I am excited to announce that Nancie J. MacIver, MD, PhD, has accepted our offer to serve as the new Division Chief of Pediatric Endocrinology. Dr. MacIver will be starting in June 2021, and comes to us from Duke University, where she is an Associate Professor of Pediatrics and the Director of the Duke Scholars in Molecular Medicine program. She earned an undergraduate degree in Mathematics from Johns Hopkins University before pursuing a combined MD/PhD program at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. After completing her medical and graduate degrees, she came to Duke for her residency and fellowship training, which she completed in 2009. Since then, Dr. MacIver has established a well-known research program that studies how malnutrition and obesity impact immunity of T cells and regulation of metabolism. I am excited for all of you to get to know her and am thrilled to have her join us! Please join me in welcoming Nancie to the UNC Children’s family!

Dr. Reddy joined the Neonatal-Perinatal Medicine faculty on February 2nd. Dr. Reddy received his medical degree in 1981 from Kurnool Medical College in Kurnool, Andhra Pradesh, India. He completed postgraduate training in pediatrics and neonatal-perinatal medicine at several hospitals, including: the Sri Venkateswara Medical College in Tirupati, Andhra Pradesh, India, the Royal College of Physicians in the UK, the North Shore University Hospital in New York, and the Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York. Since completing his fellowship in 1998, Dr. Reddy has worked in New Jersey, Georgia, Iowa, and Florida. In January 2013, Dr. Reddy began as an attending physician in the NICU at Nash General Hospital in Rocky Mount, North Carolina. He will working in the NICU at Nash UNC Healthcare as a faculty member with the UNC Department of Pediatrics.

Elana Bornstein joined the Pediatric Division of Cardiology on February 8th. Ms. Bornstein completed her Bachelor of Science in Nursing at Duke University in 2013 and remained at Duke for more than 6 years as a nurse on the Pediatric Progressive Care/Cardiac & Complex Care Unit. While working at Duke, she earned her Masters of Science in Nursing in 2019. With UNC Pediatric Cardiology, Ms. Bornstein will be working in the Pediatric Cardiology Catheterization Suite and seeing patients in the Cary clinic. Elana and her pup live in Durham.

We are excited to announce that Erin Jones, MHA, BSN, RN, CCRN-K has accepted the position of Patient Services Manager III for 5CH as of February 7th. Erin graduated from Western Carolina University with a BSN in 2010 and received her MHA in December 2019 from Queen’s University of Charlotte. Erin began her nursing career in the Medical Intensive Care Unit at the Charles George VA Hospital. She relocated to Chapel Hill in August of 2011 and continued her nursing career here at UNC Medical Center. Erin has served in several progressive nursing leadership roles including staff/charge nurse, Administrative Nursing Supervisor where she served as the liaison to Children’s service, and most recently as Patient Services Manager II of Pre-Operative Services. We are excited to welcome Erin to our team. 

The 2021-22 Doximity Survey, which helps determine US News & World Report’s “Best Hospitals” rankings, has already been emailed to some registered physicians, meaning it could already be in your inbox (if you claimed your DOXIMITY profile). We expect most of the survey emails to be sent before the second week of March.

Please check your email. If eligible, you may receive an invitation to participate in the survey from “DOXIMITY” at the address:  support@doximity.com.

Please check your junk email box in case it is routed there incorrectly. If you are registered with Doximity but have not received an invitation, you can likely still vote by going to their website.  The option to vote should appear on your profile page.

Please take a few minutes to complete the survey and share your personal ranking of specialty programs. Physician feedback in this survey plays a major role in determining which hospitals’ specialty programs are nationally ranked. (Please encourage your colleagues to “vote” for UNC entities as well).

To vote for UNC Hospitals and other UNC Health entities, you will need to type out the full name in the drop-down box of the survey: University of North Carolina Hospitals

UNC-Chapel Hill has been recognized as one of the “Best Global Universities for Gastroenterology and Hepatology” by U.S. News and World Report. UNC GI and Hepatology was ranked 6th in the US and 11th globally. 

Kristen F Cole, MSN, RN, CPNP, Anne Adams, M.Ed, CCC-SLP, and Sharon Wallace, RD, CSP, LDN

COVID-19 has undoubtedly impacted all aspects of practice for health care professionals. None have been immune to the growing pains of telemedicine. However, many unexpected positive aspects have also evolved from the use of telemedicine. Might telemedicine provide unexpected benefits for our special population of patients? Might patients and parents alike prefer to engage in feeding therapy from the comfort of their home feeding chair? Could we see a better overall picture of a child’s availability to food and assess nutrition effectively at home? The goal of this article is to offer some practical “pearls” regarding our experiences along with the experience of one parent on the receiving end of telemedicine. Read More...

