Omaha, Neb – Coming off its busiest year yet, the heart failure and cardiac transplant program at The Nebraska Medical Center is adding to its reputation for excellence.

With a reputation for excellence, innovation and extraordinary patient care, The Nebraska Medical Center has earned J.D. Power and Associates’ Hospital of Distinction award for inpatient services for four consecutive years. It also received the 2010 Consumer Choice Award, a mark of patient satisfaction as selected by healthcare consumers and has achieved Magnet recognition status for nursing excellence, Thomson Reuters 100 Top Hospitals Performance Improvement Leader recognition, as well as the Award of Progress from the state of Nebraska’s Edgerton Quality Awards Program. As the teaching hospital for the University of Nebraska Medical Center, this 624 licensed bed academic medical center has an international reputation for providing solid organ and bone marrow transplantation services and is well known nationally and regionally for its oncology, neurology and cardiology programs. The Nebraska Medical Center can be found online atwww.nebraskamed.com

2010 was the first year the American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM) offered certification for heart failure and cardiac transplantation. Ioana Dumitru, MD, heart failure specialist and transplant cardiologist at the medical center was among the first group of cardiologists in the U.S. to earn the certification.

Earning the certification requires a specialist physician to demonstrate superior skills and knowledge in all areas related to cardiology including pulmonary hypertension and mechanical assist devices. She is one of just 250 physicians in the U.S. to earn this certification.

“This certification continues to demonstrate our commitment to extraordinary patient care,” said Jorge Parodi, executive director of cardiovascular and pulmonary services at The Nebraska Medical Center. “It also recognizes Dr. Dumitru’s commitment to excellence in her clinical specialty. All these accolades elevate our program to the highest level and continue to set a new standard for patient care.”

Dr. Dumitru believes her individual certification will lead to improvements in the medical center’s clinical, educational and research areas.

“It should give patients greater confidence about the standards of quality care we provide here,” she said. “It offers up the opportunity for growth in research. It will also allow us to create a fellowship to train other specialists in this area.”

In 2010, The Nebraska Medical Center performed 21 heart transplants, a 50-percent increase over 2009. Dr. Dumitru believes increased use of the recently approved mechanical assist devices have played a big role in the program’s growth. She also credits the transplant program’s expansion to the growing expertise and reputation for excellence at The Nebraska Medical Center and its academic and research partner The University of Nebraska Medical Center.

Omaha, Neb – Ann Connealy lived her first 50 years without ever being a patient in a hospital. Her run of good luck ended with a diagnosis of cancer of the appendix in 2007. After an appendectomy and six rounds of chemotherapy, she was cautiously optimistic.

Three years later, the Pilger, Neb resident was back in the hospital. Her cancer had returned. But instead of feeling unlucky, Connealy said she felt fortunate to be in Nebraska, when her doctor in Norfolk referred her to Jason Foster, MD, a surgical oncologist at The Nebraska Medical Center who specializes in a new and emerging treatment for abdominal cancer.

“He does not give up,” Connealy said. “He operated on me for more than 12 hours. He did everything.”

Dr. Foster is one of a very small number of surgical oncologists in the United States practicing this approach.

During the operation, Dr. Foster removed all the visible cancer from Connealy’s organs. Then, using a process known as hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (HIPEC) or hot chemo, he and the surgical team bathed her organs in a heated solution of chemotherapy to kill the microscopic cancer cells which almost certainly still remained.

“With this approach, we do the surgery and the chemo all at once,” Dr. Foster explained. “It complements the IV chemotherapy she received and allows us to treat the organ surfaces and inner abdominal walls which could have been exposed to the cancer.

The typical course or conventional approach for a patient like Connealy would be multiple surgeries to remove some of the tumors, followed by multiple rounds of chemotherapy each time her disease recured. Unfortunately, 65-80 percent of abdominal cancers like Conealy’s will recur, Dr. Foster said. And in Conealy’s case her tumor did recur 2-3 years after traditional therapy.

The hot chemo (HIPEC) approach is well-suited for treating cancer in the abdominal cavity since the organs and inner abdominal wall are at risk, and the cancer cells can spread from one area to another.

After removing the visible tumors, surgeons close the abdomen, and fill the abdominal cavity with the heated chemo and bathe all the organs with the solution.

The cancer-fighting benefit does not just come from the high dose chemo solution itself.

