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Duke Heart Week ending October 6th 2019

Highlights of the week Ending October 6th 2019:

Recognition Week: Physician Assistants

This coming week (Oct. 6-12) is National Physician Assistant Week in recognition of the PA profession     and its contributions to the nation’s health. The week offers us the opportunity to offer thanks to these vital members of the Duke Heart team (and elsewhere!) as well as to help raise awareness and visibility of the overall profession. Please take some time this week to personally thank the PAs within your area.

Prior to become a week-long event, PA Day was first celebrated on October 6, 1987, in honor of the 20th anniversary of the first graduating class of physician assistants from Duke University’s Physician Assistant program; October 6 is the birthday of the profession’s founder, Eugene A. Stead, Jr., MD, former chair of the Department of Medicine and founder of the Duke Cardiovascular Disease Research Database. To read about the history of the profession at Duke, please visit: https://fmch.duke.edu/duke-physician-assistant-program/about-pa-program.

Congratulations and many thanks to each of the PAs throughout Duke Heart and Duke Health. If you are on social media and wish to post messaging about your favorite PAs, the American Academy of Physician Assistants (AAPA) is using #PAWeek as their official tag. Have a great week!

 

Lung Transplant Milestone Celebrations Held

As many of you know, the Duke Lung Transplant Program reached a milestone in August: they completed their 2000th lung transplant. This week, the group held a variety of celebrations at Duke to thank all of the DUHS teams for their support and work with the program and patients. A larger event will be held in the Spring to include all active lung transplant patients.

Congratulations to all of members of the Lung Transplant program and to the many care providers and staff across Duke Heart who work on a daily basis to ensure the safety, care and support of all lung transplant recipients at Duke. These collaborations enable groups across Duke to reach significant milestones, such as this one. Great job, everyone!

Swaminathan to Serve CART-CL Research Committee

Rajesh Swaminathan, associate professor of medicine in cardiology at Duke and director of the Cardiac Catheterization Laboratories at the Durham Veterans Affairs Medical Center, has been selected to the Research and Publications Committee of the Cardiovascular Assessment, Reporting and Tracking System for Catheterization Labs (CART-CL), the national cath lab database for the Veterans Health Association. In this capacity, Raj will be part of the team that determines the research direction of the National VA Interventional Cardiology program and reviews research proposals.

This is terrific news, Raj — congratulations!

 

Team Huddle Roll-Out Continues

Two weeks ago, we announced that DMP 7East went live as the Duke Heart pilot unit for implementation of the Duke Quality Management System initiative, Commit to Zero. This initiative allows Duke care providers and staff to take a transformative approach to teamwork by creating systems based on our individual and collective integrity, leading to enhanced patient safety and zero harm to patients and to one another.

One of the tools we are using are tiered team huddles. The huddles are taking place throughout all service areas within Duke Health and are being implemented on a rolling basis. Huddles occur daily and are designed to last approximately 15 minutes. The huddle offers an opportunity to proactively review key metrics, get updates on work in progress and to share any new safety issues that may have arisen, allowing us to move into problem solving. It offers a structured approach to identify, escalate and solve safety problems using the team’s collective knowledge. The huddles also offer an important opportunity to provide moments of recognition and celebration of team members.

This week, units 3100, 3300, 7100, 7200 and 7300, and Respiratory Care Services will officially come online with their use of huddles as part of Duke Heart Wave I. Additional teams will follow in Waves II and III over the next two months.

Wave II: Heart ICUs (7700 and 7 West); Adult Cardiac Catheterization Labs, Electrophysiology Labs, Cardiovascular Short Stay Unit (CVSSU), Heart Center Bed Control and Cardiothoracic Operating Room (CTOR) Schedulers, and Perfusion.

Wave III: Cardiac Diagnostic Unit, Cardiac MRI, EKG; Cardiopulmonary Rehab; Heart Center Communications/Heart Center Financial Administration.

We are grateful for the significant effort being made across Duke Heart in order to implement the huddles – it has required a change in how we spend our time and how we approach problems together; we are already seeing great results and improved teamwork. Thanks to everyone who is working to make this effort a huge success for us. You make Duke Heart an amazing place to be and will lead to an even safer quality-driven culture for our patients and each other. Great work!

Duke Heart Family Expands!

We are pleased to announce that our Duke Heart family has expanded by one! Congratulations to Khyati Baxi and her husband, Jatin Roper (faculty member in the Duke division of gastroenterology) on the birth of their son, Aarav Jatin Roper, on Sept. 25! Aarav joins big brother, Rahul. We are so happy for you and we look forward to meeting him soon.

