In 2018, Proctor won a gold medal at the World Championship in baton twirling in Lillehammer, Norway. On May 10, the Buffalo, N.Y., native will achieve another milestone when she crosses the stage to accept her hard-earned bachelor’s degree in nursing. Proctor became an expert multi-tasker as she tackled nursing school studies, baton twirling for UofL fans and a job at Norton Children’s hospital as a student health care assistant.

As she rotated through different clinicals, her nursing capstone experience took her with the critical care float team where she encountered every unit at Norton Children’s. This helped determine her steps after graduation.

“I fell in love with pediatric care,” said Proctor, who has decided to continue her education through UofL’s . “I know pediatrics is a very hard job, but I find it gratifying. I’m here to make those kids laugh and make their days a little better.”

Fortunately for Proctor, making the decision to advance her nursing education means continuing to do the things she most treasures.

“I am so grateful that the twirling scholarship I received will pay for the majority of my DNP program – and I can remain for two more years as the featured twirler for UofL.”

The New York native credits the caring and supportive UofL nursing faculty who helped her manage the tough schedule and nursing school curriculum for the past four years. “It’s reassuring knowing that I have adults on my side to help in case I need it or just be there to support me like my family would back home,” Proctor said.

She recognized the impact of one professor, in particular.

“Starting nursing school, I was nervous because it’s intimidating, but then I met Dr. Rebecca Gesler, who recognized me from UofL games as the twirler,” said Proctor. “She has done a lot more for me than she may realize. I knew it was going to be hard, but I’m very grateful that the professors and instructors at the are willing to be not just educators but also support systems.”

As for the future, until at least May 2028, when the nurse is scheduled to complete her Doctor of Nurse Practitioner degree, the UofL community – and the whole community – will continue to benefit from Proctor’s talents as she twirls on the field and provides health care to children.

“It’s going to be tough for sure, but I’m excited to keep going and do what I love.”

Read more about Protor’s UofL journey.��

These are the ingredients that make up raiseRED, the University of Louisville’s largest student-run philanthropy that has raised over $4.7 million for pediatric cancer and blood disorders research and patient support since 2013.

“Fight Like a Kid” is the theme of this year’s raiseRED, which will be held Friday through Saturday, Feb. 23-24, at the Swain Student Activities Center Ballroom.

raiseRED is a dance marathon that benefits UofL’s Division of Pediatric Hematology and Oncology and the Norton Children’s Cancer Institute outpatient clinic. Participants raise a minimum of $200 per person to participate, with many raising even more.

“Every dollar fundraised for raiseRED goes directly to either research for pediatric oncology or to the patients themselves,” Emilia Perez, a UofL student who was diagnosed with lymphoma in high school, said. “Everything we raise is going to benefit someone personally.”

The event kicks off at 6 p.m., Friday, Feb. 23, and culminates with the big reveal of total dollars raised at the Community Celebration from 10:30 a.m.-noon, Saturday, Feb. 24.

In between, students will kick up their heels. To keep up their spirits – and help keep their eyes open – several mini-themed events are held during raiseRED. Among them are:

• Buzz for the Cure: A long-standing raiseRED tradition, students pledge to shave their head, or do a major chop, during the dance marathon if they reach their fundraising goal.
• Angel Hour: The people in participants’ lives who have been impacted by cancer and blood disorders are recognized and remembered.��
• Mail Call: Letters of support from participants’ loved ones are read to cheer them on.
• Silent Disco: The speaker system goes silent and participants wear headphones to hear and dance to music only they can hear.

It’s the cause of helping others battling cancer and giving second chances that is the core of the effort, said Sophie Doszak, a junior at UofL.

Doszak was swabbed by the during raiseRED in 2022 and received the call last year that she had matched with a leukemia patient.��

“I would not have donated without raiseRED,” Doszak said. “Seeing the impact that you can have on someone’s life made me wish I had gotten on the donor list a long time ago. Most of the time it takes years to finally match with someone, and I was lucky enough to match with someone and give my gift of life to someone who needed another chance at life.”

The event will be beginning at 6 p.m. Friday. For information and to donate,

“It is remarkable how our team of pediatric specialists came together with the device company to offer a resolution for such a small patient weighing less than three pounds at the time of implant,” said Soham Dasgupta, pediatric electrophysiologist, Norton Children’s Heart Institute, and UofL assistant professor of pediatric cardiology. “This case is unlike any other and we are so pleased to see this patient thriving as a result of the innovative approach.”

Approximately 1 in 22,000 infants are born with CCAVB. Untreated, the condition has a high incidence of prolonged illness or death. The usual treatment involves implantation of a pacemaker once the patient meets a minimum body size, typically 4.5 to 5.5 pounds, to accommodate the implantable device. Taking time for the baby to grow while being otherwise treated is strongly preferred for this situation. With this patient, however, the traditional plan was not working.

