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"For Mayo Clinic to remain a pre-eminent leader in health care, we must continuously attract and keep the best and the brightest people," says Terrence L. Cascino, M.D., director for education and chair of the Named Professorship Committee at Mayo Clinic. "Named professorships help support the work of outstanding faculty and advance their work in research, practice and education."
Mayo Clinic College of Medicine, like many other academic health centers, honors outstanding faculty through named professorships. Mayo faculty who hold the academic rank of professor may be eligible for a named professorship. Other selection criteria include meeting benefactor designation, active and sustained pursuit of scholarly activities, national and international recognition for specialty expertise and distinguished service and leadership at Mayo Clinic.
Mayo Clinic currently has awarded more than 70 named professorships to faculty at all three sites who are engaged in activities in research, education or practice. Such support strengthens Mayo's capacity to advance important work and continue its national and international role in health care leadership.
"Professorships help us ensure the highest quality research, education and patient care in the years to come," says Dr. Cascino. "It is only through the generosity of benefactors that Mayo is able to award named professorships."
Benefactors establish a named professorship with an endowment of $2 million. Earnings generated from the gifted funds provide a continuing source of revenue to support the recipient's research or educational activities. The recipient holds the named professorship throughout his or her active scholarly career at Mayo Clinic. Benefactors endow a professorship because they recognize the importance of the work. "Before endowing a professorship, our benefactors want to know that this research or education program will lead to something positive happening for patients," says Dr. Cascino. "When the passions and interests of the benefactor coincide with the needs and the goals of Mayo Clinic, everyone wins."
This story focuses on three current named professors. On May 16, Mayo Clinic Board of Trustees honored three new named professorships.
Heidi Nelson, M.D., the recipient of the Fred C. Andersen Foundation Professorship, is the immediate past chair of the Division of Colon and Rectal Surgery at Mayo Clinic Rochester and professor of surgery at Mayo Clinic College of Medicine. Dr. Nelson's focus is on clinical research.
"Clinical research, in particular, clinical trials, ensures that the practice of medicine tomorrow is brighter than the practice of medicine today," says Dr. Nelson. "Innovative therapies emerge from clinical research and then clinical trials test the safety and efficacy of such therapies."
Dr. Nelson is a pioneer in performing clinical research in her field of colorectal surgery. One such example is taking the innovative approach of the laparoscopic colectomy for patients with colon cancer and putting it to the test with a clinical trial to determine whether it was an effective surgical approach. "It was unusual for surgical trials of this type to be performed," says Dr. Nelson. She secured funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to do the trial, which involved recruiting 48 different institutions to enroll a total of 872 patients.
"Our study showed that while laparoscopic surgery is a safe and effective treatment for colon cancer, it must be performed selectively," says Dr. Nelson. "It should not be used for patients whose cancer requires extensive surgery to other organs besides the colon, and it should be done by surgeons who are experienced in performing laparoscopic colon surgery." This study received international recognition, with stories about the findings published in more than 285 newspapers across the United States.
Dr. Nelson holds leadership positions in the American College of Surgeons Oncology Group (ACOSOG) and the Society of Surgical Oncology (SSO). Her role in both organizations has facilitated important collaborative steps between the two organizations in the advancement of clinical oncology research in the field of surgery.
"The Fred C. Andersen Foundation Professorship is helping encourage the scientific investigation of new surgical innovations and finding new ways to bring that forward at Mayo Clinic," says Dr. Nelson. "This is so important because support from the government is often narrow and too insufficient to reach beyond a single program. The support of the professorship allows us to think about patient care, which is much broader," says Dr. Nelson.
The Fred C. Andersen Foundation Professorship was established in 1977 by the Andersen Foundation and the Bayport Foundation in honor of Fred C. Andersen, the man who started and generously supported both foundations during his lifetime. The Andersen Foundation has provided significant support for the Mayo Clinic Women's Cancer Program and established a scholarship at Mayo Medical School.
Paul J. Leibson, M.D., Ph.D., who holds the Rose M. and Morris Eisenberg Professorship, is an immunologist and pediatrician at Mayo Clinic Rochester. Dr. Leibson, who joined the Mayo Clinic staff in 1986, is professor of immunology at Mayo Clinic College of Medicine. He has served in various leadership positions in education and research, including dean of Mayo Graduate School. Dr. Leibson's research has focused on using the body's immune system to fight cancer.
