UH building its health care credentials

Jan-Åke Gustafsson was the first big-name scientist recruited by the University of Houston for its health initiative, but if things go according to plan, the Swedish researcher soon will be joined by other research rock stars.

UH President Renu Khator announced last year that health would be one of her “big rocks,” the broad areas on which she expects the university to build its reputation.

Already, health-related studies account for more than half of the university’s research grants — $61 million for the 2009 fiscal year — out of a total of $110 million. That includes not only basic science and biomedical engineering, but such areas as health law and health policy.

After decades of isolated efforts, UH has grown serious about becoming a player in Houston’s health care and research scene. New administrators have been added, including Pharmacy Dean Lamar Pritchard and Kathryn Peek, who was hired to run the health initiative, and recruiting for faculty is under way.

Texas Medical Center ties

UH officially became a member of the Texas Medical Center earlier this year, the second school to be granted the status, although several have membership for one program. Rice University was the first.

Richard Wainerdi, the Medical Center’s chief executive, said UH already is involved in dozens of collaborations with members, including one involving Baylor College of Medicine and Michael E. DeBakey High School for Health Professions, which allows students to earn an undergraduate degree at UH and a medical degree at Baylor.

But official membership will streamline the process, Wainerdi said. “I think what we’re seeing is a new kind of working together,” he said. Khator, who is also chancellor of the UH system, said her “big rocks” came from suggestions during her first 100 days on the job. The top research-related suggestions were health, energy and the arts, reflecting the strengths of the city itself.

“With the largest medical facility in the world, it really makes sense for us to have health as a big rock,” Khator said.

Peek was hired to run the initiative last summer, recruited from the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, where she was director of education programs.

UH has long been a training ground for institutions in the Medical Center — providing medical students, researchers, technicians, accountants and administrators. The opening of a nursing school at UH-Victoria, with many classes offered in Sugar Land, increased the ties.

Some of the pharmacy school’s faculty and staff have been located in the Medical Center for years, while other parts of the program are on the main campus.

Gustafsson was recruited last winter with the help of a $5.5 million grant from the Texas Emerging Technology Fund and The Methodist Hospital, which joined with UH to create the Center for Nuclear Receptors and Cell Signaling.

But Khator said official medical center membership will make that kind of connection easier — from recruiting to submitting joint research proposals and doing the actual work.

Building a work force

UH also will expand its degree programs to better meet the work force needs.

“We know health care reform, in whatever direction it goes, is going to expand the number of people with health insurance,” Peek said. That means more health care providers will be needed, as well as more health care economists, lawyers and other related specialties, she said.

One thing won’t happen, according to Peek: UH will not open its own medical school. The school talked with Weill Cornell Medical School, part of Cornell University in Ithica, N.Y., about opening a medical school in 2007.