Ting-Kai Li, MD, Elected to Membership in Institute of Medicine of the
National Academy of Sciences

Ting-Kai Li, MD, distinguished professor and associate dean for research at IUSM, has been elected to membership in the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences. Dr. Li is internationally known for his research on the genetic determinants of alcohol use and alcoholism. For the past decade, Dr. Li and his colleagues at IU have examined the association of alcohol and aldehyde dehydrogenase polymorphism to alcoholism and its complications, as well as the heritability, sensitivity and repeatability of a variety of responses to ethanol in humans. With Lawrence Lumeng, MD, professor of medicine and of biochemistry and molecular biology, Dr. Li developed rodent models that have either a preference or nonpreference for alcohol.

"Dr. Li is very deserving of this honor," notes IUSM Dean Robert W. Holden, MD '63. "He has had a distinguished career and his service to the university has been truly exemplary. His attention to detail has promoted the dramatic growth of our School's research. His own research has uncovered much of what we know today about alcoholism and, more importantly, his work may hold the answer to the cure for this debilitating disease."

Dr. Li is the third faculty member from IUSM to be honored with this distinction. In 1983, Morris Green, MD, the Perry W. Lesh Professor Emeritus of Pediatrics, was elected to membership in the Institute, followed in 1994 by Clement J. McDonald, MD, distinguished professor of medicine and co-director of Regenstrief Institute.

The Institute of Medicine was established in 1970 as a unit of the National Academy of Sciences with a mission to advance and disseminate scientific knowledge to improve human health. New members are elected by the incumbent membership on the basis of professional achievement and demonstrated interest, concern and involvement with issues critical to the public health.

Future Physicians Make Early Rounds at Indy Clinics

Peggy Michelle Stein slumps under the weight of a firefighter's helmet and gear as a handful of curious youngsters swarms around her. She gently steers her entourage into the Indianapolis Westside Community Health Center.

Her outfit isn't typical medical student attire, and she's not looking to put out fires. But the firefighter's getup and her enthusiasm were all she needed to spark the children's interest and entice them into the clinic.

Promoting health, wellness and safety at this and the North Arlington Community Health Center was the goal for Ms. Stein and fellow medical students during National Primary Care Week last October. Blase Polite, a fourth-year student, originated the idea of conducting the health-screening fairs and enlisted the help of medical students at all levels. They answered the call; about sixty students were on hand at both fairs.

"These events were a chance for students to actually design a project from the ground up and then take the lead in directing patients' education," says Mr. Polite, who plans to specialize in hematology and oncology. He says the centers were selected because they are in areas where the community is medically underserved.

The students distributed free health care literature and assisted IUSM physicians in screening adults for high blood pressure, diabetes, high cholesterol, and colon cancer, and giving prostate exams. Vision and hearing screenings and dental examinations were offered to children.

The Road to Chinatown
IUSM opened the door to medicine for alumna Tina Kwan, MD '69. She walked through
to fulfill a family legacy.

Like many alumni Tina Kwan, MD '69, has fond memories of IUSM. She recalls certain professors and lifelong friendships formed while a student on the Indianapolis campus. She has amusing anecdotes about lab partners, patients and her medical school experience. But Dr. Kwan's gratitude toward her alma mater goes much farther than the usual reminiscences.

"In the 1960s things were not as open at medical schools," says Dr. Kwan, a pediatrician who practices in San Francisco. "I think women and foreign students were not welcomed to state schools."

That left Dr. Kwan with two strikes against her - as a female and a native of China. Born in 1945, Dr. Kwan's life has been an odyssey propelled by the forces of war, nationality and world events, yet stabilized by the strength of her family and the values it taught her.

Her mother was a physicist, an unusual career for a Chinese woman of that time; her father held a college degree in business; and her maternal aunt and uncle both were physicians. Shortly after her parents graduated from college in 1937, Japan invaded China and the family moved from Shanghai to Chunking, China, where Dr. Kwan was born.

