Quiet Donors of MED’s Largest-Ever Gift Step Forward: $10.5M for the Dahod Breast Cancer Research Center

In August 2008, a Boston University School of Medicine alumna pledged $10.5 million to her school — the largest gift in its history. But she chose to remain anonymous.

Now, more than a year and a half later, University Overseer Shamim Dahod (CGS’76, CAS’78, MED’87) and her husband, Ashraf, are putting a face — or more accurately, two faces — on their contribution, which will establish the Shamim and Ashraf Dahod Breast Cancer Research Center at the School of Medicine. The gift will also endow assistant professor and international scholar positions at the center and support MED’s new residence hall.

Dr. Jonathan Woodson nominated by President Barack Obama to be assistant secretary of defense for health affairs

Jonathan Woodson has been named assistant secretary of defense for health affairs for the U.S. Department of Defense by President Obama. His nomination requires U.S. Senate confirmation. Associate dean for diversity and multicultural affairs and associate professor of surgery at BUSM, and senior attending vascular surgeon at BMC, Woodson holds the rank of brigadier general […]

Mental Illness Rulebook Gets a Rewrite: MED psychiatry chair gives revised DSM good prognosis

Domenic A. Ciraulo, MED chairman of psychiatry, says that for teachers, clinicians, and researchers in the fields of psychiatry and psychology, the DSM serves as a dictionary.

The 58-year-old bible of psychology and psychiatry, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, best known as simply the DSM, recently released the much-anticipated proposed revisions for its upcoming fifth edition, with additions of new mental disorders and narrowing or expanding working definitions of others. The changes will resonate far beyond the mental health field, affecting not only physicians, therapists, patients, and their families, but health insurers, drug companies, teachers, and employers.

BU Brain Researchers Grapple with NFL Offer

Sunday afternoons have felt different for football fans lately, thanks in no small part to researchers at BU.

A dramatic shift has altered the NFL culture over the past few months: rule changes, TV commentators pointing out dangerous hits, public service announcements about concussions, and star quarterbacks ordered to sit out important games after blows to the head. This stunning mid-season transformation has evolved from research at BU’s Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy (CSTE) linking concussions to later-life brain disease.

H1N1 Flu Advisory for Faculty, Staff and Students

As we begin the fall semester, please note that all faculty, students and staff with flu-like illness should stay away from classes and limit interactions with other people (“self-isolation”) for at least 24 hours after they no longer have a fever.

Medical and dental students and faculty and staff with patient care responsibilities must isolate themselves for 7 days or 24 hours after symptoms have resolved, whichever is later. Most students with mild flu symptoms do not need to visit their doctor.