Your impact on health

“I believe healthy people need to participate in medical research. Get involved because it’s good for research studies, but it’s also good for someone who is going to benefit from the knowledge that comes out of it. That person might be you! I didn’t think they were going to find cancer, but the idea of the test is to find cancer early so it can be treated before it’s life threatening. If you can find cancer in its early stages, you are so far ahead of the game.”

— Joyce Ares, Knight Cancer Institute patient

OHSU Knight Cancer Institute, Joyce’s cancer was caught early — so early her treatment was shorter than it might have been if the cancer were more advanced. The Knight Cancer Institute is one of five sites across the country selected by health care company GRAIL, Inc. to join this study designed to improve early detection of cancer.

Learn how you can support the Knight Cancer Institute here.

The OHSU Foundation, in partnership with Seiko Izumi, Ph.D., R.N., recently helped secure a $1.3 million grant to expand community-based nursing in rural Oregon. The grant was part of the “Reimagining Nursing Initiative” from The American Nurses Foundation, which awarded $14 million nationally with a goal of expanding access for underserved patients through community nursing care reimbursed by insurance.

“It’s a huge honor for OHSU to have received this award. The American Nurses Foundation received hundreds of proposals for a small number of projects funded,” said Katie Slavin, Associate Director of Foundation Relations at OHSU Foundation. “This very prestigious award showcases OHSU School of Nursing as national leader in nurse-led innovation.”

When baby Khovny was born, the joy of her birth was tinged with fear: She was in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at Oregon Health & Science University Doernbecher Children’s Hospital, being urgently treated for hydrops, a life-threatening condition in which fluids accumulate in a fetus’s body. Khovny’s hydrops was identified early, and the Vignerys, of Keizer, were referred to OHSU Doernbecher, whose fetal care program provides the most complex prenatal care between Seattle and San Francisco. 

The in-utero technology that helped successfully treat Khovny is only available in Oregon at the OHSU Doernbecher Fetal Care Program. Now, with two new surgeons, that program is expanding to provide even more complex, in-utero surgeries, becoming one of the most comprehensive fetal care centers in the Pacific Northwest — transformational for families who would otherwise have to travel out-of-state for treatment.

Learn how you can support OHSU Doernbecher Children’s Hospital here.

“José and I are a part of the asylum clinic on campus. We help people who are applying for asylum get connected with a forensic evaluator to corroborate their claims. We’re working on setting up an in-person clinic [to] help as many people as possible. It might become a model nationwide.”

Mahtab Brar, M.D. ’22

In our most recent Equity in Education conversation, Mahtab Brar, M.D. ’22 (top left) and Jose Carrillo-Castro, M.D. ’24, talk about their experiences as medical students — and how they’re pushing forward inclusive change in medicine.

Alayna Schoblaske, DMD ’17, knew she wanted to go into dentistry since the fifth grade — and, as an early career dentist, she’s already making her mark on the field.  

In her time at OHSU, Dr. Schoblaske served as class president and in several leadership positions among dental groups. She is passionate about accessible, affordable care for all, and was the recipient of the 2022 OHSU School of Dentistry Alumni Association Early Career Achievement award for her advancement of the profession.  

In this audio story, Dr. Schoblaske speaks about her passion for dentistry, mentorship and how she wants to impact the profession.

“Now is the time to dig in and truly center transgender patient perspectives about what effective and successful gender-affirming care looks like.”

Geolani Dy, M.D.

When she’s not providing gender-affirming surgical care for transgender and non-binary patients, Geolani Dy, M.D., thinks about how she can better serve patients beyond her surgical practice. Dy co-founded the Transgender and Non-Binary Allied Research Collective, or TRANS-ARC, which seeks out trans and non-binary patient perspectives to shape research related to gender-affirming genital surgeries.

Rising tuition, transportation and housing costs, lack of time, or limited access to convenient and healthy food all play a role in food insecurity on college campuses. Students may find themselves skipping meals to pay for
textbooks or cover tuition, opting to go hungry so they can keep their education moving forward.

“When you’re in clinic all day long or working shifts over the weekend, it can be extremely difficult to shop for and prepare healthy food,” explains Gina Calco, an M.D./Ph.D. student who serves on OHSU’s Food Insecurity Task Force. “Our graduate medical students told us that they were going to events just to get free food, or that sometimes they had trouble studying because they were so hungry.”

Thanks to the efforts of student leaders and committed faculty and staff, what started as a grassroots grocery box program has grown into the OHSU Food Resource Center (FRC) — a welcoming, on-campus resource dedicated to nourishing the next generation of healers, caregivers, and innovators.

“I feel compelled to investigate, study and understand what disproportionately affects some people and how we can try to move the system.”

Ana Quiñones, Ph.D.

With new funding and data sets, Ana Quiñones, Ph.D., investigates paths to better health care policy in support of those most vulnerable. In college, Quiñones started to see how the issues of health conditions and health status affect some members of society more than others. Little has changed since then, she says. Persistent health disparities, health inequities and their effects are all a part of a giant health care puzzle that Quinones hope to solve.