As we enter the new millennium, the Lifeline Foundation has made another step to enhance the interaction with the National Institutes of Health. We are pleased to announce the recent endowment fund given by Dr and Mrs Julius Jacobson to support the Research Initiatives Conference sponsored jointly each year in Bethesda, Md, by the Lifeline Foundation and the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute/National Institutes of Health (NHLBI/NIH). This is a major step to further the mission of the Lifeline Foundation.
In the early 1980s, D. E. Strandness first conceived the idea of a closer liaison of the Society for Vascular Surgery (SVS) and the North American Chapter of the International Society for Cardiovascular Surgery (ISCVS-NA) with NHLBI.1 He thought that if an interchange of ideas could evolve, it could be important to those involved in research devoted to vascular problems. The first interaction was the organization of a Workshop on Vascular Disease with the help of John Watson, chief of the devices and technology branch of NHLBI. The success of the workshop resulted in a publication of the proceedings of the conference, titled Vascular Disease: Current Research and Clinical Applications , in 1987.2 Because of this success, a dialogue began with Dr Claude Lenfant, the Director of NHLBI to plan a future meeting, which became known now as the Research Initiatives Conference. The first joint meeting was held February 19 and 20, 1988, and the opening lecture by John Watson set the tone for future meetings. In the last 12 years, members of the SVS and the ISCVS-NA such as Frank Logerfo, Patrick Clagett, Alexander Clowes, Howard Greisler, and Craig Kent have worked tirelessly to organize the meeting and cover a wide variety of topics.
The Research Initiatives Conference is the only research meeting sponsored jointly by the NIH and a surgical society on an annual basis. Both the NIH and the scientific community have benefitted from this type of exchange.
Sponsoring the meeting is expensive and draining on the financial resources of the Lifeline Foundation, which is always a concern of the Joint Council of the SVS and ISCVS-NA. The endowment by the Jacobsons will go a long way toward maintaining the viability of the Research Initiatives Conference. Most important, we will be able to continue to expose generations of young academic surgeons to the scientific basis of vascular disease in a timely and up-to-date fashion.
Dr Julius Jacobson is no stranger to vascular surgery. He is well known for his pioneering effort in microvascular surgery. He served as the director of the vascular surgical service at Mount Sinai Medical Center from 1963 to 1997. Currently, he is a distinguished service professor of surgery at Mount Sinai Medical School. A well-respected clinical vascular surgeon in New York City, Dr Jacobson is also known for his philanthropy. He and his wife, Joan, have made generous gifts to the American College of Surgeons, Johns Hopkins University Medical School, Harvard Medical School, and many other institutions, both at home and abroad.
The Lifeline Foundation is grateful to Joan and Julius Jacobson for their generous gift of a $500,000 endowment. We are delighted that the Joint Council acted to approve the renaming of the conference to the Joan and Julius Jacobson Research Initiatives Conference. Their names will add luster to the research effort of the Lifeline Foundation.
In addition to the Research Initiatives Conference, the interaction between the Lifeline Foundation and NHLBI/NIH remains high. We are pleased with the recent joint venture with NHLBI on the KO8 award for career development of young investigators. We are also proud to have several academic vascular surgeons named as recipients of RO1 awards from the NHLBI/NIH for the study of the pathogenesis of aortic aneurysm. These awardees include Ronald Dalman and Christopher Zarins (Stanford University), Mark Fillinger (Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center), Timothy Baxter (University of Nebraska), Robert Thompson (Washington University), David Tilson (Columbia University), and William Pearce (Northwestern University). In addition, Rodney White and his technology assessment committee have submitted a proposal for an endovascular graft registry to NIH for funding. At the threshold of the new millennium, we are excited about these activities with the NHLBI/NIH.
Philanthropy is an American tradition. We especially thank Joan and Julius Jacobson for exemplifying this philanthropic spirit. To keep the spirit alive, we urge all our members to continue to give to the Lifeline Foundation.
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