Dallas Morning News – UT Southwestern given $42 million for research (Nov. 13, 2009)
UT Southwestern has received more than $42 million in federal stimulus money to finance new and ongoing research. All of the funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act were received during fiscal 2009, which ended Sept. 30. The school still has numerous applications out for additional stimulus money. "It's an absolutely terrific thing for the university," said Dr. Perrie Adams, associate dean for research administration at UT Southwestern. Read More

KTVT Ch 11 (CBS, D/FW) – North Texas family feeling the effects of PTSD (Nov. 12, 2009)
Joel McCartney is a proud and patriotic father. But when his 22-year-old son, Joel Jr., returned home from Iraq this summer, McCartney realized something had changed. "He has nightmares, he'll break out in a cold sweat," McCartney explained. "Intrusive memories of the event, whatever the trauma was, hyper arousal, always being on edge. If someone comes up behind you, you jump," psychologist Alina Suris said of PTSD symptoms. The doctor at UT Southwestern and the Dallas VA Hospital said the disorder has become almost commonplace in our nation's military. "Folks are getting redeployed over and over and over," Dr. Suris said. "Research shows the more exposure you have to trauma; the more likely you are to get PTSD." Read More

Dallas Morning News – Fort Hood shootings shatter security for soldiers (Nov. 8, 2009)
War came home to Fort Hood long ago, even though the actual fighting was thousands of miles away. Soldiers from the sprawling Army post in Central Texas have been sent into harm's way year after year since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Some who witnessed last week's shootings may have suffered the same kind of invisible wounds as soldiers who have seen too much in Iraq and Afghanistan. Carol North, a UT Southwestern psychiatrist and authority on how people react to mass shootings, comments. Read More

U.S. News & World Report – Genes linked to 'pot' belly (Nov. 6, 2009)
New research sheds light on the possible link between the genes you inherit and the size of your belly. Participants in a French study doubled their risk of having fat around the abdomen if they had a certain genetic trait, and the more of these traits one had, the greater the risk for a pot belly. The findings are just one more piece of the obesity puzzle, a nutrition specialist said. Lona Sandon, assistant professor of clinical nutrition at UT Southwestern, comments. Read More

Reuters Health – Stereotactic body radiation therapy halts lung tumors (Nov. 4, 2009)
Stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT) can effectively treat very early stage 1 non-small cell lung cancer in patients who are too frail to undergo surgery, according to phase II trial results presented at the American Society for Radiation Oncology annual meeting (ASTRO 2009). SBRT involves just 3 outpatient sessions that last one hour each. Dr. Robert Timmerman comments. Read More

Dallas Morning News – Dallas area sees significant growth in clinical trials (Nov. 4, 2009)
Testing a new drug on patients used to be done at universities, which could count on hundreds of millions of dollars a year to conduct the trials. But as pharmaceutical companies look to cut costs and get drugs to market quicker, outsourcing to other companies is an increasingly popular option. There are 877 clinical trials in Dallas looking for participants, according to clinicaltrials.gov, a Web site maintained through the U.S. National Institutes of Health. But 70 percent of clinical trials are conducted in the private sector with individual companies overseeing drug testing, said Dr. Perrie Adams, associate dean of research administration at UT Southwestern. Read More