News and Events

In the war on terror, bio-terrorism is perhaps one of the scariest of threats we face. Attacks using Sarin gas, Anthrax and other bio hazards while uncommon, pose a serious threat to large portions of the population. Now the region’s residents can feel a bit safer. On Monday, officials gathered at New York Medical College in Valhalla to dedicate the new Center of -Excellence in Precision Responses to Bioterrorism and Disasters. 

At the center the College’s researchers and physicians will use medical countermeasures and translate research findings to protect Americans from the threat of catastrophic bioterrorism, man-made disasters and public health emergencies.

NYMC Leadership: 
Edward C. Halperin, M.D., M.A., chancellor and chief executive officer
Robert W. Amler, M.D., M.B.A., dean of the School of Health Sciences and Practice and vice president for government affairs

State Sen. Terrence Murphy (R-Yorktown) announced that a $500,000 state grant will help New York Medical College in Valhalla become the first Center of Excellence in Precision Responses to Bioterrorism and Disasters in the Hudson Valley. The grant will allow the college to expand its research on preparedness planning, training and response strategies for communitywide emergencies, including biological and chemical threats. 

Dr. Edward Halperin, chancellor and chief executive officer of the college, said the grant is crucial for his institution’s work. “This Center of Excellence in Precision Responses to Bioterrorism and Disasters allows us to expand our research on preparedness planning, training and response strategies for communitywide emergencies, and help protect us all against biological and chemical threats,” Halperin said.

NYMC Leadership: Edward C. Halperin, M.D., M.A., chancellor and chief executive officer

If you're like most parents, you may be worried about your child developing an allergy to bee stings, especially during the summer months. However, there's little cause for fear according to the experts at Westchester Medical Center, as dangerous reactions to bee stings are present in only a small percentage of the population.

“Anaphylaxis to bee stings is much less common than people think — between .15 percent and .8 percent of children in the U.S are affected," said Dr. Subhadra Siegel, assistant professor of pediatrics at New York Medical College. "It is much more common for children to have a large local reaction, which is not typically life threatening.”

NYMC Faculty: Subhadra A. Siegel, M.D., M.A., assistant professor of pediatrics

Inside a new facility on New York Medical College's Valhalla campus, blinking, pulsing, and injured mannequins are used to replicate a victim in need of emergency treatment following a chemical attack or disaster.

"There could be blast injuries following the explosion of a bomb, which we know happens all too frequently these days,” said Dr. Robert Amler, dean, and professor of public health at the college. “When these go off, there will be many different types of injuries and our responders need to be able to deal with the immediacy of those injuries." The training mannequins are located inside of the Center of Excellence in Precision Medicine and Responses to Bioterrorism and Disasters, where professionals are trained for emergency scenarios.

NYMC Leadership: 
Robert W. Amler, M.D., M.B.A., dean of the School of Health Sciences and Practice and vice president for government affairs
Michael J. Reilly, Dr.P.H. ’10, M.P.H., Director of Center for Disaster Medicine, Associate Professor of Environmental Health Science, and Associate Professor of Clinical Emergency Medicine

These aren’t mannequins you’d see in a department store. The mannequins in a new facility at New York Medical College are used to train for responses to bioterrorism and disasters. They breathe and they cry and they moan while injuries are simulated and their vital signs are monitored. They also ‘die.’

“The people who are being trained experience the same kind of remorse and sense of failure that they get in a real victim situation,” Dr. Robert Amler, dean and professor of public health, told attendees on a tour of the facility Monday. “It gets that real when you’re being trained and so we don’t smile quite as much in here because we know this can be reality.”

Elected officials, law enforcement and health professionals attended the dedication of the college’s new Center of Excellence in Precision Medicine and Responses to Bioterrorism and Disasters. The center, the 11th “Center of Excellence” in the state and the first in the Hudson Valley, was supported in part by a $500,000 grant from the state, according to state Sen. Terrence Murphy.

