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Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso and the City of El Paso will honor two local philanthropists at the street corner that bears their names.

Earlier this year on the campus of TTUHSC El Paso, North Concepcion Street and Alberta Avenue were officially renamed Rick Francis Street and Robert Brown Avenue, respectively.

“It is important for El Paso to honor Rick Francis and Robert Brown for their selfless efforts and contributions to the development of Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso for generations to come,” El Paso Mayor Dee Margo said. “The city is privileged to be able to acknowledge them through this recognition.”

Rick Francis, chairman and CEO of WestStar Bank, is an El Paso native and former El Paso Inc. El Pasoan of the Year. He was named chairman of the Texas Tech University (TTU) System Board of Regents on Feb. 23, 2017, and served in that role until October 2018. Francis has served on the board since 2003, having been reappointed to the board twice.

He previously served as chairman of the Board of Regents from Jan. 1, 2005 to May 11, 2007 and has also headed the TTU System’s Finance and Administration Committee. In addition to his role on the Board of Regents, Francis is currently a member of the Academic, Clinical, and Student Affairs and Regents’ Rules Review Committees.

Robert Brown, an El Paso businessman, was appointed to the Board of Regents in 1995 and served until 2003. He was elected chairman of the board for a two-year term in 2001. Brown was also a member of the Texas Tech Foundation, serving from 2004 until 2012. Brown was honored as the 2004 Distinguished Alumnus for the TTU Rawls College of Business.

Cassandra Hernandez, El Paso City Council representative for District 3, which includes TTUHSC El Paso, led the effort and put forth the motion to approve the name change on city council’s agenda earlier this year.

“Former board chairmen Rick Francis and Robert Brown have demonstrated significant contributions and commitment as members of the Board of Regents of the Texas Tech University System for TTUHSC El Paso,” Hernandez said. “In appreciation and gratitude, we are pleased to honor their efforts on behalf of the city of El Paso.”

Rick Francis and Robert Brown will attend the dedication celebration on Friday, December 7, as will TTUHSC El Paso President Richard Lange and City Representative Cassandra Hernandez.

During their Friday meeting,the Texas Tech University System Board of Regents approved a Doctor of Dental Medicine degree to be offered by the Woody L. Hunt School of Dental Medicine (WLHSDM) at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso (TTUHSC El Paso).

Reaching this first milestone was made possible thanks to a generous gift from the Woody and Gayle Hunt Family Foundation and a grant from the Paso del Norte Health Foundation. Richard C. Black, D.D.S., M.S., who was recently named dean of the WLHSDM, said there are now opportunities for all El Pasoans to help as the work continues.

“We’re going to be asking the community to support this school,” Black said. “Whatever they give will come back many times over with the kind of educational institution we’re building here. And as this health sciences center grows, it is going to continue to be a strong economic engine for West Texas.”

With the board’s approval of the dental school and degree, TTUHSC El Paso may now pursue state approval and external accreditation. First, the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board will review the proposal, with a parallel review by TTUHSC El Paso’s institutional accreditor, the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges (SACSCOC).

Then, TTUHSC El Paso will pursue programmatic accreditation by the Commission on Dental Accreditation (CODA), a process that lasts several years.

Pending accreditation, the WLHSDM will be the first to open in Texas in nearly 50 years, and the only dental school on the U.S.-Mexico border.

TTUHSC El Paso proposed the dental school in 2016 in response to a severe shortage of dentists in West Texas. The WLHSDM expects to enroll its first cohort of dental students in 2021.

Students in the Doctor of Dental Medicine program will benefit from state-of-the-art facilities and a hands-on curriculum much like the Paul L. Foster School of Medicine’s.

Richard C. Black, D.D.S., M.S., was recently announced as Dean of the Woody L. Hunt School of Dental Medicine (WLHSDM) at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso (TTUHSC El Paso). Dr. Black has served as Interim Dean of the WLHSDM since 2017.

Dr. Black brings 39 years of experience as a practicing orthodontist to TTUHSC El Paso’s newest school. He received his D.D.S. and orthodontic specialty training at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston School of Dentistry. He has served as President of the El Paso Dental Society, as well as the Texas Dental Association, and is currently the national trustee for the 15^th District (Texas) of the American Dental Association.

Dr. Black has also served as Chair of the Texas Dental Association’s Legislative and Regulatory Affairs Council through four sessions of the Texas Legislature.