“In this instance, the patient was not of the optimal size and medical/conservative management was unsuccessful, so a specially modified pediatric-sized pacemaker also known as an implantable pulse generator (IPG) created by Medtronic was used,” Dasgupta said.

Dasgupta and his colleague, Christopher L. Johnsrude, director of pediatric and adult congenital electrophysiology at Norton and UofL associate professor of pediatric cardiology, reviewed the relevant preclinical data from a procedure where a similar tiny pediatric IPG had been implanted in an adult Yucatan miniature pig, an animal with a heart that resembles a child’s heart.

Once it was determined the pediatric IPG was potentially compatible with the patient at Norton Children’s, Dasgupta worked with Norton Children’s Research Institute, affiliated with the UofL School of Medicine, and the manufacturer, to obtain local Institutional Review Board approval and emergency authorization from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.��

The procedure to place the implant was completed over the course of a two-hour open-heart surgery. The tiny device measures 1.16 by 0.65 by 0.38 inches and weighs 0.18 ounces.

“While the operative steps might be comparable to the usual pacemaker implantation surgery, this surgery was especially delicate due to the very small size of the baby,” said Bahaaldin Alsoufi, chief of pediatric cardiothoracic surgery, co-director of Norton Children’s Heart Institute, and UofL professor of cardiothoracic surgery. “This tiny pacemaker generator was positioned in the abdominal wall on the right side and was connected to the usual leads that were attached to the heart.

“This novel device will provide the necessary support that the baby currently needs. At time of repair of the patient’s congenital heart defect in the future, we will be able to utilize these same leads and likely connect them then to a traditional larger pacemaker generator.”

To date, the patient is doing well and continues to be cared for by cardiac and neonatal specialists across Norton Children’s Heart Institute.

Beckham will take over for Band Director Amy Acklin for “Marching Together,” the band’s now-yearly event to spotlight children who are patients of UofL Pediatrics physicians at Norton Children’s Hospital.

Beckham has leukemia and currently has weekly chemotherapy treatment. But the illness hasn’t dampened his spirit one bit.

“Beckham just has this energy; we just knew, ‘Oh man, he could handle it Saturday and beyond.’ So we asked him to be the guest band director for me,” .��

“Our ‘drum major in training’ graciously agreed to get the band off the field at halftime and conduct our fight song.”

Acklin added that several of the songs performed by the band at Saturday’s performance were selected by patients at Norton Children’s.

The Marching Together event highlights UofL’s annual (and largest) student fundraiser, . Organized and conducted entirely by UofL students, raiseRED consists of a week’s worth of events leading up to an 18-hour dance marathon that supports pediatric cancer research at UofL and Norton Children’s.

Marching band members support raiseRED each year, and the band is sponsoring the Marching Together event to bring attention and encourage donations to raiseRED which will be held Feb. 22-27, 2022.

Last year, raiseRED brought in more than $690,000. Due to COVID-19, the event was not held in its traditional format, but rather outside at Cardinal Stadium. The organization plans to revisit its normal format this year and the fundraising goal is $3 million. One-hundred percent of the funds raised go to UofL’s Pediatric Division of Hematology and Oncology and to Norton Children’s Cancer Institute.

Beckham, however, is just interested in getting some practice time in. Earlier this week, he was getting baton handling pointers from feature twirler Morgan Proctor and rehearsing his lines:

“C – A – R – D – S – Go – Cards!”

UofL takes on Clemson Saturday at 7:30 p.m. at Cardinal Stadium. To donate to raiseRED, go to the

The Health Resources and Services Administration has awarded more than $1.2 million over 5 years to the UofL and Norton Children’s project, out of a $48 million award to establish a Regional Pediatric Pandemic Network. The amount awarded to UofL and Norton Children’s is expected to grow throughout the next four years. The project will involve preparing for global health threats, including pandemics, and supporting communities in everyday pediatric readiness.

Charles G. Macias, chief quality officer at University Hospitals�� Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital in Cleveland, will lead the project. Mary E. Fallat will head the UofL and Norton Children’s effort.

“We began this work before the global pandemic, and 2020 proved how important it is for hospitals, health care infrastructures, government and private entities to work together to create a coordinated emergency response model,” Macias said. “This grant is an amazing opportunity to grow a national model whose impact can inform all aspects of pediatric preparedness, from daily efforts to global health threats.”

The network brings together five children’s health care facilities but also creates a network of networks—including the nation’s only two federally-funded Pediatric Disaster Centers of Excellence, which are funded through the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response and the work of the Emergency Medical Services for Children Innovation and Improvement Center, funded through HRSA’s EMSC program.