 

HARMONEE Update

Congratulations to the DCRI HARMONEE study team and to all site partners! The OrbusNeich COMBO drug-eluting stent (DES) with endothelial progenitor cell (EPC) capture technology has just been approved for clinical use in Japan. As some of you may know, the Japan-USA HARMONEE study was conducted as a proof-of-concept in global regulatory harmonization, and provided the pivotal evidence supporting this decision by the Japanese Pharmaceutical and Medical Devices Agency and Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare. This milestone is not just a huge success for the COMBO DES as a new technology. It is also a first-ever, formal “proof of concept” program conducting a randomized, prospective coronary device study using a single protocol on both sides of the Pacific as part of the Japan-USA Harmonization By Doing program. This represents a fundamental change in the landscape of global device evaluation for innovative new devices.

In a message sent to all site teams, Shirgeru Saito, vice director of Cardiovascular Medicine at Shonan Kamakura General Hospital, and Mitchell Krucoff wrote, “We want to thank each and every one of you and your site teams for your significant contributions to this truly global HARMONEE effort. We would not be here without your amazing efforts on behalf of your patients.”

To read the formal statement from OrbusNeich, please visit: http://bit.ly/2VnzNOk. To see a copy of the journal article regarding the Harmonization by Doing Program, please visit: https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/circj/77/7/77_CJ-12-1431/_article.

Great work, everyone!

Heart Fellows Win NC/SC ACC FIT Jeopardy

Great news from the 26th Annual Joint Meeting of the NC and SC State ACC Chapters which was held last weekend at the Omni Grove Park Inn in Asheville. Dave Manly, Zak Loring and Marat Fudim won the Fellows-in-Training (FIT) Jeopardy competition, beating out teams of players from UNC, MUSC and Prisma Health (SC). Marat hopes it’s a good omen for the upcoming Duke Football and Basketball season!

FIT Jeopardy is a friendly competition that promotes a healthy rivalry between state chapter FIT teams, fosters FIT engagement in their local state chapter and provides educational value to the contestants and audience. Each team is made up of three fellows-in-training. The Duke trio will represent at the national level next spring.

Congrats and way to represent Duke Heart!

 

Update from Eldoret, Kenya

Jerry Bloomfield shared an update from Mike Foster who is adjusting to life on his new adventure in Kenya. Mike wrote:

“As some of you know, my first priority was the American Society of Echocardiography Foundation event that Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital (MTRH) hosted recently. This event was held at three schools in the area. We scanned over 1200 kids in four days. We had a great team of sonographers/MD’s from all over the USA and one from New Zealand, as well as our Kenyan team of nurses, clinical officers (sort of like what you know as Advanced Practice Providers at Duke) and a sonographer. Most kids [had normal scans]. We identified a little over 80 kids with either obvious rheumatic or congenital abnormalities or who were borderline rheumatic according to the WHO criteria (of which I’m critical). Of these, a few are definitely going to need an invasive intervention in their future. All 80 plus kids and parents will now be invited to come to Dr. Maghasi’s pediatric cardiac clinic for care.

It was nice to have Titus show up and be part of the event. I ended up having him teach some of the older kids while they were waiting for their echocardiogram.

Hitachi USA and GE Kenya were generous with loaning equipment for this event. We had three laptops and 5 Vscans. We started the week staffing a one-day symposium on Pediatric Echocardiography for the Kenyan Cardiac Society in Nairobi, which was sponsored by GE. Many of the sonographers/MD’s from our team gave lectures, including Brittany Byrd (former Duke Pediatrics tech) and Greg Tatum from the Duke Pediatrics lab.

This brings us to over 2300 kids screened from six schools from around the area –some urban, some rural. Although it’s not a good sample, we figure it gives MTRH a starting point while helping some kids and families.

After the event, I switched gears into my “element.” We have two doctors who started their cardiology fellowship in September. I’m spending time introducing them to echocardiography, parasternal long axis, patient positioning and all those knobs and buttons on machines.

I’m also working with Dr. Barasa who is director of the Cardiac Centre at MTRH to improve the Cardiac Diagnostic Unit (they took your name) with workflow, digital reporting, and an archiving system.

I’m in talks with MTRH HR about my contract for teaching a new “diagnostic cardiology” program which mostly includes teaching clinical officers to become sonographers. I expect to start in January.

I’ve lost 5 pounds already. Enjoyed seeing friends here in Kenya as well as from the USA. You should know that I’m grateful, once again, to the Duke Hubert-Yeargan Center for Global Health — they continue to be supportive of my efforts and Duke’s collaboration here. ASE and ASEF are really cool organizations to get involved with their work and help support.