“Cancer cells do not dissipate heat well and can be killed by heat; we know that from research,” Dr. Foster said. “So for this to work, we had to find a temperature warm enough to kill the cancer cells, but not too hot to damage the healthy tissue inside the body.”

That temperature is 42 degrees Celsius, or 108 degrees Fahrenheit.

Hot chemo treatments can be used for some patients with ovarian and colorectal cancer, and is the primary treatment for cancer of the appendix and peritoneal mesothelioma.

“The exact treatment is different for each patient and depends on the type of cancer they have,” Dr. Foster said. “But the concept is generally the same.”

Patients who are candidates for hot chemo treatment are facing very steep odds. They are typically stage four cancer patients and in many cases have already experienced surgery and chemotherapy.

“Ideally we would like to see all patients at the time of diagnosis to avoid multiple surgeries but often patients are not aware of this option until they relapse”, said Dr Foster.

For some people, the treatment has the potential to save a life. In others, it is used to make the remaining months or years more tolerable.

“In some cases, it’s a quality of life issue,” said Dr. Foster. “A patient may be looking at spending what time they have left undergoing traditional chemo and the side effects that sometimes come with it. For the

right person, this can be a viable alternative; improving their quality of life

and potentially extending their survival.

  “There is more research to be done,” Dr. Foster said. “Can this approach work in other parts of the body? Maybe.”

Ann Connealy’s outlook is positive. Her surgery behind her, her future will hold at least a few traditional chemotherapy treatments.

“It’s just to be sure there’s nothing else still there,” she said. “But I have a good gut feeling this time.”

With a reputation for excellence, innovation and extraordinary patient care, The Nebraska Medical Center has earned J.D. Power and Associates’ Hospital of Distinction award for inpatient services for four consecutive years. It also received the 2009 Consumer Choice Award, a mark of patient satisfaction as selected by healthcare consumers and has achieved Magnet recognition status for nursing excellence, Thomson Reuters 100 Top Hospitals Performance Improvement Leader recognition, as well as the Award of Progress from the state of Nebraska’s Edgerton Quality Awards Program. As the teaching hospital for the University of Nebraska Medical Center, this 624 licensed bed academic medical center has an international reputation for providing solid organ and bone marrow transplantation services and is well known nationally and regionally for its oncology, neurology and cardiology programs. The Nebraska Medical Center can be found online at

www.nebraskamed.com

Chief, Division of Hematology/Oncology and Professor of Medicine at the University of Nebraska Medical Center
Since being elected to the Lymphoma Research Foundation’s (LRF) Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) in 2001, Dr. Julie Vose, the Neumann M. and Mildred E. Harris Professorial Chair and Chief of the Oncology/Hematology Section in the Department of Internal Medicine at the University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC), has taken an active role in the Foundation’s leadership. Along with new SAB member Ranjana Advani, MD, Dr. Vose has formed a new LRF consortium focusing on T-cell lymphoma, which develops from abnormal T-lymphocytes. The group plans to hold meetings to discuss standards of care, conduct clinical trials and potentially award grants and hold workshops in the future assuming fundraising efforts are successful. 
 
“LRF has witnessed great success with its Mantle Cell Lymphoma Consortium, so the T-cell consortium is hoping to have similar impact in identifying new potential targets for therapies and having interactive multidisciplinary research grants funded by the LRF,” she said.

 
 
Dr. Vose has also contributed to countless other LRF programs and publications. She has served as an expert consultant for LRF’s Chicago Lymphoma Rounds program for the past two years. In this role, she reviews and approves case study presentations for Continuing Medical Education credits at the events which draw leading lymphoma experts from across the Greater Chicago area. She is a frequent member of the speaking faculty for the national Lymphoma Workshop program and co-chaired the North American Educational Forum on Lymphoma in 2008. In 2009, she was a speaker for LRF’s teleconference “Update on Lymphoma Treatment Options from the 2009 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting” and she has served as a contributor and an editor for the Foundation’s numerous patient resources, including disease-specific booklets and fact sheets.
As a medical student at the University of Nebraska Medical School, Dr. Vose, curious about new discoveries and treatments in the field of lymphoma, pursued her research interests with distinguished researcher, James Armitage, MD. She is proud of the fact that based on findings from this research, “we are able to modify treatments to be more specific for subtypes of lymphomas.”  After medical school, Dr. Vose completed both her residency and fellowship at UNMC.

