Vital Signs

Penn Medicine Racks Up Top Rankings

Penn Medicine was named #2 on Forbes magazine’s first-ever “America's Best Employers for Women” list, which ranks employers across the nation.

Forbes partnered with market research firm Statista to identify the companies who are the most successful at supporting and growing their female workforce. Statista surveyed 40,000 Americans, including 25,000 women, working for businesses with at least 1,000 employees. The survey included questions related to working conditions, diversity and how likely they would be to recommend their employer to others.

“People created opportunities for me to be exposed to different parts of the organization and higher levels of leadership,” Regina Cunningham, PhD, CEO of the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania (HUP), told Forbes. “I have worked at a number of hospitals—three other health care systems—and Penn Medicine has, by far, the best hospital culture.”

Penn Medicine was also named #6 among large employers on Forbes magazine’s annual “Best Employers in America” list, up from #7 in 2017.

On both lists, Penn Medicine was the highest ranking employer in Pennsylvania and in the health care industry overall.

Not only is Penn Medicine receiving recognition as a great place to work, but accolades also continue to accrue for the work happening within the institution: Penn Medicine hospitals were ranked among the top hospitals in the nation by U.S. News & World Report for the 12^th consecutive year, achieving Honor Roll status and top rankings in 12 clinical specialties. The combined enterprise of HUP and Penn Presbyterian Medical Center was named to the prestigious Honor Roll list, and ranked as the top hospital in Pennsylvania, in the 2018-2019 annual survey by the magazine. Out of nearly 5,000 hospitals analyzed nationwide, Penn Medicine is among only 20 institutions to be named to the publication’s 2018-2019 Honor Roll. According to the magazine’s editors, Honor Roll hospitals each perform near the top of the rankings in at least half a dozen specialty areas.

 

Preventable Hospital Readmissions Cut by More Than 25 Percent Under Innovative Contract

After the first year of an innovative, five-year contract between the University of Pennsylvania Health System and Independence Blue Cross (Independence), the health system reported a more than 25 percent cut in hospital readmissions—the largest readmission reduction in both organizations’ history. As part of the first collaboration of its kind in the United States between a health system and a health insurer, the two organizations have launched a new slate of innovations to reduce the number of patients who return to the hospital within a month of going home. The contract provided that Independence wouldn’t pay for the resulting hospitalization in those cases.

The new contract, which took effect July 1, 2017, marked Penn Medicine’s entry into a new way of working with Independence that is designed to encourage collaborative efforts by the insurer and health systems to improve quality of care and reduce health care costs for Independence members.

The efforts that led to this improvement included leveraging electronic health records to stratify patients by risk of readmission; improving coordination between the inpatient clinical team and outpatient follow-up and home health care; implementing more robust home care services for disease management and medication teaching after discharge; monitoring high-risk patients remotely after leaving the hospital; and reviewing patient data daily and having a care coordinator reach out to the patient if indicators are trending toward trouble.

“To see such a drastic improvement just one year into our partnership with Independence serves as a great motivator to continue finding ways to bend the curve of rising health care costs,” said Ralph W. Muller, CEO of the University of Pennsylvania Health System. “That can only happen if we work together to keep patients healthier, and in the first year of our new model, we’re proud to have shown that we can achieve both goals.”

Abramson Cancer Center Researchers Propel Drugs to Approval

Penn-Developed CAR T Cell Therapy Moves Ahead in Europe

“This approval demonstrates the global impact of the therapies we developed in Philadelphia, and the far-reaching potential of these therapies to change the way cancer is treated across the world.”

- Carl June, MD, Richard W. Vague Professor in Immunotherapy, Director, Center for Cellular Immunotherapies, Abramson Cancer Center

• Personalized cellular therapy Kymriah (tisagenlecleucel, formerly CTL019) approved by the European Commission (EC)
• First chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cell therapy permitted for use in the European Union in two distinct indications: treatment of relapsed or refractory B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) in patients up to age 25, and relapsed or refractory diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) in patients over 18
• Developed at Penn’s Abramson Cancer Center in collaboration with Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and Novartis
• Decision follows approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for Kymriah in B-cell ALL and DLBCL in the United States

 

 

First Nonsurgical Treatment for Rare Neuroendocrine Tumors Approved

“This is a true breakthrough. Until today, there were no anti-tumor therapies available for patients with these tumors who were not candidates for surgery.”

– Study Principal Investigator Daniel A. Pryma, MD, Associate Professor, Radiology and Radiation Oncology Chief, Nuclear Medicine and Clinical Molecular Imaging

• Targeted radiotherapy AZEDRA (iobenguane I131) approved by the FDA for nonsurgical treatment of neuroendocrine cancers
• First ever nonsurgical treatment for the rare neuroendocrine cancers pheochromocytoma and paraganglioma approved by the FDA
• Approval was based on a multi-center trial led by researchers in the Abramson Cancer Center and was granted to Progenics Pharmaceuticals

 

 

 

 

 

 

New Class Begins Journey into Medical Profession

After receiving their short white coats and stethoscopes at the annual White Coat Ceremony in August, 152 incoming first-year medical school students at the Perelman School of Medicine recited the Declaration of Geneva, a modern version of the Hippocratic Oath, pledging to treat the ill to the best of their abilities, preserve each patient's privacy, and to teach the secrets of medicine to the next generation. They were surrounded by friends, family, and faculty.

 

 

Honors and Awards

 

Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) Awards for Excellence

Three faculty members in the Perelman School of Medicine received awards from the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC), the professional organization of all 151 accredited U.S. medical schools and nearly 400 major teaching hospitals and health systems nationwide.

