PROGRESS REPORT FROM THE CHAIR
Stanford has a decades long tradition of excellence in Otolaryngology – Head & Neck Surgery. Five years ago, the university awarded OHNS status as an independent department. With this transition came a generous package of resources designed to enable a period of rapid programmatic expansion. I am proud to report that these resources have been put to good use. Building upon the existing solid foundation, Stanford OHNS has grown to become one of the world’s premier programs in the field with broad strength across all clinical subspecialties areas as well as outstanding research and educational programs.
| DEPARTMENTAL PHILOSOPHY |
A strong department begins with outstanding clinical services and superb educational programs. What distinguishes our department is the priority we place on creating new knowledge in science, developing innovative diagnostic and therapeutic methods, and inventing new medical devices. In addition to our highly productive senior faculty, we are recruiting a new cadre of young clinician scientists with the goal of creating an environment conducive to career long research productivity. Key feature our departmental design is the pairing young surgical researchers with basic scientists and openness to collaboration with laboratory throughout the community of Stanford bioscience and technology.
| FACULTY GROWTH |
Over the last few years we have grown from 6 to 18 faculty members (on the way to 22 over the next 2-3 years). These include 6 new clinical division chiefs: Dr Peter Koltai (Pediatric OHNS), Dr Michael Kaplan (Head & Neck Oncology), Dr Peter Hwang (Rhinology and Sinus Surgery), Dr Sam Most (Facial Plastic Surgery), Dr Edward Damrose (Laryngology), Dr Gerald Popelka (Audiology & Hearing Devices). Based upon strong collaborative ties, we have also awarded joint appointments to 9 faculty members in other Stanford departments.
World renowned inner ear stem cell biologist Stefan Heller, leads our Research Division which includes Anthony Ricci, PhD (hair cell biophysicist), Sunil Puria, PhD (mechanical engineer – middle ear mechanics), Caitlin O'Connell-Rodwell (elephant communication) and Yuling Yan, PhD (electrical engineer – voice image analysis).
| NEW FACULTY IN 2008 |
Dr. John Sunwoo is a biochemistry graduate of Brown University who took his medical degree and masters in biology from the Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis. After several years on the Wash U faculty where he was awarded an NIH K-08 grant, John joined our Head & Neck Surgery division. He is a true surgeon-scientist who leads our interdisciplinary effort to elucidate the role of stem cells in head and neck malignancy.
Dr. Mike Yao: is a bioengineering graduate of University of California, Berkeley, Yale University School of Medicine, Residency in OHNS at Stanford, and a fellowship in head and neck oncology at the MD Anderson Cancer Center. Prior to joining the Stanford faculty Mike was the residency program director at the University of Illinois, Chicago. He is a member of our Head & Neck Surgery division and Chief of our service at the Palo Alto Veteran’s Medical Center.
| ANTICIPATED RECRUITMENTS IN 2009 |
Stanford OHNS is recruiting two additional surgeon -scientists (rhinology, otology-neurotology) and an incremental basic scientist in 2009.
| RESEARCH INNOVATIONS |
Over just a few short years, the Stanford OHNS research laboratories have established themselves in the forefront of innovative bioscience and emerging technology. Under the leadership of Dr Stefan Heller a large team of investigators is working to overcome deafness through use of stem cells to regenerate the organ of Corti.
A cardinal goal of Stanford OHNS is to conduct translational research on issues relevant to human disease. We have created an innovative model which maximizes collaborations among basic scientists, engineers, and clinicians to address important research questions. We are in the midst of recruiting a cadre of young surgeon – investigators charged for the purpose of building strong ties between the clinical world and our basic science and engineering communities
Stanford has made a substantial investment in new laboratory space, endowment, and additional basic science faculty positions. These resources have been used to create a highly productive, innovative, and collaborative center which takes full advantage of the surrounding Stanford bioscience and engineering communities. The priority of our laboratory programs is to produce high quality, innovative research in areas of inquiry relevant to human disease. Growth in our research programs has focused upon two central themes:
| REGENERATIVE MEDICINE |
• Developing stem cell therapy for overcoming deafness
• Identification of stem cells in squamous cell carcinoma of the head & neck
• Tissue engineering
| BIOENGINEERING |
• Integration of the human ear and voice with digital devices
• Mechanics of sound transmission through the tympano-ossicular system
• Surgical simulation using 3D – haptic enhanced simulators
• Robotic microsurgery
• Microendoscopy of the inner ear
• High speed laryngeal imaging
• Virtual Laryngoscopy
• Cine MRI evaluation of the airway during sleep
| EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMS |
Our extraordinarily talented group of residents has grown from 3 to 4 per year as we have expanded our training programs in proportion to our growing faculty. We are proud that our 20 residents, over their 5 years in the department, obtain a splendid experience in the broad spectrum of contemporary OHNS procedures. Our graduates have done extremely well in obtaining post-residency fellowship positions in a number of subspecialties.
