Name Droppers: UC Davis surgeon wins global honor

Dr. Nilas Young, a UC Davis heart surgeon, is the 2012 World of Children Award winner for his success in saving the lives of more than 13,000 of the world’s most vulnerable children through the medical caregiving nonprofit he founded, Heart to Heart International.

The 67-year-old surgeon received the award at the annual World of Children Award Gala on Oct. 25 in New York City. The award is accompanied by funding to expand Heart to Heart International’s work.

The World of Children Award is the only global recognition and funding nonprofit that recognizes individuals who are changing the lives of vulnerable children around the world.

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UC Davis medical students Geneva White of Sacramento and Kevin Mullins of Fresno have been recognized as part of the Observer Media Group’s annual “30 Under 30″ tribute to the region’s most outstanding young achievers.

White and Mullins were selected by the editorial board of The Sacramento Observer and honored at a community breakfast and awards event on Sept. 29 at the Woodlake Hotel in Sacramento. The newspaper launched its “30 Under 30″ program to encourage leadership among African-American professionals early in their careers and to recognize their commitment to community service.

White earned her bachelor’s degree in biological sciences from Sacramento State. She participates in community outreach to inspire interest in the sciences among young people, provide sickle-cell disease education and support families touched by childhood cancer.

Mullins worked with the Minority Association of Pre-Medical Students to help undergraduate students of color achieve their dreams of going to medical school. He now serves as president of the UC Davis Regional Chapter of the Student National Medical Association, an organization that encourages students from underrepresented minority groups to prepare for medical and scientific careers.

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Patricia Gonsalves, a graduate student at Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing at UC Davis, is one of only 20 students chosen to participate in the Los Rios Community College Faculty Diversity Internship Program, which provides hands-on training and experience working in a classroom setting at the community college level.

The competitive program, within the second largest community college district in California, was created to support the development of a diverse pool of future community-college instructors.

For the past year, Gonsalves worked full-time at Dignity Health Sacramento and San Joaquin Service Area Transfer Center while also working toward a master’s degree in the Nursing Science and Health-Care Leadership Graduate Degree Program at UCD.

In her Dignity role, she triages and manages internal and external transfers within the region based upon need and facility resources. Previous to that, she was a clinical nurse at UC Davis Health System’s Women’s Pavilion, Labor and Delivery Unit, where she provided telephone triage, bedside assistance and peer education in an effort to improve newborn outcomes.

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Susan Murin, a nationally recognized expert in pulmonary medicine, has become chief of the Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine and the Gordon A. Wong Professor in Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at UC Davis. She replaces Timothy Albertson, who led the division for 23 years and recently became chair of the UCD department of internal medicine.

Murin, who joined the UC Davis faculty in 1995, will oversee nearly 100 faculty, staff and fellows who provide critical care, pulmonary, sleep and hospitalist services and conduct research on diseases such as asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, cystic fibrosis, pulmonary hypertension, bronchiectasis and pulmonary fibrosis.

The division includes a specialized respiratory biology research group that is developing therapeutic strategies to address lung disease at the cellular level.

— Do you know of someone who has won an award or accomplished something noteworthy? Send it, preferably by email, to newsroom@davisenterprise.net, or to Name droppers, The Davis Enterprise, P.O. Box 1470, Davis, CA 95617.