Elected Members, National Academy of Medicine

Four new Penn Medicine faculty members are among 75 new U.S. and 10 international members elected by their peers for accomplishments and contributions to the advancement of the medical sciences, health care, and public health—one of the nation’s highest honors in biomedicine.

• Susan M. Domchek, MD, Basser Professor in Oncology and Executive Director, Basser Center for BRCA
• Daniel E. Polsky, PhD, Professor of Medicine, Director, Leonard Davis Institute for Health Economics, and Robert D. Eilers Professor of Health Care Management at Wharton
• M. Celeste Simon, PhD, Arthur H. Rubenstein, MBBCh Professor in Cell and Developmental Biology and Scientific Director, Abramson Family Cancer Research Institute
• Rachel M. Werner, MD’98, PhD’04, Professor of Medicine and of Health Care, Management at Wharton

 

Sleep Research Society Distinguished Scientist Award

David F. Dinges, PhD, Professor and Chief, Sleep and Chronobiology

This award honors a single individual of prominence for contributions over an entire career and is the society’s highest honor.

Elected to the Italian Academy of Science and the German National Academy of Sciences

Garret FitzGerald, MD, Professor, Systems Pharmacology and Translational Therapeutics, Director, Institute for Translational Medicine and Therapeutics

The German National Academy (Leopoldina), is the oldest continuously existing academy of medicine and the natural sciences in the world, and the Italian Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei (Lincean Academy) is the oldest national academy of science; each awarded FitzGerald for his scientific achievements.

American Society for Mass Spectrometry Biemann Medal

Benjamin A. Garcia, PhD, Presidential Professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics

The early-career award recognizes significant achievement in basic or applied mass spectrometry, a technique for detecting the components of a sample by their mass and charge.

Albany Medical Center Prize in Medicine and Biomedical Research

Carl June, MD, Richard W. Vague Professor in Immunotherapy in Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Director, Center for Cellular Immunotherapy in the Abramson Cancer Center, and Director, Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy

Albany Medical Center has given out the $500,000 award annually since 2001 to those “who have altered the course of medical research.” It is one of the largest prizes in medicine and science in the United States, according to the organization.

President of the American Society for the Surgery of the Hand

L. Scott Levin, MD, Paul B. Magnuson Professor of Bone and Joint Surgery, Chair, Orthopedic Surgery, and Professor, Plastic Surgery

The Society includes more than 3,800 orthopedic, plastic and general surgeons from around the world.

American Society for Bioethics and Humanities Lifetime Achievement Award

Jonathan D. Moreno, PhD, David and Lyn Silfen University Professor, Penn Integrates Knowledge (PIK) Professor, Professor of Medical Ethics and Health Policy, of History and Sociology of Science, and of Philosophy

The award is the Society's highest honor, recognizing excellence in bioethics, given in recognition of longstanding achievement. The Society cited Moreno as “one of the world’s foremost experts in bioethics and politics and bioethics in national security.”

Marfan Foundation Hero with Heart Award

Reed Pyeritz, MD, PhD, William Smilow Professor in Division of Translational Medicine and Human Genetics

The award pays tribute to Pyeritz’s four decades of dedication to improving heart health in the 200,000 people in the U.S. living with Marfan syndrome and related disorders. 

International Atherosclerosis Society Gotto Prize

Daniel Rader, MD, Seymour Gray Professor of Molecular Medicine and Chair, Genetics

The prize, which is given once every three years, recognizes outstanding scientific or medical advancement in understanding the causes and reducing the development of atherosclerosis.

Alzheimer’s Association’s Khalid Iqbal Lifetime Achievement Award in Alzheimer’s Research

John Q. Trojanowski, MD, PhD, William Maul Measey-Truman G. Schnabel, Jr., M.D. Professor of Geriatric Medicine and Gerontology

The leading nonprofit funder of Alzheimer’s research worldwide honored Trojanowski for his decades-long record of ground-breaking discoveries on neurodegenerative disease.

 

Cancedda to Helm Botswana-UPenn Partnership

Corrado A. Cancedda, MD, PhD, joined Penn as director of the Botswana-UPenn Partnership (BUP) in July. Based in Gabarone, Botswana, Cancedda will spearhead a new phase of BUP’s development. Cancedda has an extensive global health background leading teams throughout sub-Saharan Africa. He served for four years as Partners in Health’s (PIH) director of training and medical education in Rwanda. He also served as executive director of the PIH Ebola response in Sierra Leone, and most recently as the principal investigator of the Resilient and Responsive Health System Initiative in Liberia. Cancedda served on the faculty at Harvard Medical School prior to joining Penn.

 

In an effort to improve health care and to create new undergraduate and graduate medical training programs in Vietnam, Penn Medicine and Penn Nursing have launched a formal alliance with the Vingroup—an enterprise that encompasses a newly formed private not-for-profit university project, VinUni, as well as the largest and leading private health service provider in Vietnam, Vinmec.

The partnership will focus initially on the establishment of medical and nursing schools within VinUni, and on the enhancement of graduate medical education and health care programs within the Vinmec Health Care System. Penn will also support the Vinmec Health Care System to enhance the quality of care and clinical training, initially at the International Hospital in Times City, Hanoi. The ultimate goal is to build a new VinUni/Vinmec teaching hospital in Hanoi, along with future plans to create medical residency training programs and a robust clinical research portfolio focused on translational medicine.

The new initiative is part of the Penn Center for Global Health’s strategy of establishing Regional Centers of Engagement to address disparities in health equity worldwide through efforts that unite Penn Medicine’s missions of education, research, clinical care and community service. The Penn Center for Global Health already operates Centers of Engagement in Africa (Botswana) and Latin America (Guatemala).