Article Category: Staff/Faculty Update

Christina Longnecker, a medical administrator with degrees in law, business administration and nursing, has been named vice president of oncology services for Siteman Cancer Center at Barnes-Jewish Hospital and Washington University School of Medicine. She had been serving in that role on an interim basis for the past nine months.

Longnecker is responsible for strategic planning, budgeting, and operational and clinical quality related to the delivery of cancer care services at Siteman’s main location, which is on the Washington University Medical Campus, and at three satellite locations in the St. Louis region. She also will oversee the Siteman Cancer Network, an affiliation with regional medical centers that is aimed at improving the health of individuals and communities through cancer research, treatment and prevention. Longnecker was selected after a national search.

“Christi brings to her role not only prerequisite skills in health and business administration, she also brings the experiences and heart of a nurse,” said Robert Cannon, president of Barnes-Jewish Hospital. “She started her career caring directly for people, a focus that will continue to serve the patients of Siteman Cancer Center at Barnes-Jewish Hospital and Washington University School of Medicine.”

In her role, Longnecker works with the leadership teams at Barnes-Jewish Hospital and Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and across clinical departments to establish processes and infrastructure to achieve the highest standards of patient care. She reports to Cannon and Timothy J. Eberlein, MD, Siteman’s director and the Spencer T. and Ann W. Olin Distinguished Professor at the School of Medicine.

“For nearly 20 years, Siteman Cancer Center has provided exceptional care for patients of this region and beyond,” Eberlein said. “Christi, with her broad experience and deep dedication to providing the highest level of care, is the right person for this pivotal leadership role.”

Longnecker succeeds Trish Lollo, who was named president of Barnes-Jewish West County Hospital last year.

At the outset of Longnecker’s career, from 1995 to 2005, she served as a staff and supervisory nurse at hospitals in Quincy, Ill., and the St. Louis area. She then moved into clinical operations and was responsible for workflow, staffing and budgets at a company that advises and assists intensive care units around the country. In 2007, Longnecker joined Barnes-Jewish Hospital as manager of the liver, kidney and pancreas transplant program, later becoming an inpatient clinical nurse manager and patient-care services director for oncology. She served in the latter role from 2012 to August 2016, when she was named interim vice president of oncology services.

“Siteman Cancer Center and Barnes-Jewish Hospital, with the help of our Washington University partners, have experienced great growth in our capacity to deliver world-class cancer care to patients across the region,” Longnecker said. “I’ve been given a very strong foundation on which to serve, and we will continue to be guided by our dedication to patients and the trust they place in us.”

Jeff Michalski, MD, the Carlos Perez Distinguished Professor of Radiation Oncology, has received the Washington University Medical Center Alumni Association Faculty Achievement Award for his contributions to radiation oncology and to the improvement of patient care at Siteman Cancer Center at Barnes-Jewish Hospital and Washington University School of Medicine.

Michalski, vice chair and director of clinical programs for the Department of Radiation Oncology and a Siteman Cancer Center member, is an international leader in the treatment of prostate and pediatric cancers. Colleagues in his field credit him with contributing greatly to the advancement of radiation oncology as a clinical discipline and to the development of innovative approaches to treatment planning and delivery of radiation therapy, including 3-D treatment planning and intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT), as well as treatment quality assurance. He has been a member of many national and international task forces and committees that have formulated important recommendations to set standards for the practice of radiation therapy.

Michalski leads Siteman’s clinical trials program and oversees clinical operations for radiation oncology at six facilities, including all five Siteman locations. He also is considered an outstanding mentor, teaching residents in urologic and pediatric oncology. He has held many national leadership positions. Currently, he is co-chair of the National Cancer Institute Genitourinary Cancers Steering Committee, as well as secretary-treasurer and board member of the American Society of Radiation Oncology (ASTRO). He chairs the Radiation Oncology Committee of NRG Oncology, a multi-institutional cancer research group. Michalski has been honored with the School of Medicine’s Distinguished Clinician Award, as well as the Frank Ellis Medal from the Royal College of Radiologists and the British Institute of Radiology. He is a fellow of ASTRO and the American College of Radiology.

