* Volunteers contribute mightily to the operation of Upstate University Hospital, logging 82,528 hours in 2013. Learn about volunteer opportunities by calling 315-464-5180 or visiting upstate.edu/hospital/volunteers.
* Bar codes on sharps containers — where needles are disposed after use – allow for the containers to be tracked as they are sterilized and reused up to 600 times. The new Stericycle containers are expected to save money as well as improve safety for nurses and other medical care providers, says Jason Rupert, assistant director for outpatient operations and materials. The lids on previous containers opened like post office boxes. The new ones have holes on top, a design that Rupert says has been shown to reduce accidental needle sticks by up to 80 percent.
* Upstate University Hospital receives about 12,000 packages per month, ranging from letters to new pieces of research or medical equipment.
* The roof of the Upstate Golisano Children’s Hospital is marked with a red H in a big white cross symbol (above, center) so that helicopter pilots can locate their landing target in the midst of the downtown buildings in Syracuse.
* Upstate’s College of Graduate Studies conferred 27 degrees in 2014, including 14 doctorates, 10 masters and three MD/PhD degrees. Programs of study include biochemistry and molecular biology, cell and developmental biology, microbiology and immunology, neuroscience, pharmacology and physiology. Learn more at upstate.edu/grad/
Participating in the check presentation are, from left, Upstate’s Gennady Bratslavsky, MD, Michael Lacombe, MD, Dmitriy Nikolovsky, MD, and Srinivas Vourganti, MD. Joining them is Jim Sarosy of the Syracuse Crunch.
* Twenty Upstate doctors joined Syracuse Crunch players in growing mustaches to raise money for prostate cancer research and spread awareness of the disease which affects about one in seven men. Fans voted online for their favorite mustaches during the month of November by making donations, and a check for $4,467.58 was presented at the Nov. 28 Crunch game.