The Regional Pediatric Pandemic Network includes:

• UH Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital, affiliated with Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio����
• University of Louisville School of Medicine Department of Surgery and Norton Children’s Hospital
• University of California San Francisco and its Benioff Children’s Hospital, Oakland, California����
• University of Utah and Primary Children’s Hospital, Salt Lake City, Utah
• Saint Louis University and Cardinal Glennon Children’s Hospital, St. Louis, Missouri

This network of children’s hospitals represents a broad geographic diversity and will serve as a hub-and-spoke model of expertise to support efforts for pediatric readiness and disaster/pandemic preparedness by incorporating specific focus areas, called “domains,” such as trauma, equity, analytics and others, to define best practices as supported by the ASPR, HRSA, EMSC, and other existing workgroups.

Norton Children’s Hospital will be the hub for integration of trauma and burns into the network, and Fallat is the principal investigator for the site. The hospital is well positioned for this effort as it has been a leader in pediatric trauma care for the region since the late 1980s, when the hospital administration supported Fallat’s efforts to build a trauma program at the hospital. Norton Children’s Hospital is a Level I American College of Surgeons verified trauma center led by David Foley.

Thanks to support from the community through the Norton Children’s Hospital Foundation, the trauma program remains a regional center for the highest level of emergency care for children. The foundation plans to raise an additional $5 million to further advance the care available to children from throughout Kentucky, Southern Indiana and beyond.��

”This is extremely important work from a number of perspectives,” Fallat said. “The first is that current efforts for national and state preparedness often forget about children. The second is that trauma still claims the lives of more children in this country annually than any other cause. The third is that efforts to prepare for mass casualty events in different domains such as infectious diseases, trauma, natural disasters and others – often operate in silos, and this grant will unite them. Lastly, there is a need in all hospitals to build ’pediatric preparedness’ into the emergency department structure and function, and adult providers need to be a part of this.

“We need to build confidence in community surgeons/emergency providers/trauma teams. Many rural medical providers are used to caring for adults and experience added stress when they are called on to care for children. They want to provide the care but realize and are distressed by a sense of higher stakes,” she said. ��“A goal should be to build a team that can, together with the surgeon, support each other to provide their best care to kids. Extrapolating to the grant at large, this seems a reasonable goal for all aspects of emergency planning.”

The UofL portion of the project also will involve Kristina K. Bryant, professor of pediatrics, system pediatric epidemiologist and infection control, UofL Division of Pediatric Infectious Diseases; Beth Spurlin, assistant professor of pediatrics at UofL and director of EMS and mass casualty at Norton Children’s Hospital, and Gena Cooper, assistant professor of pediatrics and emergency medicine at the University of Kentucky and Kentucky Children’s Hospital.����

“The pandemic’s impact on children and the health care systems that care for children extend beyond the diagnosis and management of infectious diseases to challenges with access to care and a behavioral health crisis,” said Daniel Simon, president, academic and external affairs and chief scientific officer, UH. “This new network will help to accelerate research-informed pediatric care transformation for sick and injured children across national organizations and infrastructures and we are proud to be leading efforts here in Cleveland and the nation.”

Under the newly-formed Norton Children’s Medical Group, affiliated with the UofL School of Medicine, 21 former UofL general pediatric and pediatric subspecialist practices are now part of Norton Healthcare. Approximately 600 providers and staff have transitioned with the affiliation.

“By integrating the best pediatric providers who are committed to providing safe, high-quality care, we will make it easier for families to access comprehensive medical care for their children,” said Russell F. Cox, president and CEO, Norton Healthcare.

The UofL physicians and providers who are currently on the faculty of the school of medicine will remain in their academic role and will also work clinically within Norton Children’s Medical Group.

“UofL is committed to helping nurture healthy children and communities while maintaining our strong academic training programs and research. This agreement ultimately will translate into even better care for children,” said UofL President Neeli Bendapudi.

“Integrating allows the two organizations to move forward, capitalizing on each other’s strengths for the benefit of our patients and families,” said Steven T. Hester, MD, MBA, division president, provider operations, and system chief medical officer, Norton Healthcare.

The affiliation is designed to make it easier for patients to access outpatient care within the practices and inpatient care at Norton Children’s Hospital. Access will be improved through:

• Scheduling enhancements
• Recruiting additional providers
• Increasing the number of multidisciplinary clinics, where patients with serious and chronic medical conditions can see multiple specialists on the same day
• Using a single integrated electronic medical record, which will make it easier for patients and families to access test results and communicate with their providers

“Ultimately, the goal is to develop and deliver the best possible programs, services and patient experience for the children of Kentucky and beyond,” said Jennifer C. Evans, MD, MPH, FACOG, system vice president, women’s and pediatric services, Norton Healthcare. “Both organizations have been committed to providing a seamless transition.”