They remained there until after the Japanese surrender in August, 1945, when the family returned to Shanghai, the largest city in China. However, civil war broke out soon after as the communist takeover began. Unlike many of their countrymen, the Kwok family (Dr. Kwan's maiden name) was able to leave the country for a safer harbor in Vietnam.

There the family lived in Haiphong, a northern coastal resort town, where her father did well and the family enjoyed many luxuries. After four years, during which time her sister Wendy was born, war forced the family to move once more. For the next year, her father lived in Hong Kong, trying to establish himself in business, and her mother took the girls home to live with her family in Chunking. In 1952, the family was reunited in Hong Kong, where Dr. Kwan lived until 1962 when she came to the U.S. for schooling.

This latter sojourn in Hong Kong provided lessons in life that continue to serve her, she says: the value of family, sharing, the importance of education, and how to get by happily with few material things. Unlike their years in Vietnam, the family lived for eight years, from 1952-60, in a single room. By the time they moved into a flat, there were four children in the family, a grandmother and her caretaker, all living together. The living room and dining room were converted to bedrooms for the eight people, the hallway doubled as a dining room and study area. A shower was installed in the corner of the kitchen.

But through it all, Dr. Kwan said her mother made health and education for her family a priority. The children attended a private school where they became conversant with scientific terms in both Chinese and English. When Dr. Kwan finally left Hong Kong in 1962, it was to attend Yuba College, a junior college near Sacramento which charged her no tuition. "I think that school was either rich or very nice," she reflects. Then it was on to University of California-Berkeley where she fulfilled all her pre-med requirements.

When it came time to apply to medical school, Dr. Kwan saw the hurdles she faced as a minority female. Taking a scientific approach to the problem, she did a statistical analysis of admissions to United States and Canadian medical schools, comparing the number of female and foreign students accepted at each school over several years. Though the all-female, private Medical College of Philadelphia appeared to be her best opportunity, its tuition was very high.

"My second best chance was IU," she recalls. "In 1965, 180 students were admitted to IUSM and ten percent were female. Three were foreign students, which was unusual compared to other state schools.

"I went to Bloomington for the interview; it was my first trip to the Midwest and I arrived when all the trees were changing color. I had never seen anything like it."

In her initial interview, a typical one for medical school candidates, she met with a panel of four faculty members. The encounter went so well that she was asked to attend a second interview. However, this one was conducted by four psychiatrists. Only women, out-of-state applicants and foreign students had to clear this second hurdle. Its purpose, Dr. Kwan believes in retrospect, was to determine if non-Hoosiers would become depressed or suffer other problems that would cause them to leave the program and waste Hoosier tax dollars.

An extra interview was not about to deter a woman who had already traveled so far. Dr. Kwan was accepted and went on to graduate with her 1969 class. She now holds a medical degree and a master's degree in public health.

She was drawn to San Francisco because of her husband's work as a structural engineer and because of the many Chinese there, who make up a quarter of the city's population.

"During my peds residency, the Chinese population in San Francisco increased steadily and I was very popular among the Chinese clinical patients at San Francisco's Children Hospital because I could speak both Mandarin and Cantonese," explains Dr. Kwan. "It was just a natural thing to do to set up a practice in Chinatown since a large percentage of the residents are monolingual and monocultural Chinese.

"In pediatrics, you deal with the parents as much if not more than you do with the children," she adds. "Almost all the parents in Chinatown are foreign-born; they need my services more than another population."

From her office in the heart of Chinatown, Dr. Kwan now serves patients ninety-nine percent of whom are Chinese; only about forty percent of the parents are bilingual. She realizes that her life has come full-circle. Her heritage once was an obstacle to achieving her goal. Now it is an asset. The adversity she faced as a youth has made her a better physician, a better parent and a better person. She thanks her parents for that. And she thanks IUSM for giving her the opportunity she needed to provide care to the smallest members of the Chinese community, who live in the shadow of the Golden Gate Bridge.