Michalski received his bachelor’s degree from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1982 and his medical degree from the Medical College of Wisconsin in 1986. After residency training at New York-Presbyterian/Columbia University Medical Center and Washington University’s Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology, he joined the School of Medicine faculty in 1991. He received an MBA from the John Olin School of Business at Washington University in 2001. In 2004, he completed Harvard School of Public Health’s Leadership Development Program.

Ariel Shifter, a Washington University clinical research coordinator at Siteman Cancer Center, has been named Woman of the Year by the Gateway Chapter of the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. She was recognized May 5 at the society’s Man & Woman of the Year gala at The Chase Park Plaza. 

As part of a related fundraising campaign, Shifter collected $73,000 in donations in 10 weeks for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society and related research.

“It’s an honor to be named Woman of the Year,” said Shifter, who works in the medical oncology treatment area at Siteman’s main location. “More importantly, it’s very gratifying to know I have so many family and friends who, like me, care about finding and funding a cure.”

Shifter, who has worked at Siteman since August 2015, also is a Hodgkin lymphoma survivor. After fighting her own battle as a patient at Siteman from 

June to September 2014, she changed her career path to become a Siteman staff member.

“I would not be here today if passionate individuals had not dedicated their time and money to finding a treatment that would allow me to live a full and healthy life after cancer,” Shifter wrote on her Leukemia & Lymphoma Society fundraising page. “I am so thankful to them, and I hope that my fundraising efforts will help current and future cancer patients feel the same sense of pride and relief that I felt when I found out my cancer was gone.”

Matthew Mutch, MD, chief of the Section of Colon and Rectal Surgery at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, has been named the Solon and Bettie Gershman Chair in Colon and Rectal Surgery at Barnes-Jewish Hospital (BJH).

A national leader in the laparoscopic treatment of colorectal cancer and the training of surgeons in this procedure, Mutch has served as colon and rectal surgery chief since 2015.

The endowed chair was established by the Solon and Bettie Gershman family through The Foundation for Barnes-Jewish Hospital, to support vital clinical services for patients and groundbreaking research to better understand and treat colon and rectal conditions.

“We are so fortunate to have such a terrific leader in this field as our chief of colorectal surgery,” said Timothy J. Eberlein, MD, the Bixby Professor of Surgery, head of the Department of Surgery at the School of Medicine and director of Siteman Cancer Center. “Matt has been a leader in developing innovative treatments for rectal cancer, minimally invasive techniques for colon surgery and new pathways for treating patients more efficiently and more safely. We are so appreciative of the entire Gershman family for their generosity and support of this fabulous professorship.”

Bob Cannon, BJH president and BJC group president, said the honor recognizes Mutch’s leadership in research that develops better standards of care and better outcomes for patients. “Dr. Mutch’s many impressive accomplishments have led him to this auspicious installation as the second Solon and Bettie Gershman Endowed Chair for Colon and Rectal Surgery,” Cannon said.

The chair previously was held by Ira Kodner, MD, professor emeritus of surgery. Kodner served as the first colon and rectal surgery chief and retired in 2013.

Mutch, a colorectal surgeon at Siteman Cancer Center at Barnes-Jewish Hospital and Washington University School of Medicine, also serves on Siteman’s Quality Assessment and Safety Monitoring Committee and is co-chair of Siteman’s Lower GI Cancer. He is also a member of the Surgical Innovations Committee in the university’s Department of Surgery.

He is involved in resident and fellow education on the national level as vice chair of the Colon and Rectal Surgery Residency Review Committee, and is a member of the Fellowship Council Accreditation Committee. He also serves as secretary of the Association of Program Directors for Colon and Rectal Surgery; on the executive council of the American Society of Colon and Rectal Surgeons; and is a council representative of the Self-Assessment Committee. He also is a member of the Written Board Subcommittee, Maintenance of Certification Committee, and an oral boards associate examiner for the American Board of Colon and Rectal Surgery.

