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Sharon Brangman, MD, is Professor and Chair of the Department of Geriatrics and Division Chief of the Center of Excellence of Alzheimer's Disease at Upstate, which is a NYS Center of Excellence for Alzheimer's Disease. Upstate's pediatric critical care transport team now travels on Mercy Flight Central helicopters to bring care to patients even sooner. PERSONALIZED MEDICINE: FROM RESEARCH TO APPLICATION Personalized medicine is improving treat- ment or cancer, as well as of some of the infectious diseases and immunologic disorders, such as rheumatoid arthritis and lupus. Upstate recently opened a genomics laboratory and recruited top talent from around the country to help with state-of-the-art genetic testing and next-generation sequencing. "Genome sequencing panels for solid tumors a nd blood-based tumors will revolutionize pathology and oncology," Dr. Corona says. "We hope to collaborate with other institutions and share data to get a larger database with the goal of reaching more precise conclusions on tumors and their therapies. It's exciting now with immunotherapy and precision- based medicine to really personalize the treatment of patients." Upstate is also implementing a diag- nostic-based team approach in which pathologists contribute to the analysis of a case with the full medical team. They are ca lling this approach "molecular grand rounds" and it can help to direct per son a l i z ed t her apy a nd i mprove patient outcomes. "Molecular grand rounds take place when difficult-to-treat cases are presented to a team of oncologists and molecular- ba sed pat holog ists who look at new therapies, approaches and research pro- tocols for patients who are not responding well to traditional therapies," Dr. Corona says. "As a team, they discuss what tests to order to help with utilization, and then they can help interpret some of the more complex results. This aids in direction of treatment and ultimately improves patient care. Other innovations are being fostered at Upstate. "A company working out of our biotech accelerator is developing a genetic test for autism that looks at a panel of genes from saliva," Dr. Corona says. "Another test was developed here to detect certain proteins that spill into the blood after a concussion, and it just received FDA approval." PEDIATRIC TRANSPORT SERVICES The Upstate Golisano Children's Hospital serves the surrounding 17-county area, and is the only children's hospital in the region. Area air medical services save hours on the road when transporting patients from an accident scene or from a communit y hospita l to Upstate by helicopter. Now the critical care team is joining the flights to bring care to the child even more quickly. "We are partnering with Mercy Flight Central to bring the expertise and experi- ence of our pediatric intensive care unit (PICU) to a critically ill child who needs to be flown from a community hospital to our children's hospital," says Robert Newmyer, MD, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics, Neurology and Neurosurgery at SUNY Upstate Medical University and Medical Director of Pediatric Critical Care Transport. "Our critical care experts now can travel on the helicopter in order to start taking care of a patient sooner. A number of studies show specialty teams that provide pediatric critical care outside of the hospital improve outcomes. I see our team making a difference every time they get in an ambulance, and now they'll be doing the same thing in the air." To learn more about Upstate University Hospital, please visit upstate.edu. n M D N E W S . C O M /// M D N E W S C E N T R A l N E W Y O R K ■ 2 018 0 9