Sixteen years ago, when Dr. Elizabeth Bell Odom Carr received her dental hygienist degree from the University of Mississippi School of Health Related Professions, she fully expected to begin a long career in private practice.

No way - no way - did she consider she would end up as a teacher. But, she really should have seen it coming.

“It seems like everyone in my family is an educator,” said Carr, who grew up in Cleveland, Miss. “I come from a long line of teachers, and even though I chose a career in the medical field, it's pretty funny that I still turned out to be a teacher.”

Carr, an associate professor in dental hygiene at SHRP who also received a doctorate of health administration from the school, was recognized as the 2016 SHRP Alumnus of the Year during the school's Alumni Day and Continuing Education event held Friday, April 1 on the University of Mississippi Medical Center campus.

The event serves not only as a reunion for all SHRP alumni, but also provides a wide variety of interdisciplinary continuing education sessions. This year's speakers included experts from UMMC and state government presenting topics on ethics in health care, data-driven decision making, and Medicaid fraud.

Sybil Cumberland entered the world at a healthy 7 pounds, 5 ounces, but unbeknown to her family and physicians, she arrived with a broken heart.

The first sign of trouble: Sybil didn't take her first breath until several minutes after birth. “They put her on a CPAP immediately,” remembers her mother, Tara Cumberland of Brandon.

Still, Sybil had a healthy weight, so she went home after two and a half weeks in a neonatal intensive care unit. Day by day, she grew weaker.

Fast-forward three years, past coming to Batson Children's Hospital and two surgeries there, and Sybil is now an active little girl who loves dancing, soccer and tee-ball. She'll get to take the field on a larger diamond April 30 at Trustmark Park when she's Ambassador of the local March of Dimes March for Babies, where event participants hope to raise $500,000.

“I've always said, anything I can do for Batson Children's Hospital and for the March of Dimes, I'll do. I want to give back,” said Tara Cumberland. “We were nominated to be the 2016 ambassadors for the March of Dimes March for Babies, and I thought, 'Wow, that may be how we're supposed to give back.'”

Since 2009, Dr. Satya Packianathan has helped heal University of Mississippi Medical Center patients coping with thoracic and gastrointestinal tumors.

But Dr. Pack, as his patients and colleagues call him, offers them more than his medical expertise. He hand-crafts lamps and places them around the Department of Radiation Oncology and its clinic at the Jackson Medical Mall so that patients can take solace in their whimsical beauty.

His hobby isn't unusual, seeing that Packianathan, an assistant professor of radiation/oncology, worked as an electrical technician in his native Malaysia before beginning his medical education.

The Medical Center is proud to announce the following additions to its faculty and leadership staff.

A staff nurse anesthetist accepts a national political award, while a UM pharmacy student is among 12 recipients of ASHP's leadership prize.