Dr. Peyton Thompson, Assistant Professor in Pediatric Infectious Diseases, in partnership with Allison Aiello, PhD and Kim Powers, PhD in the Gillings School of Global Public Health, has been working with the COVID & Schools project. The final report, SARS-CoV-2 Prevention in North Carolina Public K-12 Schools, is now live on the NC Policy Collaboratory website. The Policy Collaboratory was established by the North Carolina General Assembly in 2016 to utilize and disseminate the research expertise across the University of North Carolina System for practical use by state and local government.

Faculty - please encourage learners to submit abstracts to unc.az1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_5jdX7Lv9JKaQG9M

Presenting AOE Engage: The Podcast

The first Academy of Educators podcast is live! We interview and highlight the stories of star medical educators. Hosted by Judson MacDonald, these stories connect us through personal narrative, teaching tips and tricks, and conversations you certainly don't want to miss! New episodes every other Thursday.

You may notice a familiar name! Christian Lawrence, MD, Hospital Pediatrics shared his story on the February 18th recording of AOE Engage!

Listen now and subscribe on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts!

If you couldn't join us for the UNC Children's Virtual Meeting on Thurs, February 18th, check out the recording !

The UNC Pediatric Division of Allergy/Immunology and the Division of Rheumatology were extremely well represented at the 2021 AAAAI Annual Meeting at the end of February. Our faculty, fellows, and research staff are acting as moderators, leading live symposia, presenting multiple oral abstracts, and giving copious poster presentations.

When you come to a fork in the road, take it. (Yogi Berra) I have always been intrigued by the way chemicals, the good and the bad kind, alter biology.

www.flavoredtobacco.org

Michael Adams, MD – Pediatric Genetics and Metabolism – Lisa P. Spees, PhD; Laura Farnan, PhD; Karen Hicklin, PhD; Jeannette Bensen, PhD; Jonathan Berg, MD, PhD; Bradford Powell, MD, PhD; Kristen Hassmiller Lich, PhD, "Testing and Extending Recommended Algorithms for Identifying Genetic Disease-Related Encounters in Pediatric Patients". Accepted for American College of Medical Genetics Annual Clinical Genetics Meeting April 13-16, 2021.

Michael Adams, MD & Elizabeth Jalazo, MD – Pediatric Genetics and Metabolism – In collaboration with other UNC colleagures - Thomas Felton, Steven P. Trau, Cynthia M. Powell, “Bi-allelic SPEG variants Identified in an Infant Presenting with Severe Hypotonia, Failure to Thrive, and 5-oxoprolinuria.” Accepted for American College of Medical Genetics Annual Clinical Genetics Meeting April 13-16, 2021.

Elizabeth Jalazo, MD – Pediatric Genetics and Metabolism - Hogan MJ, Stephens K, Smith E, Jalazo ER, Hendriksz CJ, Edwards LJ, Bjoraker KJ. “Toileting Abilities Survey as a surrogate outcome measure for cognitive function: Findings from neuronopathic mucopolysaccharidosis II patients treated with idursulfase and intrathecal idursulfase.” Mol Genet Metab Rep. 2020 Oct 21;25:100669. doi: 10.1016/j.ymgmr.2020.100669. PMID: 33101985; PMCID: PMC7578548.

Elizabeth Jalazo, MD – Pediatric Genetics and Metabolism – In collaboration with other UNC colleagues - Winslow A, Felton T, Weimer E, Montgomery N, Moran T, Spence E. “A Novel De Novo PGM3 Pathogenic Mutation Identified in an Infant Presenting with Abnormal TREC Assay and Severe Neutropenia.” Accepted for American College of Medical Genetics Annual Clinical Genetics Meeting April 13-16, 2021.

Michelle Hernandez, MD - Pediatric Allergy/Immunology - Michelle L. Hernandez, Allison J. Burbank, Neil E. Alexis, Meghan E. Rebuli, Elise D. Hickman, Ilona Jaspers, Guillermo Guidos,

"Electronic Cigarettes and Their Impact on Allergic Respiratory Diseases: A Work Group Report of the AAAAI Environmental Exposures and Respiratory Health Committee." The Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology: In Practice, 2021. ISSN 2213-2198, doi.org/10.1016/j.jaip.2020.12.065.

