Division News

John W. Williams, MD, MHSc, is the subject of this week’s faculty spotlight. In this interview, Williams talks about directing the Durham VA Evidence Synthesis Center, implementing mental health care into patient-centered medical homes, the 1989 SGIM Conference in New Orleans and hiking Mount Kilimanjaro.

How long have you been at Duke? How long have you been at the division of General Internal Medicine?
I came to Duke as a fellow in 1988, left at the end of 1991 for a faculty position in San Antonio, and returned to the division in July of 2001.

Nicaragua, a country of more than six million people, has just five palliative care specialists to its name. Megan Jordan, MD, hopes to change that. In the two years she has been at the division of General Internal Medicine, Jordan has been visiting the country every six months to broaden education, help train health care providers, and even explain the concept of palliative care.

George Jackson, MD, MHA (left), and John W. Williams, Jr., MD, MHSc (right), wrote an invited commentary on the benefits of patient-centered medical homes (PCMH) for the latest issue of JAMA Internal Medicine.

In addition to working at Duke Medicine’s Sutton Station Internal Medicine Clinic, Ronald Halbrooks, MD, consulting associate in the Department of Medicine, has practiced medicine on three continents.

Rowena Dolor, MD, is the co-author of a meta-analysis examining the effects of therapies for intermittent claudication. Published in a recent issue of Clinical Cardiology, the study examined the evidence for the benefits of supervised exercise, revascularization, and medical therapy for the condition, which causes cramping, pain, and fatigue in the legs at irregular intervals.

This year will mark the 30th year since Eugene Oddone, MD, MHS began his residency at Duke. In this week’s faculty spotlight, he talks about how internal medicine has changed over the past three decades, overseeing more than 100 research projects at the COIN at the Durham VAMC, and his loves of Habitat for Humanity, mysteries, and downhill skiing.

Jennifer Gierisch, PhD, MPH, was a co-author of a major new systematic review and meta-analysis examining associations between smoking and acute pancreatitis.

Jason A. Webb, MD talks about providing an integrated approach to palliative care and psychiatry, his travels through Kenya, and his home life as a father, green thumb and poet.

Three of the nation’s largest philanthropies – the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and the Simons Foundation – have announced a new partnership to provide much needed research support to outstanding early-career scientists in the United States.

Through the new Faculty Scholars Program, the philanthropies will invest a total of $148 million in research support over the program’s first five years.

James A. Tulsky, MD, chief of Duke Palliative Care and professor of medicine and nursing, has accepted a position as chair of the Department of Psychosocial Oncology and Palliative Care at Dana Farber Cancer Institute. He will continue to work at Duke until July 3, before assuming the new position on Sept. 1.