 
Driven by the exhilaration of new discoveries and enhancements in therapies, Dr. Vose now focuses her research on novel therapies for different subtypes of lymphomas. As for what she finds most exciting in modern lymphoma research, Dr. Vose said, “gene expression and [Single Nucleotide Polymorphism] work that is going on in individual lymphomas, which may direct patients’ individualized therapy in the future.”

 
 
Dr. Vose has played a significant role in moving several novel agent lymphoma treatments from Phase I to Phase II and Phase III clinical trials. She recently completed a Phase III trial in the Blood and Marrow Transplant Clinical Trials Network on the Bexxar/BEAM protocol, which focused on the addition of radiolabeled antibodies to high dose chemotherapy and autologous stem cell transplantation.

 
Her research has led her to be an advisor and member of several advisory boards. Most recently, the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) elected Dr. Vose to the Undesignated Specialty seat on its Board of Directors. Her 3-year term started in June and she is the only lymphoma specialist on the 20-member board.

 
When asked for the most important piece of advice she would give to a newly diagnosed lymphoma patient, Dr. Vose said “to conduct plenty of research and to make sure to be treated by a lymphoma specialist.”

Posted: Lymphoma Research Foundation News

An Omaha man is recovering well today after undergoing an historic operation at The Nebraska Medical Center on May 18. David Gildea was the first patient at the medical center to receive a combined heart and kidney transplant.

 
“This is an exciting milestone for our transplant program,” said John Um, M.D., heart transplant surgeon at The Nebraska Medical Center. “This is a vital treatment option for patients in our region who have advanced heart failure and renal disease.”

 
Before transplant, Gildea had end-stage heart disease and his kidneys were barely functioning, requiring daily dialysis.

 
“Medically speaking, he was about as sick as a person can get,” said Clifford Miles, M.D., nephrologist at The Nebraska Medical Center.

 
Even at a medical center which routinely handles complex cases requiring multi-disciplinary care, Gildea’s case necessitated a remarkable amount of highly specialized expertise; bringing together experts from five different medical specialties.

 
“Very few heart transplant programs in the world will perform a multi-organ transplant for an extremely sick patient, said Eugenia Raichlin, M.D., cardiologist at The Nebraska Medical Center. “The care for this patient required the skills of an experienced and sophisticated team of transplant surgeons, hematologists and renal and cardiovascular disease specialists.”
Dr. Raichlin adds that advanced renal disease in the presence of severe heart failure has traditionally been a reason to exclude heart failure patients from a heart transplant. “Patients in this particular condition have faced insurmountable odds,” said Dr. Raichlin. “With simultaneous heart and kidney transplantation, we are able to offer more of the high-risk heart disease patients a reason for hope.”

 
Surgery began at 5:30 p.m. on Tues., May 18 and continued until 1:00 a.m. the next morning. The patient’s heart was transplanted first, followed immediately by the kidney.

 
“Once we were confident that the new heart was working well, we knew the patient could tolerate the kidney transplant,” said Dr. Um.

 
An Uncommon Operation
A combined heart and kidney transplant is not a common procedure. Data from the United Network of Organ Sharing (UNOS) shows there were only a total of 60 combined heart and kidney transplants performed in the nation last year in comparison to 362 combined liver and kidney transplants and 16,831 isolated kidney transplants.

 
“This is not a technically difficult operation,” said Michael Morris, M.D., kidney transplant surgeon at The Nebraska Medical Center. “The reason these operations are relatively rare is because there are not many robust heart transplant programs in the nation. The fact that The Nebraska Medical Center can now perform these transplants is a huge credit to the growing success of our heart transplant program.”

 
The Nebraska Medical Center transplant team anticipates there will be a growing need for combined heart and kidney transplants. According to Dr. Miles, many patients who suffer from long-term heart failure also have significant renal disease. The two problems often co-exist because a weakened heart cannot pump blood sufficiently to the kidneys or because the kidneys have been damaged by other cardiovascular conditions such as hypertension or diabetes.

 
At age 61, David Gildea says he had been in great shape until recently, eating well and exercising every day since his teenage years.

 
“For more than forty years, I ran about two to three miles a day and lifted weights,” said Gildea. But one day, about a year ago, he says he couldn’t find the energy to run. “I was alarmed,” he said. He quickly got worse. “I had a hard time doing anything. It would take me a few hours to get dressed every morning.”

 
“He was exhausted just walking from the bedroom to the living room,” said Gildea’s girlfriend, Karen Rech. “It was to the point that every time he moved, I was in constant fear of losing him.”

