With involvement from Anna Khanna, M.D., the medical director of the UF Health Shands Comprehensive Stroke Center and an assistant professor of neurology, and Brian Hoh, M.D., M.B.A., chair of the Lillian S. Wells Department of Neurosurgery, UF Health will roll out its first mobile stroke treatment unit in July, enabling patients to receive immediate stroke care, even before they can be transported to a treatment center. The initiative was announced June 5 in an event outside of the George T. Harrell, M.D., Medical Education Building.

The units will include a diagnostic CT scanner, clot-busting drugs such as tissue plasminogen activator, or tPA, medications given intravenously to lower high blood pressure, medications used to reverse the effects of bleeding inside the brain, and telemedicine equipment. Ambulances will be staffed by a team that includes a stroke-trained health provider, a CT technologist, an EMT driver and a paramedic, as well as a neurologist specializing in stroke care, who will be available via telemedicine.

“We are always looking for innovative ways to enhance our patient care efforts,” Hoh said. “The mobile stroke treatment unit allows us to bring stroke care to the patient and save precious time in our efforts to preserve brain function.”

Every day, millions of patient data points are captured by physicians and their teams, providing insights into medical histories, predispositions and health trajectories that can be valuable in driving medical decisions. Understanding how this data is collected and synthesized is an important component of that decision-making process.

With these goals in mind, the UF College of Medicine is taking steps to prepare its physicians-in-training to remain curious and informed through its artificial intelligence in medicine track of the Research and Discovery Pathways Program, which aims to teach students the main domains relevant to AI in medicine and introduce them to the tools used to develop and interpret results.

Faculty and loved ones applauded as distinguished directors and staff placed personalized white coats on each student’s shoulders to mark their transition from didactic education to clinical training at the 16th annual UF School of PA Studies white coat ceremony, which took place June 2 at the UF Health Professions, Nursing & Pharmacy Auditorium.

Students celebrated this milestone in their new uniforms at an exciting time for the PA school, which commemorated its 50th anniversary last fall and was recognized as being in the top 5% of PA programs across the country by U.S. News & World Report this spring.

“You’ll remember this day as your hard work is taking you to the next stage of your education,” UF College of Medicine Dean Colleen Koch, M.D., M.S., M.B.A., told students. “Once you put on your white coat, you step into the role of an advocate for your patients, a teammate to your colleagues and a lifelong learner.”