Mutch’s research focuses on the identification of molecular markers to predict cancer-related outcomes in patients with rectal cancer, and clinical outcomes related to laparoscopic colorectal surgery. He has published 59 peer-reviewed articles.

Mutch has been a member of the faculty since 2002. Before he was named a section chief, he was the program director for the Colon and Rectal Surgery Fellowship from 2007 to 2016. A graduate of the School of Medicine, he completed his general surgery residency at Barnes-Jewish Hospital, followed by a fellowship in colon and rectal surgery at the Lahey Clinic in Burlington, Mass.

Solon and Bettie Gershman established the chair in 1998. Solon Gershman – founder and chairman of both Solon Gershman Realty and Gershman Investment Corp. – was a generous and dedicated philanthropist who gave to dozens of charities and organizations in the St. Louis area.

John DiPersio, MD, PhD, the Virginia E. and Samuel J. Golman Endowed Professor of Oncology and director of the Division of Oncology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, has been named a 2017 Legacy Leadership Award honoree by the Gateway Chapter of the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. He was recognized May 5 at the society’s Man & Woman of the Year gala at The Chase Park Plaza.

DiPersio, a medical oncologist and bone marrow transplant specialist, also is deputy director of Siteman Cancer Center at Barnes-Jewish Hospital and Washington University School of Medicine.

The annual Legacy Leadership Award recognizes individuals who have contributed significantly to the society’s mission of improving the quality of lives of patients with leukemia, lymphoma, Hodgkin’s disease or myeloma, and their families.

Samuel Achilefu, PhD, the Michel M. Ter-Pogossian Professor of Radiology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, has been elected as a fellow to the Royal Society of Chemistry and to The Optical Society.

The Royal Society of Chemistry is a London-based professional association of chemical scientists with more than 50,000 members worldwide. Achilefu — who also is a professor of biochemistry and molecular biophysics and of biomedical engineering — was elected for his innovative approach of integrating chemical sciences with engineering, biology and medicine, and for his outstanding leadership to the scientific community.

He was elected to The Optical Society for pioneering the development of near-infrared molecular imaging and image-guided surgical resection of cancer, and exceptional leadership and service to the biomedical optics community. The Washington-based society is the oldest professional organization for optical engineers.

Achilefu pioneered the development of molecular optical imaging and therapy of human diseases using novel molecular probes and light-sensitive drugs. He discovered a new molecular entity that can be used to deliver drugs to many types of cancer. Achilefu also led a team that developed a wearable goggle-based imaging system for guiding surgical removal of tumors. He also co-discovered a treatment paradigm for cancer that incorporates a special type of light source and nanomaterials that can find and selectively trigger cancer cell death without harming healthy tissue.

A Siteman Cancer Center research member, Achilefu also is director of the Optical Radiology Lab at the Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology. The lab and its team of biologists, chemists, engineers, medical scientists and physicists work collaboratively to harness the properties of light to develop methods for understanding, diagnosing and treating human diseases.

Celebrating innovation in St. Louis, the St. Louis Business Journal on June 23 honored area individuals and companies with the publication’s third annual Innovation Awards. Among those honored were Sasa Mutic, PhD, director of the Medical Physics Division in the Department of Radiation Oncology at Washington University School of Medicine. He also is a Siteman Cancer Center research member.

The Business Journal selected individuals and companies demonstrating cutting-edge advancements that have propelled St. Louis to become one of the nation’s top tech hubs.

Mutic, who was honored in the award’s medical category, was recognized for his innovations in radiation therapy to treat cancer.

Among his achievements, Mutic co-founded Radialogica, a health-care information technology company that is helping the university perform audits of its radiation oncology facilities. The company’s aim is to empower health-care providers and payers with tools and data to manage the quality of treatment.