 
A biopsy revealed amyloid (pronounced AM’-i-loyd) protein deposits in Gildea’s kidneys and heart. His physician suspected Gildea had amyloidosis, a rare blood disease affecting only eight of every one million people. People who have the disease have abnormal deposits of amyloid in their tissue or organs. Harm results when the deposits cause the organs to malfunction. The disease is rapidly disabling and life-threatening. In Gildea’s case, his heart and kidneys were affected.

 
“I had never heard of amyloidosis,” said Gildea. “I was told it was a very rare disease, and that most people don’t survive it.”

 
Dr. Raichlin had trained at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., a center which specializes in amyloidosis, and knew about an aggressive treatment for the disease – a multi-organ transplant followed by a blood stem cell transplant.

 
“I knew our medical center had the expertise to help this patient,” said Dr. Raichlin. “Plus, we had to act quickly; David didn’t have a lot of time. I suggested this innovative treatment.”

 
Immediately following his heart and kidney transplant, Gildea said he felt like a new person. “I wasn’t short of breath when I went for a walk. I had stamina again.” His friends said they also noticed he could think more clearly.

 
Another Transplant to Come
As amyloidosis is normally a fatal disease, Gildea will require high-dose chemotherapy followed by an autologous blood stem cell transplant to halt the progression of the disease towards his transplanted organs. Edward Faber Jr., DO, MS, hematopoietic stem cell transplant specialist at The Nebraska Medical Center plans to prepare Gildea for this treatment over the next three months.

 
“Many patients with amyloidosis have advanced organ disease or are too old to benefit from this type of intensive treatment,” said Dr. Faber. “Usually, heart and kidney failure from amyloidosis are contraindications to this type of therapy, but Gildea is now eligible for the treatment due to the successful combined heart and kidney transplant.”

 
Gildea will receive an autologous blood stem cell transplant, which means that he will have his own blood stem cells collected and stored in liquid nitrogen. He then will receive high-dose chemotherapy to damage the blood stem cells which are causing the amyloidosis. After chemotherapy, Gildea’s stored blood stem cells will be reintroduced to replace the damaged blood stem cells.

 
Gildea Continues Positive Attitude
“Although I was deeply concerned when I was first diagnosed, a positive attitude has gotten me through the tough times,” said Gildea. “As the father of severely handicapped 29 year old twins, I have had a lot of hard days in my life. I know I still have a long road ahead with my treatment. My goal has always been to not complain.”

 
Before he went into the transplant operation, Gildea says he was asked, “How can you be so calm?” His response, “I know the outcome.” This is the kind of attitude that will help Gildea through the next steps of his treatment.

The findings appear in the March 1 issue of the Journal of Immunology.

“This could be a revolutionary means for Parkinson’s disease therapeutics,” said Howard Gendelman, M.D., chairman of the department of pharmacology and experimental neuroscience (PEN), who partnered with R. Lee Mosley, Ph.D., to lead the research. “It has been a long journey representing more than 10 years of hard work by our research team.”

UNMC researchers reversed the neurodegenerative effects of alpha synuclein by changing immune responses to it.

In mice with an experimental form of Parkinson’s disease, researchers found that the vaccine enabled T cells to migrate to the damaged area of the brain and triggered a neuroprotective response that reduced disease-linked reactions in the brain.

T cells are white blood cells that are key to immune response. They act like soldiers who search out and destroy the targeted invaders.

Other contributors:
Graduate students, Ashley Reynolds, Ph.D., David Stone and Jessica Hutter, contributed to the study.
 
 
Additional work is needed to determine how to safely translate the study results into a therapy for humans, Dr. Gendelman said.

Human studies are being conducted at the University of Alabama-Birmingham and within the next month at UNMC to determine if the immune deficits seen in mice also are present in humans with Parkinson’s disease. Such studies are required before vaccine trials are performed in humans, Dr. Gendelman said.

“Early results are encouraging,” said Dr. Mosley, an associate professor in the PEN department, who noted that the research could open new doors for treatment of Parkinson’s and other neurodegenerative disorders.

UNMC’s technology transfer company, UNeMed, has filed a patent application on the vaccine and soon will talk to commercial partners about bringing the vaccine to the clinical setting.

 
 
 
Date Published: Tuesday, March 2, 2010 

Chad Kimpel said it with a smile.

“I died. Multiple times.”

The 41 year old father of three from Farragut, IA first came to The Nebraska Medical Center on July 1, 2009. That was the day of the heart attack.