We now offer 7 post-residency clinical instructorship programs. These include: facial plastic surgery, head & neck surgery, pediatric OHNS, neurotology & skull base surgery, sinus surgery, sleep surgery, and laryngology. These programs not only provide advanced training for promising young academicians, but as junior faculty members they also enhance the residency educational experience. As our number one educational priority is our residency program, a key role of the clinical instructors is to augment the resident educational and operative experience.
| CLINICAL PROGRAMS |
Stanford has comprehensive programs in all of the sub-specialties of otolaryngology – head & neck surgery (facial plastic surgery, head & neck surgery, laryngology, otology/neurotology, pediatric otolaryngology, and sleep surgery). Our head & neck tumor board sees 10-20 new tumors per week and has numerous ongoing clinical trials. The Stanford Cochlear Implant Center now implants 30 - 50 devices in adults and children each year. Our renowned skull base surgery program has recently expanded into endoscopic surgery of the anterior cranial base. Our facial plastic surgery program has its own procedure room where general anesthetic cosmetic surgeries are routinely performed. Our Sinus Center now includes a clinic staffed by several board certified allergists.
| STATE OF THE ART FACILITIES |
The Department has undergone an extraordinary improvement in our physical plant with all aspects of the educational, research, and administrative programs transitioning to newly constructed facilities. We are privileged to be one of the few OHNS departments to have our own home building on the university campus – occupied after a $4 million renovation. This provides core facilities for our academic, administrative, and educational programs and includes state-of-the-art library-conference facilities (The Willard E. Fee Jr., M.D. Library) and a superb 10 station educational microdissection laboratory (The Rodney Perkins, M.D. Microsurgical Laboratory). The building also houses some of our adult clinical programs (facial plastic surgery, laryngology, rhinology-sinus surgery, otology-neurotology, the cochlear implant center, and audiology & hearing device program). Our Head & Neck Oncology programs are housed in the magnificent new Stanford Cancer Center in which OHNS has 3 faculty offices, a suite of exam rooms, and a conference facility for Head & Neck Tumor Board. This building is located adjacent to the new OHNS home. New clinical facilities for Pediatric Otolaryngology and Pediatric Audiology opened recently (Mary L. Johnson Pediatric Ambulatory Care Center) a few hundred feet away from our departmental core facility.
With all of the new academic, educational, and clinical spaces we have recently occupied, the question might arise what happened to the former space which housed Stanford OHNS for nearly 40 years? The good news is that this outmoded 7000 sq ft facility has been rebuilt to accommodate our expanding basic science research effort while an entirely new research building (FIM 1), in which we will be anchor tenants, is in the planning stages. In early 2009 we anticipate occupying a $1.5 Million addition to our laboratory. Highlights of our laboratory is an imaging center with two confocal microscopes, several sophisticated sensory physiology suites, and a state-of-the-art animal hearing test facility.
Stanford OHNS has come a long way in a short 5 years since emerging as an independent department: tripling of the faculty with recruitment of a number of highly talented individuals; abandoning long antiquated facilities for new ones triple their size; sizable expansion of both residency and fellowship programs; and development of dynamic, cutting edge research programs. It is a credit to a large team of hard working individuals that we have made much progress in such a relatively short period. We look forward to sharing with you our progress in the coming years. We plan to keep things hopping on “The farm.”
Robert K. Jackler, MD
Sewall Professor and Chair
Associate Dean, CME
December, 2008