Mutic also has published more than 120 manuscripts in radiation therapy- and medical physics-related journals and has been named an inventor on four patents.

Two scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and Siteman Cancer Center are among the 84 members and 21 foreign associates elected to the National Academy of Sciences this year. Election to the academy — which was announced May 3 — is considered one of the highest honors that can be awarded to a U.S. scientist or engineer.

The two are: Kenneth M. Murphy, MD, PhD, the Eugene Opie Centennial Professor of Pathology and Immunology and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator; and Herbert W. “Skip” Virgin IV, MD, PhD, the Edward Mallinckrodt Professor and head of the Department of Pathology and Immunology. Both also are Siteman Cancer Center research members.

Murphy

Murphy, who came to Washington University as a pathology resident in 1984, is known for his research into the development of immune cells known as T cells and the way they work with other factors to fight infections.

In recent years, Murphy has shifted his lab’s focus to transcriptional programs of dendritic cells. Such cells sense the presence of pathogens and direct the development of T cells and other immune cells. 

Previously, he was director of the Immunology Program of the Division of Biology and Biomedical Sciences. He also is the lead author of the widely respected and comprehensive textbook, “Janeway’s Immunobiology.”

Murphy earned his medical and doctoral degrees at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in 1984. He did postdoctoral work at Washington University and in 1989 was named an assistant professor of pathology and immunology. He became an associate professor in 1994, professor in 1999 and was named the Eugene L. Opie First Centennial Professor of Pathology and Immunology in 2011.

He is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation and the American Association of Physicians. 

He also is a past recipient of the Juvenile Diabetes Foundation’s Career Development Award and of the School of Medicine’s Distinguished Investigator Award.

Virgin

Virgin joined Washington University in 1990, as an instructor in the department of medicine and pathology and immunology. He became a professor of pathology and immunology in 2002 and was named the Edward Mallinckrodt Professor of Pathology and Immunology and head of the department in 2006. He was named a professor of medicine in 2008.

His research includes studies to understand how the immune system responds to chronic viral infections. Virgin and his colleagues have found that, in addition to causing disease, chronic viruses can have beneficial effects on host immunity. 

Among Virgin’s many contributions to scientific research, he and his colleagues became the first to successfully grow noroviruses in the laboratory. Norovirus disease is characterized by frequent vomiting and diarrhea over the course of 1-2 days. The accomplishment has helped scientists seek ways to weaken norovirus, for use as a vaccine.

Virgin also served as director and principal investigator of the Midwest Regional Center of Excellence for Biodefense and Emerging Infectious Diseases Research.

He earned his medical and doctoral degrees at Harvard University Medical School in 1985. Before coming to Washington University, he completed a residency in internal medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and a postdoctoral fellowship in microbiology and molecular genetics at Harvard.

He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation and the American Association of Physicians. He also is a recipient of the School of Medicine’s Outstanding Faculty Mentor Award and the Academic Mentorship Award of the Academic Women’s Network of Washington University.

Ralph G. Dacey Jr., MD, has been awarded the Harvey Cushing Medal by the American Association of Neurological Surgeons (AANS). He was honored with the medal, the association’s most prestigious award, for his many years of outstanding leadership, dedication and contributions to the field of neurosurgery.

The medal – named in honor of the father of modern neurosurgery – was awarded May 3 at the AANS annual meeting in Chicago.

“It means a lot to me to be recognized by my peers,” said Dacey, the Henry G. and Edith R. Schwartz Professor and head of the Department of Neurosurgery.

Dacey, who is also neurosurgeon-in-chief at Barnes-Jewish Hospital, is known for his work on the clinical management of cerebral aneurysms and brain tumors as well as how blood vessels in the brain control blood flow, which is important in a variety of neurosurgical diseases.

He counts among his achievements the recruitment of outstanding clinicians and researchers to his department.

