Weill Cornell Medical College has received a $250,000 grant from the Avon Foundation to support a unique new meditation-based stress reduction program for women who have been treated for breast cancer or gynecologic cancer.

Weill Cornell Medical College today broke ground on its new Ambulatory Care and Medical Education Building, the 106-year-old institution's first clinical facility. The centerpiece of Weill Cornell's capital campaign, Advancing the Clinical Mission, the 13-story,$230-million medical complex will serve as the new focus for patient care and education at the Medical College's campus, as well as the flagship building for Cornell University in New York City.

For men who suffer from enlargement of the prostate, also called benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH), combining two classes of drugs reduces the risk of significant worsening of symptoms and other BPH complications by 66 percent, according to a multi-center study authored by a physician-scientist at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center. The study results, published in the December 18 New England Journal of Medicine, may affect treatment for men with BPH including half of all men 60 and older in the United States.

Abnormally low blood sugar may raise an infant's risk for brain damage during delivery, according to a new study led by a NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center researcher. He believes early testing for neonatal hypoglycemia might potentially reduce neurologic morbidity.

In a significant scientific achievement, physicians and scientists at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center have successfully employed preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) for retinoblastoma. The result was the world's first babies genetically predisposed to this disease to be born free of the deadly eye cancer. The news appears in this month's issue of the American Journal of Ophthalmology.

Researchers at Weill Cornell Medical College believe they've uncovered a molecular switch that naturally suppresses the body's immune response in situations where it's not needed. Drugs that mimic or oppose this mechanism might someday fight autoimmune disorders like lupus or rheumatoid arthritis, or protect immune cells from enemies like HIV.

As part of an ongoing Phase I NIH-funded study, brain tumor patients at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center are being treated with a novel chemotherapy treatment, in which the drug topotecan is administered directly into the brain tumor through catheters. Traditional intravenous chemotherapy cannot treat brain tumors due to limitations caused by the blood-brain barrier, which prevents drugs from entering the brain. NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center is the only medical center worldwide where the treatment is available.

The American Heart Association (AHA) has selected numerous physician-scientists from Weill Cornell Medical College and NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center to present their work at the AHA's Scientific Sessions 2004. The four-day conference began this weekend at the Morial Convention Center in New Orleans.