“My heart stopped before they got me on the life flight chopper to get here,” Kimpel recalled. “They shocked me and brought me back, but the doctor said I died several more times on the flight here. They kept bringing me back.”

Once at the medical center, Kimpel was diagnosed with heart failure. Treatments had him in and out of the hospital several times in the following months. When he returned to the medical center in January, his heart was working at just a fraction of its potential and his remaining arteries blocked. Kimpel’s cardiologists decided to place a stent in his artery.

A new type of heart pump allowed doctors to place the stents while Kimpel’s damaged heart continued to work. Instead of preparing for major heart surgery, Kimpel’s doctors placed the Impella 2.5 in his heart inside a cardiac catheterization lab at The Nebraska Medical Center. He was sedated, but awake during the procedure.

“The Impella acts almost like an artificial heart,” explained Ed O’Leary, MD, cardiologist at The Nebraska Medical Center. “Without this machine, his blood pressure would drop to dangerously low levels and he might not make it through the procedure.”

Dr. O’Leary inserted the Impella pump through the femoral artery in Kimpel’s left leg. He then guided it through his body into his heart. Once in place, the straw-sized pump assisted Kimpel’s heart by pulling blood out of the left ventricle and into the aorta. By keeping his blood flowing, the cardiology team was able to keep Kimpel’s blood pressure stable while placing the stents in his artery. Once the stents were placed, the Impella pump was removed and Kimpel’s heart was pumping blood through a newly cleared artery.

“Dr. O’Leary told me it was as close as I could get to having a new artery,” Kimpel said.

The Impella is designed to help the heart for short periods of time.

“There are machines that do the work of the heart,” Dr. O’Leary said. “Those bypass machines are used during open heart surgery. During those surgeries, the heart is stopped and the bypass machine does the work of the heart. Bypass surgery would have been very risky for Chad. With as weak as his heart was, it might have been very difficult to get his heart re-started after surgery.”

Instead of a long and risky open heart surgery, Kimpel’s angioplasty took only two hours. The Impella carried part of his heart’s workload for much of that time.

After the procedure, Kimpel was all smiles.

“I feel great,” he said with a laugh. “The technology is amazing. They put this little turbocharger in my heart and I feel great!”

Kimpel will have close follow up care with his cardiology team at the medical center. A carefully designed diet and exercise plan awaits him back home in Iowa.

“I’ve always been in good shape and kind of a health food nut,” he said. “But I’ll have to be extra careful about salt, and about doing too much exercise.”

The Impella was approved by the FDA in June of 2008.

Dr. Ed O’Leary (right) places the Impella 2.5 into the left femoral artery
of angioplasty patient Chad Kimpel

by Tom O’Connor, UNMC public relations

 
(EDITOR’S NOTE: The following story originally appeared in the Fall 2009 edition of UNMC Discover.

 Julia Bridge, M.D., has a unique skill set that makes her a true Sherlock Holmes in the pathology world.

She specializes in analyzing bone and soft tissue tumors, and she’s one of the best in the world.

A professor of pathology and microbiology at UNMC, Dr. Bridge will be honored next year by Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC) in New York for her contributions to advance knowledge of human cancer. She will receive the prestigious Fred W. Stewart Award, which honors a top pathologist each year.

“Cancer cytogenetics is one of the foundations of our growing understanding of human cancer that is driving improved diagnosis and therapy,” said Marc Ladanyi, M.D., chief of MSKCC’s Molecular Diagnostics Service in the department of pathology. “Through her career-long effort in this area, Dr. Bridge has not only put UNMC on the map, she has made it a world capital in this field.”

There are more than 100 different types of bone and soft tissue cancers and many types exhibit overlapping clinical, radiographic and microscopic features, so making the correct diagnosis is challenging.

New genetic findings — at least 40 of which have been discovered by Dr. Bridge and her laboratory team — allow pathologists to more precisely identify and classify these tumors.

“Once we know the exact type of cancer, the clinician can provide the most appropriate therapy with the highest chance of delivering a successful outcome,” she said.

One tumor-specific genetic change identified by Dr. Bridge’s team is the 12;22 rearrangement in clear cell sarcoma.

“Cancer cytogenetics is one of the foundations of our growing understanding of human cancer that is driving improved diagnosis and therapy. … Dr. Bridge has not only put UNMC on the map, she has made it a world capital in this field.”-Marc Ladanyi, M.D.
 