“We’ve added great faculty and trained superb residents,” said Dacey. “We have some really innovative research being done here – for example, on the effective management of malignant brain tumors and spinal cord injuries, and on brain computer interfaces and complex cerebrovascular conditions.”

Dacey is a former chairman of the American Board of Neurological Surgery and has served as president of the Congress of Neurological Surgeons, the American Academy of Neurological Surgeons, and the Society of Neurological Surgeons. He was elected to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences in 2010 and is an honorary fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland.

Founded in 1931 as the Harvey Cushing Society, the AANS is a scientific and educational association with more than 8,000 members worldwide. The AANS is dedicated to advancing the specialty of neurological surgery to provide the highest quality of neurosurgical care to patients.

Timothy Ley, MD, an expert in cancer genomics and leukemia, will receive a 2016 Washington University in St. Louis faculty achievement award, Chancellor Mark S. Wrighton has announced.

A Siteman Cancer Center research member, Ley also is the Lewis T. and Rosalind B. Apple Professor of Medicine in the School of Medicine and chief of the Section of Stem Cell Biology in the Division of Oncology. He will receive the Carl and Gerty Cori Faculty Achievement Award.

Two other faculty member also will receive achievement awards: Deanna Barch, a leading researcher on the role of cognition, emotion and brain function in illnesses such as schizophrenia and depression, and Irving Boime, a professor of developmental biology and of obstetrics and gynecology in the School of Medicine.

“These faculty achievement awards are intended to build bridges between the Danforth Campus and our School of Medicine Campus,” Wrighton said. “As distinguished scholars and as members of the Washington University faculty, professors Barch and Ley embody the ideals of individual and collaborative excellence. Their work has done much to strengthen interdisciplinary scholarship among our campuses. I am extremely pleased to recognize their achievements with these awards. These awards are very significant because faculty peers select the honorees from a group of nominees from the faculty.”

Ley, Barch and Boime will be recognized at an awards ceremony Oct. 14. Ley and Barch also will make presentations on their scholarly work at the ceremony.

Ley’s pioneering research in cancer genomics has laid the groundwork for precision medicine in cancer, which targets treatment to a patient based on the genetic makeup of a tumor and how it responds to therapy.

In 2008, he led a team of researchers at The McDonnell Genome Institute that decoded the entire genome of a cancer patient’s tumor. It was the first time scientists compared the DNA in a patient’s healthy and malignant cells to find genetic mutations that likely caused the disease.

Last year, President Barack Obama named Ley to the National Cancer Advisory Board, which advises the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services, the director of the National Cancer Institute (NCI) and the president on the nation’s cancer program and reviews proposals awarded by the NCI. His term lasts until 2020.

Ley also is associate director for cancer genomics at The McDonnell Genome Institute and a research member at Siteman Cancer Center at Barnes-Jewish Hospital and Washington University School of Medicine.

He currently holds $1.7 million in annual grants from the NCI and has authored nearly 200 publications. Ley has served on the boards of many medical and research organizations, including the National Human Genome Research Institute Board of Scientific Counselors, the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology Board of Directors, and the councils of the American Society for Clinical Investigation and the Association of American Physicians.

Ley is an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine and of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. He also is a past president of the American Society for Clinical Investigation and was chair of the Board of Scientific Counselors for the National Human Genome Research Institute.

Ley earned his bachelor’s degree from Drake University in 1974 and his medical degree from Washington University in 1978. He is board-certified in internal medicine and hematology. He joined the School of Medicine faculty in 1986 as an assistant professor of medicine after being a senior investigator for two years at the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Md.

He has received numerous honors and awards, including the Erasmus Hematology Prize from Erasmus University in Rotterdam, Netherlands; NCI’s Alfred G. Knudson Award for Cancer Genetics, the American Society of Hematology’s E. Donnall Thomas Prize and its Mentor Award, and Washington University’s Second Century Award, which recognizes individuals whose long-term commitment and participation have enabled the School of Medicine to look to the future with strength and confidence.