DukeMed Alumni News
Fall 2007

Unique, Ambitious Duke-Singapore
Graduate Medical School Opens

By Jim Rogalski

The inaugural class of 26 medical students at the Duke-National University of Singapore Graduate Medical School Singapore began classes August 1, launching an ambitious education and research partnership that is unique for U.S. medical schools.

“The faculty and students engaged in this project are true pioneers," said Robert Kamei, MD, vice dean of education at the new school at the opening ceremony, which was videocast to cheering medical students and faculty in Durham. “ The faculty have been working hard to put together an innovative program that takes the absolute best of the Duke curriculum. The students have entered this new school with great faith in our faculty to deliver this new curriculum as well as faith in the development of medical research in Singapore, which will make it one of the top biomedical science hubs in the world.”

The students and their parents were officially welcomed by Duke and Duke-NUS GMS officials and introduced to key faculty and the school’s governing board members. The day’s events culminated with a dinner.

In establishing Duke-NUS GMS, Duke becomes one of the first medical schools to offer a U.S. medical degree on foreign soil. The school is unique to the Southeast Asia region as well because it requires medical students to already have a post-secondary degree, unlike the norm there where students head to medical training straight out of high school.

It seeks university graduates and masters and PhD degree holders to enter training to become physician-scientists. Scholarships for MD students and a stipend for MD/PhD students are available from the school. Graduates of Duke-NUS GMS will receive a joint degree from Duke University and the National University of Singapore.

“I think this will be a leading medical school and research center in Asia,” says Ranga Krishnan, HS’81-’84, MB, CHB, the executive vice dean of Duke-NUS GMS and chairman of the Department of Psychiatry at Duke, who has moved to Singapore.

In addition to Duke faculty already relocated to Singapore, other Duke representatives at the opening event included Duke University trustee Charles Smith and his wife Barbara; Huntington Willard, PhD, director of the Duke Institute for Genome Sciences and Policy; Jean G. Spaulding, MD’72, HS’73-’77, associate professor of child and adolescent psychiatry; and Duke School of Medicine Senior Vice Chancellor R. Sanders “Sandy” Williams, MD’74, HS’77-’80, the founding dean of Duke-NUS GMS.

The first class being taken by the 26 inaugural students is the Foundations Course, which gives them skills in teamwork and leadership.

The Duke-NUS GMS curriculum is based on Duke’s medical school model, which allows tremendous flexibility for individual research during the third year. Duke’s commitment to research is a major reason the Singapore government sought out Duke for a partnership, which was formalized after years of dialogue between the two entities.

Durham-based Duke students and faculty will have the opportunity to ferry between the two countries for research and education.

Two Duke medical students will be spending their third year this fall in Singapore, and third-year Duke-NUS GMS students will have the opportunity to spend their third year in Durham.

Faculty partnerships between the two schools continue to be established. Duke psychiatrist Richard Keefe, PhD, for example, has collaborated with the Institute of Mental Health in Singapore. That facility has 2,000 beds and a large population of patients with chizophrenia. Krishnan says this was an ideal fit for expanding existing programs at Duke “to work with an outstanding group of individuals in Singapore to initiate studies that are likely to be of major impact.”

Michael Chee, MBBS, a Duke-NUS GMS professor of cognitive neuroscience, has established a program in Singapore similar to Duke’s Brain Imaging and Analysis Center (BIAC) and is collaborating with Duke’s Allen Song, PhD, a professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at BIAC.

BIAC brings together scientists from Duke and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill to find solutions to fundamental research questions about the human brain around two key themes. The first is to improve research techniques in neuroimaging and the understanding of brain hemodynamics. The second is to investigate the functional properties of the human brain by incorporating state-of-the-art research techniques into studies of cognitive processing.

BIAC researchers study the organization of the visual cortex, the cortical control of attention and brain circuits involved with learning and memory, among many other research topics. Chee and Song’s work focuses on imaging methodology developments and their application in aging, sleep deprivation, and the attention process.

“Mike travels back to Duke at least once a year for a few weeks,” Song says, “and I intend to spend some time (in Singapore) in the summer along with other imaging faculty members such as Scott Huettel, Marty Woldorff, and Roberto Cabeza.”

Singapore is investing $3 billion over the next five years on its ambitious Biomedical Sciences Initiative. It has offered incentives to attract companies and world-class scientists and is funding research institutes devoted to genomics, bioinformatics, bioengineering, nanotechnology, molecular and cell biology, and cancer therapies.

Part of this push is the establishment of the Duke-NUS GMS, which Duke officials have said gives Duke a major footing in Southeast Asia to pursue its goal of addressing global health issues.

In addition to Krishan, key players in the Duke-NUS GMS include:

• Duke School of Medicine Senior Vice Chancellor R. Sanders “Sandy” Williams, MD’74, HS’77-’80, acting dean of Duke-NUS GMS until a new dean is named at the completion of the 2007-08 academic year. The new dean, as well the new dean of the Duke School of Medicine will report directly to Williams.

• Patrick J. Casey, PhD, professor of pharmacology and cancer biology at Duke, is the senior vice dean in Singapore and relocated there in August 2005 to get the Duke-Singapore initiative started. He was the senior officer-in-residence at Duke-NUS GMS until this July, when Krishnan arrived as executive vice dean. As senior vice dean Casey’s responsibilities include developing the signature research programs, which include five areas: cancer and stem cell biology; neurobehavioral disorders; cardiovascular
and metabolic disorders; emerging infectious diseases; and health services research.

Fifteen faculty have been recruited to these programs, with one-third coming from Duke, one-third from Singapore, and one-third from international locations.

Casey anticipates recruiting another 35 or so as the new facility (scheduled for completion in early 2009) will have research space for 50 investigators, in addition to housing administration and education.

“In addition,” Casey says, “I have my own research program that focuses on preclinical development of a novel class of anti-cancer agents we discovered at Duke a few years ago.”

• David Virshup, MD, an internationally recognized cancer researcher, is the director of the Cancer and Stem Cell Biology Program at Duke-NUS GMS and will benefit from close interactions with Duke’s nationally recognized Comprehensive Cancer Center.

He is formerly the Willard Snow Hansen Presidential Professor of Cancer Research at the Huntsman Cancer Institute at the University of Utah. “Singapore is an exciting place to do science,” Virshup says. “Their tremendous investment in the biomedical research base over the past decade has attracted world-class researchers in many disciplines. A key mission of Duke-NUS GMS is to help move this research into the clinic in collaboration with gifted basic scientists, expert clinicians, and the private sector, while training the next generation of physician-scientists.”

• Doyle G. Graham, MD‘66, PhD‘71, a former professor of pathology and dean of medical education at Duke, former chair of the Pathology Department at Vanderbilt University, and former chair of the toxicology study section of the National Institutes of Health, is a visiting professor and director for the Body and Disease first-year course that will be taught over 20 weeks.