September 2019-Around UF Health

The POST is the monthly newsletter for UF Health

TAKE A DEEP BREATH

Around UF Health What’s the first thing you do after you unwrap your new stethoscope, provided by UF College of Medicine alumni? Why, try it out on the person next to you, of course. First-year medical students experimented with their new instruments during orientation and, by all reports, they worked just fine. — Greg Hamilton

 

Board of Governors selects UF to lead medical marijuana research consortium

Marijuana buds

The State University System of Florida Board of Governors has selected the University of Florida to lead a statewide consortium studying health outcomes related to medical marijuana. UF will lead the Consortium for Medical Marijuana Clinical Outcomes Research, which will include public and private universities engaged in research on clinical outcomes of medical marijuana. As the lead institution, UF will receive $1.5 million in annual recurrent funding from the state to evaluate the safety and effectiveness of medical marijuana and to consider dosing and routes of administration. The research infrastructure proposed by UF will focus on three primary activities: build a data repository known as the Medical Marijuana Clinical Outcomes Repository, or MEMORY, that can track patient outcomes over time; develop a Clinical Research Core, which will provide infrastructure support for prospective studies; and establish a competitive grants program offering $600,000 annually from the state appropriation to participating institutions.— Matt Splett

 

Grant to help UF Health researchers boost HPV vaccinations among youngsters

A team of UF Health researchers has received a five-year, $2.9 million grant from the National Cancer Institute to evaluate simple interventions aimed at health care providers and parents that could substantially boost vaccine rates for human papillomavirus, or HPV, among 11- and 12-year-olds. A recent study in the Journal of Infectious Diseases found only 16% of teens were protected by the time they turned 13. The researchers will evaluate ways to raise the frequency of provider recommendations by training providers to use short scripts highlighting the routineness of vaccines and the cancer prevention benefits. The team also will prepare parents of preteens for these conversations with educational text messages. — Diana Tonnessen