Stephen G. Schwartz, M.D., M.B.A., associate professor of clinical ophthalmology and medical director of Bascom Palmer Eye Institute at Naples, was installed as president of the Florida Society of Ophthalmology. The organization represents more than 500 physicians across the state and provides continuing medical education for physicians and other health care professionals.

M. Ross Bullock, M.D., Ph.D., professor of neurological surgery and director of clinical neurotrauma, is the new president-elect of the National Neurotrauma Society and will organize the 2011 national meeting to be held in South Florida. Helen M. Bramlett, Ph.D., associate professor of neurological surgery, is now vice president-elect of the organization and Coleen Atkins, Ph.D., assistant professor of neurological surgery, is the new secretary/treasurer-elect.

Sonjia Kenya, Ed.D., M.S., M.A., assistant professor of family medicine and health disparities program director at the Jay Weiss Center for Social Medicine and Health Equity, represented the Miller School at a Medical College Roundtable hosted by the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Held in Atlanta, the May 23-24 gathering of deans and administrative officers of medical schools was designed to foster greater collaboration on health disparities and related workforce development issues.

Daniel Lichtstein, M.D., professor of medicine, regional dean (interim) and senior associate regional dean for medical education, and Matthias Salathe, M.D., professor of medicine and chief of the Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine, served as external examiners June 20-24 for medical students who were completing their seventh and final year at Kuwait University's Health Sciences Center. Drs. Lichtstein and Salathe were invited to conduct the practical exams that tested clinical skills and medical knowledge of the medical students by Fuad Hasan, M.D., dean of Kuwait University's department of medicine and a former internal medicine resident at Jackson Memorial Hospital.

Ross J. Scalese, M.D., associate professor of medicine and assistant director of the Research and Technology Division at the Gordon Center for Research in Medical Education, recently traveled to Ottawa to work with The Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada during the college's internal medicine oral board certification examinations.

W. Dalton Dietrich, Ph.D., scientific director of The Miami Project to Cure Paralysis, is the principal investigator on a $2.1 million grant from the U.S. Department of Defense to study Schwann cell implantation for spinal cord injury repair, including optimization of dosing, long-term cell persistence and the evaluation of toxicity and tumorigenicity. Mary Bartlett Bunge, Ph.D, professor of cell biology and anatomy, neurological surgery and surgery, James D. Guest, M.D., Ph.D., associate professor of neurological surgery, and Damien D. Pearse, Ph.D., associate professor of neurological surgery, also are investigators on the grant.

Mark S. Nash, Ph.D., professor of neurological surgery, rehabilitation medicine and physical therapy, has been awarded a $1.9 million grant from the U.S. Department of Defense to conduct a diabetes prevention trial in people with chronic spinal cord injury. The grant was part of the Congressionally Directed Medical Research Program, and will be conducted with partners at the Shepherd Center and the Veterans Affairs Medical Centers in Miami and Atlanta.

Angelique S.C. Grant, Ph.D., executive director of major gifts, has been selected for a Fulbright award from the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board. As a grant recipient, she will participate in the 2010 Fulbright Seminar for U.S. Administrators in International Education conducted by the Fulbright Commission in Berlin, Germany, in October. Fulbright grantees help foster mutual understanding between Americans and people of the more than 150 countries that participate in the program.

James D. Guest, M.D., Ph.D., associate professor of neurological surgery, was an invited speaker at the Global Stem Cell Blueprint Conference in Toronto and presented Clinical Spinal Cord Injury Researcher Perspective: Challenges In Translating Basic Science Discoveries Into Spinal Cord Injury Clinical Trials. He also was a moderator of the Government-Regular Perspective section of the conference on the topic of Regulation of Stem Cells.

Helen M. Bramlett, Ph.D., associate professor of neurological surgery, spoke at the 5th Pannonian Symposium on Central Nervous System Injury held in Pécs, Hungary. Dr. Bramlett spoke on Posttraumatic Epilepsy Following Experimental Traumatic Brain Injury: Mechanisms and Treatment.