Transplant program, VC emeritus among recent UMMC award winners, achievers

Transplant program earns Top 50 national ranking

In its annual ranking of the 50 most active kidney transplant centers, Nephrology News and Issues places UMMC’s Organ Transplant Program at No. 42 with 146 kidney transplants during 2016.

The top-ranked program at the University of California Davis Medical Center transplanted 402 kidneys last year.

The rankings have been published by Nephrology News since 2009. Data is acquired from the United Network for Organ Sharing’s Organ Procurement and Transplant Network. It includes deceased and living donor kidney and kidney/pancreas transplants.

ABN names UMMC nursing professor president-elect

The Association of Black Nursing Faculty has selected Dr. Audwin B. Fletcher, professor of nursing, as its president-elect. Fletcher will serve through 2018.

The ABNF, a group of black professional nurses with similar credentials, interests and concerns, promotes health-related issues and educational interests for the benefit of the black community. Its vision is to reduce health care disparities among minority communities by contributing to the global scholarly discourse, and its mission is to promote and widely disseminate the research and other scholarly works of minority nurse academicians.

A School of Nursing alum, Fletcher has served as a family nurse practitioner in the school’s nurse-managed UNACARE Family Health Clinic since receiving his M.S.N. in 1998. He earned his Ph.D. at the School of Health Related Professions in 2003.

Fletcher teaches in the Master of Science in Nursing program and serves as director of the Acute Care Adult-Gerontology and Family Nurse Practitioner tracks. He served as the school’s director of multicultural affairs for more than three years.

 
Family Medicine faculty’s presentation makes big Impact

A presentation by Dr. Molly S. Clark, associate professor of family medicine, and Dr. Jeff Sternlieb, a psychologist and family systems associate in the Lehigh Valley Health Network, “Boundaries, Dilemmas and Awareness,” was selected for an Impact Award by the Forum for Behavioral Science in Family Medicine.

The award recognizes outstanding Forum presentations that advance the manner in which behavioral science educators teach and practice behavioral science in medical education. The award is based on exemplary professional, scholarly and academic criteria, including the ability to clearly develop a presentation, effectively communicate with attendees and produce a tangible effect on the teaching practices of colleagues.

Clark and Sternlieb will be recognized at a Forum luncheon Sept. 25.

VC emeritus named to top Ole Miss alumni list

The Ole Miss Alumni Association will honor Dr. James E. Keeton, vice chancellor emeritus for health affairs and dean emeritus of the School of Medicine, and four other distinguished alumni by inducting them into the Ole Miss Hall of Fame during the school’s Homecoming this fall.

Created in 1974, the award is the highest annual honor presented by the association. Recipients are select alumni who have made an outstanding contribution to their country, state or the University of Mississippi through good deeds, services or contributions that have perpetuated the good name of Ole Miss.

Keeton will be inducted along with Don Fruge, Walton Gresham III, Tom Papa and Mary Sharp Rayner. A reception is scheduled for 6 p.m. Friday, Oct. 13, in the Gertrude C. Ford Ballroom at the Inn at Ole Miss, with a dinner to follow at 7. For information about attending the dinner, call (662) 915-7375 before Friday, Sept. 29.

Professor of surgery and pediatrics, Keeton served as vice chancellor for health affairs and dean of the School of Medicine from 2009-15. During his tenure, he oversaw planning of and secured funding for the new School of Medicine building and was instrumental in planning the construction of the University Heart Center, the Translational Research Center and a major expansion of the Batson Children’s Hospital.