NYMC Leadership: 
Robert W. Amler, M.D., M.B.A., dean of the School of Health Sciences and Practice and vice president for government affairs
Alan Kadish, M.D., president

The New York Medical College is making major investments in its Valhalla facility, hoping to become a leader in bioterrorism and disaster training. The college unveiled the new center devoted to helping train medical professionals and first responders how to identify, manage and treat victims of biological and chemical attacks. The facility, which is being run out of the medical college, will be called the Center for Excellence. Officials say it will offer the kind of repetitive specialized training normally only available at military facilities. Dr. Robert Almer says his goal is to make sure first responders can handle any disaster that could arise. "If you don't practice, what you learn, suffers and begins to fade away," he says. The center is coming to fruition due to large grants from state politicians. Officials say they hope it’s fully operational in a couple of months.

NYMC Leadership: 
Robert W. Amler, M.D., M.B.A., dean of the School of Health Sciences and Practice and vice president for government affairs
Michael J. Reilly, Dr.P.H. ’10, M.P.H., Director of Center for Disaster Medicine, Associate Professor of Environmental Health Science, and Associate Professor of Clinical Emergency Medicine

NYMC Leadership: Robert W. Amler, M.D., M.B.A., dean of the School of Health Sciences and Practice and vice president for government affairs

The New York Medical College unveils 'Center of Excellence' Video.

NYMC Leadership: Robert W. Amler, M.D., M.B.A., dean of the School of Health Sciences and Practice and vice president for government affairs

New research confirms that psychiatric patients are at high risk for suicide immediately after being discharged from a mental health care facility, and that risk can remain high for years. "Discharged patients have suicide rates many times that in the general community," said a team led by Matthew Michael Large of the University of New South Wales in Australia. One psychiatrist in the United States said the study highlights the need to help patients long after they've been discharged from care.

Dr. Ami Baxi directs adult inpatient services at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City. She agreed that the study "emphasizes the importance of closely monitoring patients who were recently discharged from a hospital and patients who were admitted with suicidal ideation or behaviors."

NYMC Faculty: Ami S. Baxi M.D., instructor of psychiatry & behavioral sciences

Westchester Community College and The Touro College and University System will work together to streamline the process for WCC nursing graduates to receive a bachelor’s degree from Touro. The Valhalla community college and Touro, the nonprofit school system that operates New York Medical College, signed an articulation agreement on WCC’s campus May 18. The agreement will provide a streamlined transfer process for Westchester Community College’s graduates with an associate degree in nursing to enter the bachelor of science in nursing program offered by Touro. The program, offered by the Touro School of Health Sciences, is called the Registered Nurse to Bachelor of Science in Nursing, or RN to BSN. Starting in fall 2017, the Touro will offer the RN to BSN program on the New York Medical College campus in Valhalla.

NYMC Leadership: Edward C. Halperin, M.D., M.A., chancellor and chief executive officer

The induction was part the YWCA White Plains & Central Westchester's 9th annual In the Company Women luncheon on Friday, May 12 at the Doubletree in Tarrytown. This year’s honorees at the luncheon were Millie Hernandez-Becker, president and CEO of Skyqueen Enterprises; YWCA Board member, Patricia Mulqueen; Dr. Jin Li, neurologist with Westchester Medical Center. Keynote speaker for the occasion was Lauren Leader- Chivèe, co-founder and CEO of All in Together, a nonprofit campaign dedicated to engaging American women in politics and civic action. YWCA board member and Global Head of Bloomberg Corporate Communications, Monica Bertran, served as Master of Ceremonies.

NYMC Faculty: Jin Li, M.D., Ph.D., clinical associate professor of neurology

On May 13th, 2017 nine highly accomplished Iranian Americans, including IA-100 member Mohammed Farzaneh, were awarded the 2017 Ellis Island Medal of Honor for outstanding achievement in their personal and professional lives, as well as their commitment to the preservation of their Iranian culture and heritage and noteworthy citizenship to the United States.