Immunity is the body's ability to resist a disease, and the immune system is a bodywide network of interacting systems that include the lymph system, bone marrow and white blood cells. As a clinical researcher in immunology, Dr. Leibson is concerned with the mechanisms by which cells become activated when they recognize a tumor cell or some type of infection.
"When a lymphocyte encounters a tumor cell or an infection, it generates signals, and these signals dictate what the cell will or will not be able to do," says Dr. Leibson.
Signals are the language that cells use to determine what they are going to do. Signals are what researchers monitor in order to design treatment approaches.
Dr. Leibson and his research group recently identified and described an important signal used by the human immune system to destroy tumors. When this signal is generated inside cells called natural killer (NK) cells, materials are released in the body that induce cell death in cancer cells. Identification of this signal opens the possibility of generating new strategies for enhancing the ability of the immune system to kill tumor cells in patients with cancer.
"I'm wedded to this area of research because of my strong conviction that if we understand the language — the signals that cells use to determine their behavior — we're going to be able to modify that cell behavior for the benefit of patients," says Dr. Leibson.
There isn't a single system in the body in which the immune system can't play either a protective role or a harmful one, he says. Immunologists do not work in isolation, explains Dr. Leibson. "We have collaborations with scientists and specialists across a variety of medical specialties; however, cancer is one of the major areas."
"The professorship endowment support is crucial to this program. It ensures support in perpetuity. Knowing that there is consistent support enables me to choose and pursue the areas that are likely to provide the greatest amount of information to understand the mechanisms of disease and then the therapies," says Dr. Leibson.
The Rose M. and Morris Eisenberg Professorship was established in 1986 by George M. Eisenberg in honor of his parents. It was the second of eight professorships he endowed. Mr. Eisenberg was particularly interested in medical research leading to more information about the cause and cure of cancer and other diseases.
Douglas H. Johnson, M.D., recipient of the Whitney and Betty MacMillan Professorship in Ophthalmology in honor of Robert R. Waller, M.D., is an ophthalmologist at Mayo Clinic Rochester and professor of ophthalmology at Mayo Clinic College of Medicine.
The focus of Dr. Johnson's research program is to understand the basic disease process of glaucoma, the second leading cause of blindness in the world.
"We do bedside-to-bench research, meaning we take the clinical problem and then we study the mechanics or pathophysiology of what might happen," says Dr. Johnson. "Because there are no good animal models for the kind of glaucoma that humans develop, studying animals doesn't really help."
Dr. Johnson's research laboratory uses eyes from eye banks to conduct studies that would not be possible on living people. Dr. Johnson has invented a technique of keeping the eyes viable for about a month. This technique has been adopted widely and is currently being used by 15 laboratories around the world.
"Glaucoma is a 'plumbing' problem," says Dr. Johnson. "In glaucoma, the fluid drainage system at the front of the eye malfunctions and causes pressure buildup within the eyeball." Dr. Johnson explains that the problem is in the cells or in the tissues on which they rest. While many places study one or the other, Dr. Johnson's research laboratory focuses on both the tissues and the cells. "You need to study both in order to understand how they fit together," he says.
Dr. Johnson and his colleagues use electron microscopy and molecular biology in the study of what genes may be at fault in glaucoma. He and his colleague, Michael P. Fautsch, Ph.D., have collaborated for more than seven years in this area. This year, the two led an international conference on the topic.
"There are pilot projects that are so new or different that we do not have government funding to do them," says Dr. Johnson. "The support of the professorship allows us to pursue new and creative projects." The professorship also provides for a postdoctoral research fellow to help with the work. "We have many more ideas than we have time," says Dr. Johnson.
The Ophthalmology Professorship was established in 1998 by Mayo Foundation emeritus public trustee Whitney MacMillan and his wife, Betty. The MacMillans endowed the professorship in honor of Robert R. Waller, M.D., as he retired as president and chief executive officer of Mayo Foundation. Mr. MacMillan is the former chair and chief executive officer of Cargill. The Ophthalmology Professorship is not restricted to a specific Mayo campus.
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