Dr. Black is a native El Pasoan and prominent community leader. He has served in many civic positions, including Chairman of City/County Public Health, Chairman of the Board of the Early Childhood Learning Center, El Paso Craniofacial Team, President of the Sunturians of El Paso, President and Chairman of the American Heart Association in El Paso and Texas, and President of El Paso’s Sun Bowl Association.

The WLHSDM is expected to welcome its first class of dental students in 2021. When the school opens its doors, it will be West Texas’ first and only dental school.

An upcoming Facebook Live Q&A will invite the community to listen in and pose health questions to a physician from Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso (TTUHSC El Paso).

In honor of Mental Health Month, Peter Thompson, M.D., a physician and researcher in the Department of Psychiatry, will host the session. Dr. Thompson, who specializes in bipolar disorder, treatment-resistant depression and the biology of brain disorders, will take questions from viewers about a variety of mental illnesses, including depression and schizophrenia.

Dr. Thompson will also discuss El Paso’s first Brain Bank — a TTUHSC El Paso laboratory that conducts postmortem research to understand the biological underpinnings behind mental illness.

Dr. Thompson received his Doctor of Medicine and residency training from Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston, Massachusetts. He went on to complete a fellowship at the University of California, San Diego and the Scripps Research Institute. Dr. Thompson is director of the Southwest Brain Bank; he joined TTUHSC El Paso in 2016.

Participants are encouraged to submit their questions to Dr. Thompson in advance and RSVP on TTUHSC El Paso’s Facebook Live Q&A on Mental Health and the Biology of Brain Disorders event page.

This Q&A session is part of a new TTUHSC El Paso initiative called The Exam Room. The Exam Room encourages the El Paso community to engage with expert health care professionals at TTUHSC El Paso.

Each month, The Exam Room will hold one or more public Q&As, each focusing on a different health-related topic and highlighting a TTUHSC El Paso health care specialist who has volunteered to answer questions on the subject.

What: Live health care Q&A open to the El Paso community

When: 11 a.m. Friday, May 12

Where: Online via Herald-Post’s Facebook page or TTUHSC El Paso’s Page

Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso (TTUHSC El Paso) recently added Jose Castro-Garcia, M.D., to its team of health care providers. Dr. Castro-Garcia specializes in plastic and craniofacial surgery.

“My scope of practice is very wide and not limited by any anatomical area, making my work very exciting and challenging,” says Dr. Castro Garcia. “On the same day, I could be doing a child’s cleft lip, a breast reconstruction, a hand anomaly, and then a trauma case.”

As the only plastic surgeon in the Department of Surgery, Dr. Castro-Garcia dove straight into work after arriving in September and has performed nearly 600 surgeries since. The plastic surgeon is capable of addressing a range of health issues, including skin cancer, scars, upper and lower extremity reconstruction, post-traumatic injury, burns, and congenital malformations.

His skill set is, perhaps, most beneficial for patients of the Texas Tech Physicians of El Paso (TTP El Paso) Breast Care Center. With Dr. Castro-Garcia’s expertise, the team is now able to perform breast reconstruction immediately after a mastectomy — minimizing patient recovery times and the number of surgeries a patient may need to undergo.

“Performing reconstruction at the same time as the mastectomy provides patients with the best cosmetic results,” he explains. “This is because there is no scar tissue or post-radiation injury to deal with.”

Dr. Castro-Garcia is familiar with the border region. He completed a general surgery residency at the Paul L. Foster School of Medicine in 2012.

“I really enjoyed my time in this city and always planned to come back,” he says. “I enjoy the culture and the patient population that we have the opportunity to treat in this area.”

Dr. Castro-Garcia received his Doctor of Medicine from the Autonomous University of San Luis Potosi in Mexico. He went on to complete a prestigious plastic surgery fellowship at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota and continued his training at the Medical City Hospital Craniofacial Center in Dallas, Texas.

An upcoming Facebook Live Q&A will invite the community to listen in and pose health questions to a physician at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso (TTUHSC El Paso).

In honor of Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month, Navkiran Shokar, M.A., M.P.H., M.D., a physician and clinical researcher in the Department of Family and Community Medicine, will host the session. Dr. Shokar, who specializes in cancer prevention and early detection, will take questions from viewers about all things related to colorectal cancer, including prevention, screening, and treatment.

Dr. Shokar has brought nearly $8 million in grant funding to the El Paso community for cancer detection and early prevention services. She received her Doctor of Medicine from the University of Oxford Medical School and completed residencies at Oxford University Hospitals’ Horton General Hospital and St. Joseph Medical Center in Houston, Texas.

