School of Medicine

Transitioning home after a stay in a nursing home or long-term care facility can be a difficult experience, oftentimes leading to hospitalization or reinstitution. But preliminary results from a new West Virginia University Office of Health Affairs pilot program shows that telehealth can help these individuals remain healthy and happy in their own communities.

The inaugural Huggins Homecoming in Cincinnati raised more than $150,000 to bolster cancer care and research at the WVU Cancer Institute.

Every day, our bodies face a bombardment of UV rays, ozone, cigarette smoke, industrial chemicals and other hazards. This exposure can lead to free-radical production in our bodies, which damages our DNA and tissues. A new study from Eric Kelley—a researcher with the WVU School of Medicine—suggests that unrepaired DNA damage can increase the speed of aging. His results appear in the journal Nature.

Imagine being woken up at 3 a.m. to navigate a corn maze, memorize 20 items on a shopping list or pass your driver’s test. According to a new analysis out of West Virginia University, that’s often what it’s like to be a rodent in a biomedical study. Mice and rats, which make up the vast majority of animal models, are nocturnal. Yet a survey of animal studies across eight behavioral neuroscience domains showed that most behavioral testing is conducted during the day, when the rodents would normally be at rest.

Even amid talk of COVID-19’s “lost year of learning,” the urgency to help West Virginia’s youngest learners strengthen their reading and writing skills was never lost on the state’s education leaders.

If someone joins a church, mosque or synagogue, they may be seeking better emotional or spiritual health. But according to research out of West Virginia University, faith communities have the potential to promote physical wellbeing, as well.

The West Virginia Clinical and Translational Science Institute Project ECHO program has been spreading specialty care knowledge across the Mountain State for five years. Building upon its success, the project can now lend resources and expertise to health providers beyond West Virginia with its recent designation as an ECHO Superhub – one of only eight in the United States and 18 worldwide.

Following a year of missed milestones, celebrations and traditions, West Virginia University’s first in-person commencement ceremony since December 2019 ushered in a renewed sense of optimism for the nearly 4,500 graduates who walked across the stage to receive their diplomas in four ceremonies this weekend (May 15-16).

Women are far more likely than men to have autoimmune or chronic inflammatory diseases. One potential reason? Hormones. In a new study, Jonathan Busada—a researcher with the WVU School of Medicine and Cancer Institute—found that male sex hormones may help to keep stomach inflammation in check.

With Pfizer-BioNTech’s COVID-19 vaccine authorized by the Food and Drug Administration for adolescents ages 12 to 15, one West Virginia University pediatrician assured its safety and efficacy: It underwent the same rigorous testing as for adults.