cornell Medicine, and is now an Emergency Medicine faculty member.
The Paul B. Beeson Emerging Leaders Career Development Award in Aging is a competitive $800K grant sponsored by the National Institute on Aging intended to...
September 16, 2016
Raul Martinez-McFaline, Fifth Year MD-PhD student in the laboratory of Dr. Yariv Houvras at Weill Cornell Medicine, has been awarded an F31 Fellowship from the NCI to investigate the role of histone 3 lysine 9 (H3K9) methyltransferases in melanoma. The project aims to evaluate the effects of aberrant H3K9 methyltransferase activity using a transgenic zebrafish melanoma model and human melanoma cell lines....
July 27, 2016
Video of We Are Weill Cornell Medicine : Dr. Silvia Formenti
Oncologist Dr. Silvia Formenti has spent her career in medicine fighting for those with incurable diseases. At Weill Cornell Medicine, she leads a team of daring, passionate scientists, who are relentless in their search for a cure for cancer.
"Most patients really want a doctor who is a partner, and there's an immediate connection once they sense your passion," said Dr. Formenti, chair of the Department of...
July 26, 2016
Video of We Are Weill Cornell Medicine : Dr. Randy Longman
At Weill Cornell Medicine, people are the heart and soul of our institution. Our faculty and staff — the physicians, scientists, and administrators who work so hard every day to fulfill our mission to care for patients, discover innovative cures and treatments, and teach the next generation of physicians — make us who we are.
In the coming months, in words, photos and videos, we will celebrate this community and its...
July 25, 2016
Alumni are invited back to campus on Friday, September 23, and Saturday, September 24 for Reunion 2016! Whether you graduated 5 or 65 years ago, the biennial Reunion Weekend provides an ideal setting for reconnecting with old friends and reminiscing with classmates.
There is only one week left of early bird registration! After July 31, the cost will increase from $65 to $90. Find more information about Reunion 2016 and register here.
February 25, 2016
Dr. Paul N. Casale has been appointed executive director of NewYork Quality Care, the Accountable Care Organization (ACO) of NewYork-Presbyterian, Columbia and Weill Cornell Medicine. He joins the ACO from Lancaster General Health/Penn Medicine, where he served as chief of the Division of Cardiology and medical director of quality.
