Dr. Daniel Cho, Dr. Xin Wang, and Dr. Lili Zhou, residents in the Department of Radiation Oncology, competed in the Radiological and Medical Physics Society of New York's annual Young Investigators Symposium, named in honor of Salvatore Vacirca, a past RAMPS president, April 16 at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. The residents all presented abstracts and Dr. Wang won second place at the RAMPS/Vacirca symposium. RAMPS promotes the application of physics to medicine and biology, encourages interest in training medical physics, shares information and discusses best practices in the application of physics in medicine.
Dr. Alfons Pomp, chief of gastrointestinal metabolic and bariatric surgery, the Leon C. Hirsch Professor of Surgery and professor of surgery, was awarded the 2013 Excellence in Clinical Care Award from the Society of American Gastrointestinal and Endoscopic Surgeons. The award, presented four times, is designated for a clinician who is recognized by the surgical/gastrointestinal community for excellence in patient care and surgical practice. The criteria for this award include significant surgical/endoscopic skills, patient care and contributions to community and volunteerism. The society is a leading surgical society representing more than 6,000 general and gastrointestinal surgeons throughout North America and the world.
Rising second-year medical student Ranjodh Singh was awarded a summer fellowship from the American Association of Neurological Surgeons Medical Student Summer Research Fellowship program. Singh was one of 20 first- and second-year medical students who were awarded a medical student summer research fellowship, which provides a stipend of $2,500 to work in a neurosurgical laboratory and be mentored by a neurosurgical investigator during the summer. The American Association of Neurological Surgeons is dedicated to advancing the specialty of neurological surgery in order to promote the highest quality of patient care. In addition, Singh was awarded a summer fellowship from Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation for Childhood Cancer's Pediatric Oncology Student Training Program, which provides $6,000 stipends to graduate and medical students who have an interest in pediatric oncology research and would like to experience the field first-hand. The foundation, which seeks to raise money in hopes of finding a cure for cancer, bears the name of a young cancer patient, Alex, who at 4 years old opened a lemonade stand to raise money to help find a cure childhood cancers. Singh will spend the summer in the pediatric neuro-oncology lab of Dr. Mark Souweidane, vice chairman of the Department of Neurological Surgery, director of pediatric neurological surgery, professor of neurological surgery and professor of neurological surgery in pediatrics, for both fellowships.