The Duke Cardiac Diagnostic Unit and its culture of support, learning and professional advancement is second to none in this world. I wouldn’t have had the opportunity, skills, critical thinking and confidence to embark on this endeavor had it not been for you guys. Take advantage of it. Support Sreek and our attendings.” — Mike

We followed up with Titus Ngeno regarding the teaching experience Mike mentioned above.

Titus wrote, “I had the pleasure of joining Mike in his herculean undertaking, promoting CVD awareness and developing treatment capacity in Eldoret, Kenya. He called me into a classroom after the inquisitive 7th grade students asked him why the left side of the heart is bigger than the right side. A poignant reminder to me of the effects of rheumatic heart disease and unexplained pulmonary hypertension in the region. The CV fellowship and collaborative research efforts led by Duke is touching and improving lives globally.” — Titus

Many thanks to Jerry for sharing this update with us!

Global Cardio-Oncology Summit This Last Week in São Paulo

The Global Cardio-Onc Summit was in São Paulo this week.  Susan Dent and Chiara Melloni attended from Duke.  Susan is part of the organizing committee. Susan tweeted several meeting updates over the week, and it seems like it was a great meeting. There were more than 500 attendees  from 17 countries around the globe!!! It is increasing every year. We hope to have a bigger presence from Duke next year in Toronto.  Below are few pics from the event.

 

Cybersecurity Awareness Month

October is Cybersecurity Awareness Month. Duke faces daily attacks from hackers, and we need everyone’s help to protect Duke. This year Duke’s IT Security Office has launched a new “Report Phish” button that allows you to report any suspicious email with one click. The button is now available at the top of your email in Outlook and is labelled “Report Phish to Duke”/Phish Alert.

 

Upcoming Opportunities/Save the Date:

Duke SOM Research Week

The inaugural Duke University School of Medicine Research Week will be held from Monday, October 14 through Thursday, October 17 on the sixth floor of the Trent Semans Center for Health Education.

Activities for the week will include presentations from four School of Medicine faculty members (including Duke Heart’s Svati Shah!), a Duke Office of Scientific Integrity (DOSI) Research Town Hall, the Robert J. Lefkowitz, MD, Distinguished Lecture, Innovation Jam – with DIHI that Manesh Patel will emcee, a Clinical Keynote Lecture, and a poster session featuring the research of residents, trainees and PhD students from clinical and basic science departments. To learn more about events being held as part of Research Week, please visit: https://medschool.duke.edu/research/research-week.

 

Cardiology Grand Rounds

Our grand rounds this week will be the Cardiology Fellows Conference with Zak Loring. Please join us on Tuesday, Oct. 8, 7:15 a.m., DN, 2003.

Upcoming Grand Rounds:

  • 15: Faculty Staff Meeting, 5 p.m.
  • 22: Cardiology Fellows Conference with Sounok Sen
  • 29: Euan Ashley from Stanford, “Towards Precision Medicine.” 5 p.m.
  • 5: Renato Lopes will present “AF and PCI: Triple Trouble? Double Therapy? Where do we stand in 2019?”
  • 8 (Friday): Kim Eagle, Michigan, will be presenting the Eugene Stead Lecture
  • 12: Javed Butler, University of Mississippi

 

3rd Annual Invented at Duke Celebration, Nov. 5

Co-hosted by the Duke Office of Licensing & Ventures and & Duke Innovation & Entrepreneurship, Invented at Duke celebrates and promotes the diverse accomplishments of Duke innovators and entrepreneurs.

The event showcases select technologies, inventions, and novel ideas–illustrating the breadth of Duke discoveries–while also highlighting Duke’s innovation and entrepreneurship resources and facilitating discussions among Duke inventors and the broader Duke community.

Join us to celebrate innovations coming out of Duke, learn about Duke’s resources, and engage with inventors, the local investment community, alumni, Duke leadership, and researchers. The event will be held at Penn Pavilion on Tuesday, Nov. 5 from 5-7 p.m. (remarks begin at 5:30).

This year’s guest speaker is Derek Jantz, CSO of Precision BioSciences, a recently-made-public company spun out of the Duke School of Medicine. Precision uses a proprietary genome editing method called ARCUS to overcome cancers, cure genetic diseases, and create safer, more productive food sources.

If you’re an inventor, entrepreneur, researcher, licensee, investor, or someone interested in partnering with Duke, we hope you’ll join us for our 3rd Annual #InventedAtDuke Celebration. To learn more or to register, please visit: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/3rd-annual-invented-at-duke-celebration-tickets-65802486007.

 


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