This cancer may appear clinically and microscopically identical to the deadly skin cancer malignant melanoma. Recognition of this molecular marker has become fundamental in differentiating it from malignant melanoma.

Dr. Bridge’s team tries to identify additional markers of diagnostic and prognostic importance and develop more rational classification schemes that will impact clinical management and therapy election.

“We’re looking at the underlying genetic changes and the molecular consequences of those changes,” she said. “Many tumors have a characteristic genetic change that is exclusive to that tumor.

“Once we recognize this change, it’s like a domino effect. We can then specifically target these genes as well as other genes further down the pathway.”
 
 
Date Published: Thursday, December 31, 2009

by Vicky Cerino, UNMC public relations

Julie Vose, M.D., has been elected to the board of directors of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO).

Dr. Vose, the Neumann M. and Mildred E. Harris Professorial Chair and chief of section of hematology/oncology, begins her four-year term in June.

 ASCO — the world’s leading professional organization — represents physicians who treat people with cancer. It also sets the standard for patient care worldwide and leads the way in clinical research to improve the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of cancer.

“This is a very exciting opportunity for UNMC to be involved in setting national health care standards and policies in hematology and oncology,” said Dr. Vose, one of the country’s leading experts on lymphoma. “It will give us a voice and a seat at the table with other oncology leaders from around the country and world to improve oncology clinical care, research, and education.”

Dr. Vose’s election to the board is a testimony to her expertise and international recognition in clinical oncology, said Lynell Klassen, M.D., professor and chairman of the UNMC Department of Internal Medicine.

“It reflects what she’s done,” he said. “To be elected at this level by a group of peers is truly noteworthy.”

Dr. Vose is principal investigator or co-investigator of two National Cancer Institute grants and other clinical research grants totaling more than $6 million. She has authored or co-authored 240 manuscripts, 40 book chapters and 230 abstracts and has given more than 400 lectures and presentations internationally.

Date Published: Thursday, January 7, 2010

The Nebraska Medical team’s first visit to KFSH-D lasted for three days. During their visit they surveyed several hospital departments, met with the departments’ administrators and consultants, and attended presentations about the specialized services each department provides.

The Nebraska Medical Center, is known for its specialization in Bone Marrow and Organ Transplant, it is also known for their Advanced Epilepsy Center. Nebraska Medical Center has shared its experience with a number of international centers including China, India and King Faisal Hospital in Jeddah. And now, KFSH-D will be added to the list.

Dr. Nizar Mamdani, the Executive Director of International Health Services said that he was very impressed with the leadership and enthusiasm of the consultants and staff of the hospital; he has high hopes for future collaborative efforts set to happen, as he states “Our Goals are alike”.

A total of 192 physicians who practice at The Nebraska Medical Center have been recognized on this year’s list of Best Doctors in America®. The doctors include 156 full and part-time faculty at the University of Nebraska Medical Center and who are also affiliated with UNMC Physicians, the UNMC practice group.

The list of physicians was excerpted from the Best Doctors in America® 2009-2010 database of over 45,000 doctors in more than 40 specialties, which represents the top 3 to 5 percent of specialists in the country.

Physicians are selected on the basis of the question: “If you or a loved one needed a doctor in your specialty, to whom would you refer them?” A peer-review survey by thousands of doctors determines the doctors included in the database. Only those doctors who earn the consensus support of their peers are included and only physicians in the Best Doctors database are allowed to receive the survey, nominate others and vote.

Best Doctors in America® was founded in 1989 by two physicians affiliated with Harvard Medical School and is today a leading resource to those seeking medical advice and information.

The Nebraska Medical Center physicians featured in the 2009-2010 database are identified below.

