VCU news

Anne-Marie Irani, M.D., professor, Division of Allergy and Immunology, Department of Pediatrics, School of Medicine

Irani has been elected to serve on the executive committee of the board of directors for the American Board of Medical Specialties. The American Board of Medical Specialties is a nonprofit organization of approved medical boards, representing 24 broad areas of specialty medicine. It is the largest physician-led specialty certification organization in the United States.

Babette Fuss, Ph.D., professor, Department of Anatomy and Neurobiology, School of Medicine

Fuss is now president of the American Society for Neurochemistry. She took office during the society’s 46th annual meeting held in March in Atlanta. Fuss has been a member of the organization since 1995 when she was a postdoctoral fellow at UCLA.

“The society has a great tradition of fostering junior researchers,” said Fuss, who gave her first oral presentation to a national audience at an ASN meeting while still a postdoctoral fellow. Once she became a junior faculty member, she stepped into leadership roles with the organization, serving first on a number of committees and then being elected to the ASN council in 2007 and as secretary in 2009.

“The society has greatly facilitated the building of my professional network and has contributed to my career development by, for example, providing the opportunity for oral presentations at an early career stage,” Fuss said. “For as long as I have been involved, the society has put a strong emphasis on supporting junior scientists. This is one important and unique aspect of the ASN.”

As a result, she now encourages her own students to attend the society’s annual meeting, and most discover they appreciate the opportunities that arise from it.

“ASN’s annual meetings provide a number of opportunities for interactions between junior scientists and well-established researchers, as for example lunch group meetings with the plenary speakers. A strong focus during my tenure will be the continuation of ASN traditions, specifically organizing high-quality annual meetings in the field of cellular and molecular neuroscience and the fostering of young talent,” Fuss said.

Fuss also hopes to increase participation of faculty and students from Latin America and Canada.

“Based on my own experiences with collaborators located in South America, there is a vibrant and creative neuroscience community that offers ample opportunities for remarkable scientific interactions. What I would like to see in the future is that ASN’s annual meetings will provide a unique forum for research done within the Americas and to thereby foster Pan-American interactions and career development beyond borders.”

Patricia Kinser, Ph.D., assistant professor, Department of Family and Community Health Nursing, VCU School of Nursing

Saba Masho, M.D., associate professor, Department of Family Medicine and Population Health, VCU School of Medicine

Kinser and Masho were selected to receive a Sigma Theta Tau International/Southern Nursing Research Society grant to support a pilot study titled “Mindful Physical Activity + Centering Pregnancy for Overweight/Obese Diverse Pregnant Women.”

The two VCU faculty members are co-investigators on the study, which follows black and Hispanic pregnant, overweight and obese women to evaluate the feasibility, acceptability and preliminary effects of yoga as a gentle, mindful physical activity incorporated into group prenatal care. The findings will be compared with recently collected data from an existing longitudinal study of pregnant women who participated in Centering Pregnancy prenatal care alone. It will also be used to develop future large-scale randomized controlled trials.

Daniel Riddle, Ph.D., assistant chair and department coordinator, School of Allied Health Professions 

Riddle, a VCU alumnus, recently received the American Physical Therapy Association’s Marian Williams Award for Research in Physical Therapy during APTA’s NEXT Conference and Exposition in National Harbor, Maryland. 

The award honors individuals who have published outstanding clinical or educational research in the field of physical therapy. 

Riddle is a renowned expert in rehabilitation outcomes research and total knee arthroplasty. He is also an author with more than 125 published scientific articles, and has received 14 research grants totaling more than $5.6 million. 

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