The 2024 UW-CTRI All-Staff Meeting was anything but typical. It was the first time in the Center’s 32 years that it marked the change of directors. Dr. Michael Fiore, who co-founded the organization with Dr. Tim Baker, and served as its founding director for 32 years, welcomed the group that included new UW-CTRI Director Dr. Hasmeena Kathuria.
Sure, Fiore gave his usual state of the Center—one that reviewed how UW-CTRI rallied to write more than 10 grants, garnered two recently and received very high scores on three others. But he also welcomed Kathuria, and discussed how she has been a perfect fit since assuming leadership.
Guest speakers Dr. James Stein and Dr. Nizar Jarjour echoed those sentiments, having served on the search committee for the new director. They both expressed excitement that Kathuria brings a wealth of experience as a practicing pulmonologist and a researcher particularly focused on how to help the most vulnerable patients quit tobacco use.
Fiore, Stein and Jarjour complimented the entire UW-CTRI staff for their work to help patients across the state, the nation and beyond to address their tobacco use.
UW-CTRI Outreach Director Karen Conner spoke about how she and Kathuria plan to lead the Outreach program.
Dr. Brian Williams discussed his new five-year K08 grant from NIDA to help youth quit vaping. Dr. Megan Piper presented on the new five-year R01 from NCI she’s leading with Baker called Avenues, designed to help people quit smoking.
Regarding potential grants on the horizon, Piper, Stein and Dr. Danielle McCarthy also gave overviews of proposals that received very high review scores.
McCarthy’s grant proposal got an especially high score.
“Last year, I talked about how the smoking epidemic is moving toward socially disadvantaged communities and how we need to move in that direction,” McCarthy said. “So this application builds on the foundation that Dr. Bruce Christiansen and the Outreach Team have built with community social service agencies throughout the state, including the Salvation Army.”
Watch future issues of this newsletter and ctri.wisc.edu for updates on these pending grants.
Fiore honored employees with medals for major work milestones, including (from top left):
- 5 years: Adam Nunez, Kay Lera
- 10 years: Dr. Tom Piasecki
- 15 years: Kirsten Webster (who couldn’t be there, so Dr. Jess Cook accepted the medal on her behalf)
- 20 years: Christopher Hollenback, Chris Ripley
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Dr. Megan Piper displays her 25-year medal with Dr. Michael Fiore. 25 years: Dr. Megan Piper
UW-CTRI colleagues gathered at the Pyle Center on the UW-Madison campus.
“Kay Lera coordinated the event beautifully and deftly,” Kathuria said.
Special thanks to Jack Williford, who took most of the pictures.