Participants are encouraged to submit their questions to Dr. Shokar in advance and RSVP on TTUHSC El Paso’s Facebook Live Q&A on Colorectal Cancer event page.

This Q&A session is part of a new TTUHSC El Paso initiative called The Exam Room. The Exam Room encourages the El Paso community to engage with expert health care professionals at TTUHSC El Paso.

Each month, The Exam Room will hold one or more public Q&As, each focusing on a different health-related topic and highlighting a TTUHSC El Paso health care specialist who has volunteered to answer questions on the subject.

What: Live health care Q&A open to the El Paso community

When: 10 a.m. Friday, March 3

Where: Online at facebook.com/ttuhscep

As part of a statewide effort to teach lifesaving first-aid skills, free hands-only CPR training sessions will be offered throughout El Paso and the rest of Texas this weekend.

The Texas Two Step: Save a Life Campaign is led locally by medical students at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center ElPaso. The future doctors will volunteer at seven public locations on Saturday, offering bystanders free five-minute CPR training sessions.

Participants will learn how to act quickly in the event of cardiac arrest by taking two critical steps: step one is to call 911, and step two is to initiate CPR by pushing hard and fast on the center of the chest.

Participants will practice on mannequins and be provided with educational materials summarizing the skills learned.

Last year, more than 4,200 individuals in 53 Texas locations took the lifesaving training course, with the help of more than 650 medical students.

What: Statewide hands-only CPR training

When: 8 a.m. – 4 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 11

Where: Various locations citywide (see schedule below).

8 a.m. – Noon Loya Family YMCA, 2044 Trawood Dr.

8 a.m. – Noon Westside Family YMCA, 7145 N. Mesa St.

8 a.m. – Noon Rotacare Clinic, 301 S. Schutz Dr.

8 a.m. – Noon El Paso Baptist Clinic, 816 S. Florence St.

8 a.m. – 4 p.m.        Sun Metro Bert Williams Downtown Santa Fe Transfer Station –  601 S. Santa Fe St.

8 a.m. – 4 p.m. San Jacinto Plaza, 111 Mills St.

Noon – 4 p.m. The Fountains at Farah (Amphitheater Lawn and Stage) – 8889 Gateway Blvd. West

The Gayle Greve Hunt School of Nursing (GGHSON) at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso (TTUHSC El Paso) has received a $430,780 grant from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) to provide long-distance health education to underserved communities in rural West Texas.

TTUHSC El Paso is the only institution in the state to receive one of the USDA’s 45 distance learning grants.

“I grew up in a small town and I understand what rurality is,” says Associate Professor and Assistant Dean Penny Cooper, D.N.P., R.N., the primary investigator who is leading the project. “Rurality impacts poverty and knowledge base, and ultimately, health.”

The grant will fund free health education services via interactive, live video conferencing for 10 West Texas communities. The target communities include Hudspeth, Presidio, Yoakum and El Paso counties, all of which have been labeled StrikeForce counties by the USDA — rural U.S. counties plagued by persistently high poverty rates.

Forty-three percent of individuals living in Hudspeth and 21 percent of individuals living in Presidio live below the U.S. poverty line. In addition to staggering poverty rates, these communities face low levels of educational advancement. Only 2.6 percent of Hudspeth’s residents and 10.9 percent of Presidio’s hold a bachelor’s degree.

The GGHSON has already developed relationships with school districts in the 10 communities. While the program focuses primarily on elementary through high school students, education courses may be extended to the broader community, including parents and senior citizens. The project’s first step will be to determine the unique health education needs of each site.

“Each site will decide its own needs because they are the ones that know their region best,” Cooper explains. “Whether they need education on street safety, oral health, nutrition, obesity, exercise, chronic disease — we’ll be there to collaborate with them.”

In partnership with University Medical Center of El Paso (UMC), the GGHSON will also provide Continuing Nursing Education (CNE) courses to nurses in rural hospitals and medical centers. Practicing nurses are required to take 20 hours of CNE courses every two years; however, this requirement may be challenging to meet in rural settings.

“Some forms of CNE may not be offered in rural areas, so nurses have to travel to attend them — creating unwanted travel expenses and work absences, and draining facilities that already run on limited nursing staff,” says Professor and Associate Dean Wm. Michael Scott, D.N.P., R.N., FAANP, co-investigator of the project. To help ease this strain, CNE courses will be live streamed from UMC to Pecos County Memorial Hospital and Permian Regional Medical Center.