UNMC Physicians

Joseph C. Anderson, Radiology
Dean L. Antonson, Pediatric Specialist
Kimberly Ann Apker, Radiology
James O. Armitage, Medical Oncology and Hematology
Hari Bandla, Pediatric Specialist
Teri Jo Barkoukis, Sleep Medicine
Teresa Grace Berg, Obstetrics and Gynecology
John M. Bertoni, Neurology
Joel Bessmer, Internal Medicine
Philip J. Bierman, Medical Oncology and Hematology
Jean Frederick Botha, Surgery
Susan Boust, Psychiatry
Julia A. Bridge, Medical Genetics & Pathology
Bruce A. Buehler, Medical Genetics
William J. Burke, Psychiatry
Wing C. (John) Chan, Pathology
Peter F. Coccia, Pediatric Specialist
Samuel M. (Sam) Cohen, Pathology
John L. Colombo, Pediatric Specialist  
Kevin P. Corley, Pediatric Specialist
Kenneth H. Cowan, Medical Oncology and Hematology
David A. Danford, Pediatric Specialist
Cyrus Victor DeSouza, Endocrinology and Metabolism
Kim F. Duncan, Pediatric Specialist
Arthur R. Easley, Cardiovascular Disease
Catherine M. Eberle, Geriatric Medicine
James Edney, Surgical Oncology
Charles A. Enke, Radiation Oncology
Christopher C. Erickson, Pediatric Specialist
Paul Esposito, Pediatric Specialist
Pierre B. Fayad, Neurology
Edward Vincent Fehringer, Orthopaedic Surgery
David Finken, Pediatrics
Mark H. Fleisher, Psychiatry
Kenneth A. Follett, Neurological Surgery & Pain Medicine
Alison Gail Freifeld, Infectious Disease
Kevin L. Garvin, Orthopaedic Surgery
James Gigantelli, Ophthalmology
Glen M. Ginsburg, Pediatric Specialist
Dennis P. Goeschel, Family Medicine
John L. Gollan, Gastroenterology & Hepatology
Whitney Sears Goldner, Endocrinology and Metabolism
Bruce Gordon, Pediatric Specialist
Carl Greiner, Psychiatry
Timothy Greiner, Pathology
Carl H. Gumbiner, Pediatric Specialist
Jud W. Gurney, Radiology
Daniel E. Halm, Family Medicine
James Martin Hammel, Thoracic Surgery
Christine P. Hans, Pathology
Jeffrey Harrison, Family Medicine
Brian Hasley, Pediatric Specialist
Kristie Denise Hayes, Dermatology
Leslie Hellbusch, Pediatric Specialist/Neurological Surgery
Steven H. Hinrichs, Pathology
Ronald R. Hollins, Plastic Surgery 
Barbara J. Hurlbert, Anesthesiology
Thomas J. Imray, Radiology
Kimberly Jean Jarzynka, Family Medicine
Sonny L. Johansson, Pathology
Perry Johnson, Plastic Surgery
Andre Kalil, Infectious Disease
Margaret Anne Kessinger, Medical Oncology and Hematology
Lynell W. Klassen, Rheumatology
Christopher J. Kratochvil, Pediatric Specialist/Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
John Dale Kugler, Pediatric Specialist
Rudy Paul Lackner, Thoracic Surgery
Amy E. Lacroix, Pediatrics
James T. Lane, Endocrinology and Metabolism
Alan N. Langnas, Surgery
Jennifer L. Larsen, Endocrinology and Metabolism
Paul D. Larsen, Pediatric Specialist/Neurology
Audrey Lazenby, Pathology
Subodh M. Lele, Pathology
Peter J. Lennarson, Neurological Surgery
Donald A. Leopold, Otolaryngology
Gary Stephen Lerner, Pediatrics
Richard E. Lutz, Pediatric Specialist
Daniel D. Lydiatt, Otolaryngology
William M. Lydiatt, Otolaryngology
Thomas G. Lynch, Vascular Surgery
William L. Lyons, Geriatric Medicine
Lynn Mack-Shipman, Endocrinology and Metabolism
Thomas M. Magnuson, Psychiatry 
Mark E. Mailliard, Gastroenterology & Hepatology
Timothy Raymond, Malloy Geriatric Medicine
Rodney S. Markin, Pathology
Monty S. Mathews, Family Medicine
Timothy M. McCashland, Hepatology
Rodney D. McComb, Pathology
Ted Mikuls, Rheumatology
Timothy E. Moore, Radiology
Matthew A. Mormino, Orthopaedic Surgery
Debra E. Mostek, Family Medicine
Robert Muelleman, Emergency Medicine
Sandeep Mukherjee, Hepatology
Peter James Murphy, Pulmonary Medicine
Amy S. Neumeister, Endocrinology and Metabolism
J. Scott Neumeister, Internal Medicine
Nils Nystrom, Hand Surgery
David V. O’Dell, Internal Medicine
James R. O’Dell, Rheumatology
Jennifer Parker, Internal Medicine & Pediatrics
Audrey Paulman, Family Medicine
Paul M. Paulman, Family Medicine
Craig Arnold Piquette, Critical Care Medicine & Pulmonary Medicine
Samuel Pirruccello, Pathology
Sheryl L. Pitner, Pediatrics
Jill Adair Poole, Allergy and Immunology
Thomas R. Porter, Cardiovascular Disease
Jane F. Potter, Geriatric Medicine
Laurel C. Preheim, Infectious Disease
Mohammed Abdul Quader, Thoracic Surgery
Elizabeth C. Reed, Medical Oncology and Hematology
Stephen I. Rennard, Pulmonary Medicine
William Bradley Rizzo, Pediatric Specialist
William H. Roccaforte, Psychiatry
Kerry J. Rodabaugh, Obstetrics and Gynecology
Debra J. Romberger, Pulmonary Medicine & Critical Care Medicine
Mark E. Rupp, Infectious Disease
Paul H. Sammut, Pediatric Specialist
Aaron R. Sasson, Surgical Oncology & Surgery
Daniel F. Schafer, Gastroenterology & Hepatology
Susan A. Scherl, Pediatric Specialist
Tina Scott-Mordhorst, Pediatrics
Patricia Seivert, Pediatrics
Byers W. Shaw, Jr., Surgery
Vijay Shivaswamy, Endocrinology and Metabolism
Edibaldo Silva-Lopez, Surgical Oncology
Joseph H. Sisson, Critical Care Medicine & Pulmonary Medicine
Michael A. Sitorius, Family Medicine
Carl V. Smith, Obstetrics and Gynecology
John Lloyd Smith, Family Medicine
Philip W. Smith, Infectious Disease
Russell B. Smith, Otolaryngology & Surgery
Michael F. Sorrell, Hepatology
John Wesley Sparks, Pediatric Specialist/Neonatal-Perinatal Medicine
Sharon Stoolman, Pediatrics
Todd W. Stull, Psychiatry
Thomas Gerald Tape, Internal Medicine
John H. Tinker, Anesthesiology
Edward Vandenberg, Family Medicine & Geriatric Medicine
Jon A. Vanderhoof, Pediatric Specialist
Susanna Gertrude Von Essen, Critical Care Medicine & Pulmonary Medicine
Julie M. Vose, Medical Oncology and Hematology
John N. Walburn, Pediatrics
Craig W. Walker, Radiology
Phyllis I. Warkentin, Pathology
Dennis D. Weisenburger, Pathology
Steven Wengel, Psychiatry
Douglas H. Wheatley, Family Medicine
Robert Swift Wigton, Internal Medicine
John Windle, Cardiovascular Disease
James L. Wisecarver, Pathology
Renee L. Young, Gastroenterology
Weining (Ken) Zhen, Radiation Oncology

