The 42nd annual Ogura Lectureship and 37th annual Resident Research Day were held June 21 to a capacity crowd at the Eric P. Newman Education Center on the medical school campus of Washington University.
This year’s invited guest speaker was noted neurotologist Charles Limb, MD, professor and chief, Division of Otology, Neurotology and Skull Base Surgery in the Department of Otolaryngology—Head & Neck Surgery and Neurosurgery, University of California San Francisco School of Medicine.
A noted musician, Limb’s research interests include the neural basis of musical creativity. He provided two presentations on the topic: 1. Music for Deaf Ears: Cochlear Implant-Mediated Perception of Music; and 2. Creativity and the Brain
Music is the pinnacle of hearing.
Charles Limb, MD
Some of his best known work involves the study of music perception in deaf individuals with cochlear implants. Limb highlighted the observation that despite great success with spoken language, most cochlear implant users cannot hear music well.
“Critical impairments in pitch, timber and sound quality underlie the difficulty that CI users have in hearing music and reveal limitations of CI processing that normal speech testing does not,” he said. “In short, cochlear implants are severely out of tune.”
He outlined several directions that could improve music perception, including CI design, processing strategies, musical training, and even altering the music itself.
Resident Research Day
A number of trainees including residents, medical students and postdoctoral scientists also shared highlights of their research in a variety of disciplines covering basic, clinical and outcomes research. Topics covered broad aspects of head and neck cancer; cochlear implant outcomes; and infectious diseases of the cochlea and sinuses.
Winners of the annual Paparella Research Awards for basic and clinical science were announced by Vice-chair for Research Jay Piccirillo, MD, during the graduation dinner celebration that evening:
1st Place in Basic Science Research
Amit Walia, MD, MSCI
Amyloid and Tau Proteins: Potential Perilymph Biomarkers for Cochlear Implant Performance?
2nd Place in Basic Science Research
Ben Wahle, MD
APOBEC Dominant Mutational Signatures Define Clinically Distinct Oral Cavity Cancer Subgroup
1st Place in Clinical Science Research
Andrew Charap, MD
Prevalence of Oversized Endotracheal Tube Placement among ICU Patients at Barnes-Jewish Hospital
2nd Place in Clinical Science Research (co-recipient)
Theresa Tharakan, MD, MSCI
Swallowing Outcomes of HPV+ OPSCC Survivors by POA(C)RT Dose in the MINT and E3311 cohorts