Michelle Hernandez, MD - Pediatric Allergy/Immunology - Hernandez ML, Lucas N, Mann C, Lin L, Burbank AJ, Brown J, Sims M, Ivins S, Cunningham A, Maciag MC, Akar-Ghibril N, Bennett AV, Phipatanakul W, Reeve BB. "Association of step count with PROMIS® pediatric health-related quality of life measures in children and adolescents with persistent asthma". J Allergy Clin Immunol Pract. 2021 Feb 15:S2213-2198(21)00183-5. doi: 10.1016/j.jaip.2021.01.046. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 33601050.

Michael Kappelman, MD - Pediatric Gastroenterology - For calendar year 2021, in collaboration with Dr. Millie Long in the Medicine Division of Gastroenterology, the "IBD Partners Patient Powered Research Network" (www.ibdpartners.org) received continued funding, $210,000, from the Crohn’s & Colitis Foundation.

Michael Kappelman, MD - Pediatric Gastroenterology - Received a 1 year extension with additional funding of $157,946 from the Helmsley Charitable Trust for "Surveillance Epidemiology of Coronavirus Under Research Exclusion (SECURE-IBD)", an international, pediatric and adult database to monitor and report on outcomes of COVID-19 occurring in IBD patients.

Michael Kappelman, MD - Pediatric Gastroenterology - In collaboration with Dr. Millie Long, was awarded $1,307,512 over a period of 24 months from the Helmsley Charitable Trust for the project: “COVID-19 Vaccine Effectiveness in Patients with IBD Treated with Immune Suppression Partnership to Report Effectiveness of Vaccination in populations Excluded from iNitial Trials of COVID (PREVENT-COVID).”  

T. Michael O'Shea, MD - Neonatal-Perinatal Medicine - O’Shea, T.M. "Families’ perspectives on monitoring infants’ health and development after discharge from NICUs." Pediatr Res (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41390-020-01243-2

Samantha Schilling, MD, MSHP - General Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine - Was awarded funding for her Research Project Grant (R01) "Child-Adult Relationship Enhancement in Primary Care: Effectiveness Trial of a Primary Care Based Parenting Intervention to Prevent Child Maltreatment." The project involves a multisite RCT of PriCARE/Cariño (a brief group positive parenting intervention) to achieve 3 aims: (1) evaluate the effect of PriCARE/Cariño on reducing child maltreatment; (2) examine the mediating effects of parenting, parent stress, and child behavior on the relationship between PriCARE/Cariño and child maltreatment; and (3) identify and understand the relationship between PriCARE/Cariño implementation determinants and key implementation outcomes.

John Stephens, MD - Medicine & Pediatrics Hospital Medicine - Cotter JM, Hall M, Girdwood ST, Stephens JR, Markham JL, Gay JC, Shah SS. "Opportunities for Stewardship in the Transition From Intravenous to Enteral Antibiotics in Hospitalized Pediatric Patients." J Hosp Med. 2021 Feb;16(2):70-76. doi: 10.12788/jhm.3538. PMID: 33496660; PMCID: PMC7850597.

Stephanie Schwartz, MD & Tracie Walker, MD - Pediatric Critical Care Medicine - Feldstein LR, Tenforde MW, Friedman KG, et al. "Characteristics and Outcomes of US Children and Adolescents With Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome in Children (MIS-C) Compared With Severe Acute COVID-19." JAMA. Published online February 24, 2021. doi:10.1001/jama.2021.2091

A UNC School of Medicine Social Justice Task Force was developed to address the importance of integrating social justice into the curriculum to prepare our students and trainees to improve health equity and reduce health disparities.

We are happy to share the Final Report from the Task Force. Also, we are proud to share the accolades for Emily Vander Schaaf, MD, MPH Assistant Professor in General Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine and for Neva Howard, MD, MS, Assistant Professor in Pediatric Emergency Medicine, received for their roles with the Task Force.

The Carolina for the Kids (CFTK) grant application opens on February 1st! This opportunity to fund a project is open to anyone who works with children—not just physicians. Grant requests between $1,000 and $15,000 will be considered. Application is open from the morning of February 1 until March 12 at 5pm.

For details, visit www.uncchildrens.org/uncmc/unc-childrens/support/cftk-grants/

Kaitlin Campbell joined the Department of Pediatrics on October 19th.

Since working with her, Kaitlin has impressed me with her knowledge-base and daily plans on rounds despite only being in the unit for several weeks. She is thorough, thoughtful, and proactive in her decision making. Her interactions with patients and families were just wonderful – she shows genuine empathy and her patients/families were the best updated ones in the entire unit!"