The GGHSON team hopes the two-year health education project will ultimately improve the health of West Texas’ rural communities. The team also hopes to inspire young students to consider careers in health care.

“The job potentials for many of these communities are limited to prison guards, farmers and border patrol agents,” Cooper says. “We want to inspire younger generations to think outside the box and realize there are other possibilities — like nursing, medicine and dentistry.”

Additional partners on the project include Cisco Systems, Synetra and Netsync Network Solutions, which will assist with technology setup and implementation. The GGHSON project has been endorsed by U.S. Reps. Will Hurd and Beto O’Rourke and Texas Sen. José Rodríguez, as well as community agencies such as the Texas E-Health Alliance and the Workforce Solutions Borderplex.

The Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences (GSBS) at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso (TTUHSC El Paso) has been approved to award a post-baccalaureate certificate in biomedical sciences.

“We’re very excited to have the official approval for a home-grown program,” says Rajkumar Lakshmanaswamy, Ph.D., dean of the GSBS. “Often, this post-baccalaureate certificate is treated as a preparatory program for our students, the natural next step being medical school.”

The new certificate was approved by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB) July 25 and interested students can begin applying to the program during the fall admissions season. The two-semester program has been offered at TTUHSC El Paso since 2013; however, until now, students earned their certificates from TTUHSC Lubbock.

The GSBS became the third school of TTUHSC El Paso earlier this year, after the THECB approved the Master of Science in Biomedical Sciences degree January 21. Those who successfully complete the certificate program are ensured an interview with the Paul L. Foster School of Medicine (PLFSOM) as part of the medical school admissions process.

“The pipeline that is created between the post-baccalaureate program and PLFSOM is crucial for our certificate students,” says Lakshmanaswamy. “Once admitted, they are already familiar with the campus and available resources because of their post-baccalaureate studies.”

GSBS plans for the future include adding Ph.D. and combined M.D.-Ph.D. programs to offer El Paso even more advanced educational opportunities. The first class of students to be offered the post-baccalaureate certificate in Biomedical Sciences from TTUHSC El Paso will begin classes August 17.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott has appointed Jeremy Stewart as student regent for the Texas Tech University System Board of Regents, his office announced May 11.

Stewart is from Arlington and is pursuing a Doctor of Medicine from the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso Paul L. Foster School of Medicine. He will become the eleventh student to serve on the Board of Regents and will be the first to represent the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso.

“We are very proud of Jeremy and delighted that he will be our university’s first student regent,” said Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso President Richard Lange, M.D., M.B.A. “He has been a true leader during his time at the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso, and I know he will do an outstanding job serving on the board and representing all Texas Tech students.”

As a third-year medical student, Stewart serves as the 2017 class president of the Medical Student Council and is a past president of the Student Government Association at the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso. He also was the 2015 representative to the Texas Medical Association and was recently inducted into the Arnold P. Gold Foundation Gold Humanism Honor Society.

“As student regent, Jeremy will have the important role of representing nearly 50,000 students across the Texas Tech University System,” said Chancellor Robert Duncan. “His viewpoint will be beneficial as we strive to provide the best experience for our students and advance our four universities. On behalf of the Texas Tech University System, we congratulate Jeremy on his appointment and look forward to having his insight on the Board of Regents.”

Stewart will serve a one-year term beginning June 1, and his first Board of Regents meeting will take place Aug. 11-12 in Lubbock. He replaces Victoria Messer of Texas Tech University who was appointed in 2015.

Stewart received a Bachelor of Science in biology from the University of Texas at Arlington and a Bachelor of Science in kinesiology from the University of Texas at Austin. He is married to Brielle Goldberg Stewart, an associate attorney at Gordon Davis Johnson & Shane P.C. They reside in El Paso, Texas.

The Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso was established in May 2013 as the fourth university within the Texas Tech University System. The university is the only comprehensive health-related institution on the U.S. southern border and is home to the Paul L. Foster School of Medicine, the Gayle Greve Hunt School of Nursing and a Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences.

Thanks to a new art project, a walk around the Texas Tech University campus here in El Paso just got more colorful.  Visitors, students and staff may not notice the new artwork right away, though.

Warren Love, graphic artist for institutional advancement, designed the artwork now appearing on what was once, giant steel utility boxes.  Love’s use of natural patterns, helps the design blend seamlessly with the natural landscape and other pieces of campus artwork such as the Helix Garden.

Officials with TTUHSC El Paso say that more boxes will be covered in the coming weeks.