The U.S. Congress sanctions the Ellis Island Medals of Honor and recipients' names are listed in the Congressional Record. Six Presidents of the United States, Nobel Prize winners, athletes, leaders of industry, artists, and others are among the remarkable group of individuals to have received the award. One of the 2017 Iranian American honorees is Shaheen Tedjarati: Dr. Tedjarati is the Associate Director of OB/GYN and Chief of Gynecologic Oncology & Robotic Surgery and an Associate Professor at New York Medical College and Westchester Medical Center Health Network.

NYMC Faculty: Sean Shaheen Tedjarati, M.D., M.P.H., associate professor of obstetrics and gynecology

The study involved just 10 boys, aged 5 to 14, with autism. This was the first human trial to attempt to replicate encouraging results seen in work with mice, the researchers noted. The drug is called suramin. Dr. Matthew Lorber, a child and adolescent psychiatrist with Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, reacted to the findings with caution. "The improvement in the children studied was robust," he noted, "which is cause for hope, since we do not have any approved treatments for the root of autism. "Unfortunately," Lorber added, "the study was so small -- only five children actually received the medication -- that we cannot come to any real conclusions." The upshot, Lorber said, is that "until suramin is tested in a much larger group of people with autism, we cannot move ahead using it as a potential treatment. In addition, suramin in traditional doses can have serious side effects, and it is important that doctors do not start using it for children with autism because the data is scant, and we need much more scientific research."

NYMC Faculty: Matthew Lorber, M.D., M.P.A., clinical assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences

Nora V. Bergasa, MD, Chief of Medicine at NYC Health + Hospitals/Metropolitan, was recognized with the 2017 Heritage Innovation in Healthcare Delivery Award, presented by Heritage Provider Network, the nation’s leading physician-led managed care organization, and Crain’s Custom Studio. The award recognizes an innovator in the development of new modes of diagnosis, treatment, and care who actively improves the delivery of services and improves the quality of health care. The winners were announced at a luncheon at the New York Athletic Club.

NYMC Faculty: Nora Bergasa, M.D., professor of medicine

The Zika virus may have undergone a genetic mutation that enabled it to become the serious public health concern we are battling today, according to the latest research from a team of researchers from the U.S. and China. In a paper published in Nature the researchers explain that Zika virus isolates from the recent outbreak in the Americas were much more infectious in mosquitoes than Zika virus isolates collected in Cambodia in 2010. The increase in the virus’s infectivity in mosquito was likely due to a genetic mutation found in a particular non-structural protein. “This research helped us understand how and why the Zika virus, which we’ve known about since the 1940s, suddenly spread so quickly,” said Pei-Yong Shi, a professor at The University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston. “The current study used a well-adapted laboratory mosquito strains. The next step is to examine whether field mosquitoes could recapitulate the same conclusion.” The researchers who participated in this work included scientists from The University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, along with collaborators from Dr. Gong Cheng’s team at the Tsinghua University, and other participants from the Shenzhen Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the Institute of Microbiology and Epidemiology, the Southern University of Science and Technology, and the New York Medical College.

Four Ossining High School students who qualified for an all-expense paid trip to the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair each won special awards at the competition this month. Also in the cellular and molecular biology category, the team of Lior Raz-Farley and Michelle Zhang received an honorable mention from the American Statistical Association. They presented research on the significant effects of natural killer cell migration through the blood brain barrier may have on infantile spasms, a form of epilepsy. This dynamic duo worked together at New York Medical College this past summer.

NYMC Faculty: Lior Raz-Farley and Michelle Zhang were mentored by Jana Veliskova, M.D., Ph.D., professor of cell biology and anatomy, obstetrics and gynecology and neurology, and Libor Velísek, M.D., Ph.D., professor of cell biology and anatomy, pediatrics, and neurology

NYMC Leadership: Alan Kadish, M.D., president