From The Director

Dr. Jackson

Letter from the Director J. Brooks Jackson, M.D., M.B.A.
Baxley Professor & Director of Pathology

Welcome to the Johns Hopkins Medicine Pathology Web Site. As our Department continues to grow, communication becomes increasingly more important. Currently, there are over 1400 people in the department which includes approximately 120 full-time faculty, 34 residents, 45 graduate students, over 100 fellows, and approximately 1000 staff. Full-time Hopkins pathology employees are not just based in Maryland, but also in China, Uganda, Malawi, South Africa and Brazil. With internet access available at all these sites, I strongly encourage Pathology faculty, housestaff, students, staff, alumni, and prospective trainees to find out more about the activities of the Department.

This past 2010 fiscal/academic year, the Department of Pathology was successful in meeting or exceeding all its goals due to the strong efforts made by our faculty, fellows, residents, students and staff. Financial targets were met or exceeded for the University side of the Department, The Johns Hopkins Hospital, Bayview Medical Center, and Howard County General Hospital budgets in terms of generating surpluses which are critical for supporting the new buildings, new equipment, and money for research projects, especially for junior investigators.

Last summer 2009 saw the opening of our third clinical research building in Uganda, named the Zayed Makerere University Johns Hopkins University Family Care Center, which allowed the 25,000 sq ft expansion of our HIV clinical trials effort there and provision of family care. Despite the difficulty in obtaining NIH funding for research, the Department's spending on extramural research increased by 7% over FY 2008-2009. NIH grant and contract awards were at an all time high at $52,280,193 placing our Department first in NIH funding for Departments of Pathology providing multiple research opportunities for faculty and trainees. Helping talented junior investigators obtain support has and will continue to be a priority for the Department. The Department continues its tradition of excellent scholarship publishing nearly 200 first or last author peer-reviewed articles in the scientific literature.

In terms of patient safety we had a number of successful initiatives such as reducing the number of mislabeled specimens, maintaining hand hygiene compliance of >90%, improving breast biopsy turnaround time, and minimizing acute hemolytic transfusion events (i.e. zero events).

In terms of our educational programs, five new excellent residents were accepted through the MATCH program and ten new graduate students started in the Pathobiology program this fall including new students from Singapore. We now have a total of 34 residents and 45 graduate students enrolled, respectively. This past Fall the new medical school Genes-to-Society curriculum was implemented and Pathology is playing a major role in all four years, not just the predominant role it played in year 2. Through the efforts of Ralph Hruban, Sandy Markowitz, and several faculty, gifts exceeding $1.7 million were donated this past year from over 1,000 generous alumni, patients, and friends of the Department. These funds will support innovative research projects by junior faculty, fellows, and residents and provide stipends for some of our graduate students.

Our Diversity initiatives continue to focus our efforts to increase the diversity of our faculty, teaching programs, and staff. The Department has developed and implemented a plan which we believe will help us achieve this important objective.

Despite the notable achievements this past year, the current academic year will bring new challenges including another tough year for obtaining NIH funding, and increased regulatory compliance requirements. Given the talent and hard work of our faculty, trainees, and staff, I am confident we will deal with these challenges successfully as well. I think that we truly do have the best Pathology Department in the country and that we will continue to have an increasingly greater impact in research, teaching, and patient care in our field.