Private Practice Physicians

 
Garnet J. Blatchford, Colon and Rectal Surgery
David E. Brown, Orthopaedic Surgery
Charles Burt, Orthopaedic Surgery
Derek Burdeny, Radiology
James Canedy, Orthopaedic Surgery
John Joseph Cannella, Internal Medicine
Robert M. Cochran, Hand Surgery
James Richard Commers, Medical Oncology and Hematology
Harris A. Frankel, Neurology 
Mark E. Goebel, Orthopaedic Surgery
George Greene, Neurological Surgery
Michael A. Halsted, Ophthalmology
T. J. Holmes, Internal Medicine
Brett Kettelhut, Allergy and Immunology
Timothy K. Kingston, Surgery
Sarah B. Konigsberg, Endocrinology and Metabolism
Lonny Joe Legino, Obstetrics and Gynecology
Rodney P. Lusk, Pediatric Specialist/Otolaryngology
Paul H. Meissner, Family Medicine
Gordon S. Moshman, Family Medicine
Randall D. Neumann, Orthopaedic Surgery
Mark D. Omar, Internal Medicine
Richard K. Osterholm, Internal Medicine
William R. Palmer, Rheumatology
Douglas Ramos, Plastic Surgery
Edwin Conrad Schafer II, Gastroenterology
Joseph F. Shehan, Internal Medicine
Kent H. Siemers, Obstetrics and Gynecology
Ann Meissner Sjulin, Obstetrics and Gynecology
Karen J. Stacey, Internal Medicine
Britt A. Thedinger, Otolaryngology
Alan G. Thorson, Colon and Rectal Surgery & Surgical Oncology
Timothy O. Wahl, Endocrinology and Metabolism
Peter J. Whitted, Ophthalmology
Thomas Whittle, Vascular Surgery