Awards and Honors: March 2017
Celebrating the accomplishments of Department of Medicine faculty and staff
Sanjay Basu and Team Win Third Place in SPRINT Data Analysis Challenge
The SPRINT Data Analysis Challenge asked, "What can be achieved by sharing clinical trial data?" Making use of a dataset underlying the New England Journal of Medicine article, "A Randomized Trial of Intensive vs. Standard Blood Pressure Control," the research community answered the challenge with more than 16,000 followers and 200 qualifying teams. Ultimately, those researchers submitted 143 entries for the Challenge, each containing novel scientific or clinical findings from the same dataset.
A team of Stanford researchers led by Sanjay Basu, MD, PhD, won third place in the challenge. Within the data set, Basu noted signs pointing to which patients may experience serious adverse effects from blood pressure meds.
Sanjay Basu is an assistant professor of medicine at Stanford. He's a member of both Bio-X and Child Health Research Institute. He earned an undergraduate degree from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and, as a Rhodes Scholar, a master’s degree from Oxford. After earning his MD/PhD from Yale, Basu completed his internship and residency at UCSF.
He has received the Physician Recognition Award from the American Heart Association, the Rosenkranz Prize for Health Care Research from Stanford, a New Innovator Award from National Institutes of Health and a Junior Investigator Award from the Annals of Internal Medicine. In 2013, Foreign Policy Magazine included Basu on its Top 100 Global Thinkers List, and in 2016, he was inducted into The American Society for Clinical Investigation.
Chitra Dinakar to Serve on AAAAI Board of Directors
Chitra Dinakar, MD, (clinical professor, pulmonary & critical care medicine), has been elected to the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology’s Board of Directors. For the next four years, Dinakar will serve as the At-Large Director from the Nominating Committee.
During her tenure, she plans to focus on precision health, technology, and patient engagement. “I believe the A/I community is uniquely positioned to capitalize on these opportunities,” Dinakar said in an official press release. “We must accentuate our understanding of the immunobiology of health/disease and develop biometric tools and targeted therapies to personalize care. We must embrace technology such as the use of telemedicine services and disease-related applications on smart mobile devices. And finally, we must actively partner with all stakeholders to synergize seamlessly into a learning healthcare system.”
Dinakar currently serves on the American Board of Allergy/ Immunology, the Joint Task Force on Allergy/Immunology Practice Parameters, and on the Allergy/Immunology Executive Committee of the American Academy of Pediatrics. Recent honors include the Distinguished Fellow Award and the Woman in Allergy Award from the American College of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology.
Her research and clinical interest include asthma, food allergies, adherence to therapies, and healthcare disparities and outcomes.