Cardiovascular disease risk models built using majority-white populations also work well for African-Americans, say recent findings from the University of Mississippi Medical Center and the Jackson Heart Study.

Dr. Ervin Fox, cardiologist, professor of medicine and Jackson Heart Study (JHS) senior investigator is lead author on the paper, published in the inaugural issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) Cardiology.

“We want to make sure that whatever risk calculator we use applies to an African-American cohort,” Fox said.

The Framingham Risk Score (FRS) and newer American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association pooled cohort risk equations (PCEs) are the current standards for determining coronary heart disease (CHD) risk. They include factors such as age, blood pressure, diabetes, cholesterol and smoking.

Phyllis Hamberlin of Vicksburg knows others set the foundation for the therapy she receives today for myeloma, a cancer of the plasma cells.

Now, she's doing the same: participating in a clinical trial that her doctor at UMMC hopes will improve this therapy for her and for others.

“It's been working for us,” she said recently. For this trial she had an additional incentive: It helps pay for some of her medications. 

“In a good clinical trial, you try to find a good standard of care and add something to it,” said Dr. Tondre Buck, a hematologist/oncologist at UMMC and Hamberlin's primary physician. “You wouldn't have gotten to the standard of care without clinical trials.”

Clinical trials are crucial in getting the latest research into clinics where they can make a difference in human lives, said Dr. Tate Thigpen, head of the UMMC Division of Hematology/Oncology. Trials such as the one Hamberlin entered help refine treatment recommendations, he said.

Going to medical school just because you have brains is like running a marathon just because you have muscles.

Without motivation and desire, you'll probably collapse long before the finish line.

No one knows this better than members of UMMC's School of Medicine Class of 2016, who reach a personal and professional milestone on Friday: Residency Match Day.

Starting at 11 a.m. in Jackson's Thalia Mara Hall, the ubiquitous medical school ritual reveals to these imminent graduates where they'll spend the next several years of their lives as they train for a specialty.

Among them are Nicholas Chamberlain, and a married couple, Eden and Sam Yelverton: three future residents whose inspiration to earn an M.D. at one time lay buried under layers of self-doubt or denial or lack of dedication.

No one would question their commitment now.

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

The Division of Orthotics and Prosthetics achieves valuable certification, a longtime pediatric surgeon garners a singular honor and radiologic sciences and dentistry students make waves nationally.