This new model also will allow the practices to enhance their focus on providing highly-skilled clinical care that is integrated with world-class medical education and research. A strong continued commitment to innovation and education is an important component of the integration. UofL’s academic and research mission is key to teaching the next generation of pediatric providers, which is essential to growing a regionally and nationally recognized pediatric program. In addition, by working together, the organizations can recruit, train and retain key talent for pediatric programs.

“Children will benefit from the strong academic training programs and research that will continue through the UofL School of Medicine,” said Kimberly A. Boland, MD, professor and chair, department of pediatrics, University of Louisville School of Medicine. “Working together will help us attract additional specialists to Louisville to care for children with the most complex medical issues. We look forward to seeing what great things we can accomplish together, not only in clinical care, but also in educating future pediatricians and making new discoveries in the field of child and adolescent health care.”

The Joint Commission, the premiere national health care accrediting organization, granted the center a Certificate of Distinction for Inpatient Diabetes Care, making the center one of only three in the country to receive the designation. The others are Boston Children’s Hospital and Children’s Medical Center of Dallas

“The certification was made possible through our partnership with the University of Louisville and our joint vision to develop one of the most comprehensive diabetes programs in the nation,” said Emmett C. Ramser, chief administrative officer, Norton Children’s Hospital. “We’re always striving to provide the best service to our patients, families, and the community, and are proud these efforts have been nationally recognized.”

The certification is the result of a focus on improving diabetes care, particularly for children moving between the hospital and outpatient care settings. At UofL, outpatient services are provided in the Wendy Novak Diabetes Center location in the Novak Center for Children’s Health.

“We’ve seen the number of children with Type 1 diabetes increase dramatically in recent years,” said Kupper A. Wintergerst, MD, division chief of pediatric endocrinology and director of the center. “Caring for children with diabetes, especially those who are newly diagnosed, requires a coordinated approach so that patients are successful once they leave the hospital. By coordinating care on all levels, we can better support patients and families living with this disease.”

Norton Children’s Hospital underwent a rigorous review to assess its compliance with standards on quality, safety, transitions of care, handoff communications and other key attributes. More than 1,200 children currently are being treated for Type 1 diabetes by specialists at Norton Children’s Hospital and the University of Louisville. Approximately 150 children are diagnosed each year.

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Boland has served as assistant dean of resident education and work environment in the Office of Graduate Medical ����ֱ�� at the UofL medical school since August 2016. Additionally, she holds the positions of executive vice chair of pediatrics, associate director of pediatric residency training and professor in the UofL Department of Pediatrics. Board-certified in pediatrics, Boland is a pediatric hospitalist with and .

“Kim Boland is an outstanding clinician educator, scholar and leader,” Ganzel said. “She is well positioned to lead the Department of Pediatrics now and into the future.”

In addition to overseeing the pediatric residency program for nine years as program director, Boland oversaw nine pediatric fellowship programs at UofL. She assisted in the creation of the department’s Development and Behavioral Fellowship, Pediatric Child Abuse Fellowship, Pediatric Pulmonary Fellowship, Pediatric Endocrinology Fellowship and Pediatric Hematology-Oncology Fellowship. She also serves the university on the Promotion Appointment and Tenure Committee and the School of Medicine Wellness Committee.

She is a past recipient of the Paul Weber Award, the School of Medicine Master Educator Award and Dean’s Educator Award for Distinguished Teaching, along with five clinical teaching awards and seven faculty peer-mentoring awards.

Boland was named a fellow of the Hedwig van Ameringen Executive Leadership in Academic Medicine (ELAM) Program’s 2017-18 class. ELAM is a yearlong fellowship for women faculty in schools of medicine, dentistry and public health and provides training and experiential learning to help expand the national pool of qualified women candidates for executive positions in the academic health sciences.

She also is immediate past chair of the Association of Pediatric Program Directors’ Mid-America Region and a member of its Curriculum Task Force and a past president of both the Kentucky Pediatric Foundation and the Kentucky Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics.

A��Louisville native, Boland earned her undergraduate degree from Notre Dame University and her medical degree from UofL. She completed her residency and chief residency in pediatrics and a fellowship in pediatric critical care at St. Louis Children’s Hospital at Washington University in St. Louis.

Boland succeeds Charles Woods, MD, who has been named pediatrics chair at the University of Tennessee-Chattanooga and Children’s Hospital at Erlanger after serving at UofL for 12 years. “We thank Dr. Woods for his many years of service and leadership at the School of Medicine and wish him well in his new position,” Ganzel said.

Brian Holland, MD, has been serving as interim chief since 2017 and practices with . The UofL Board of Trustees approved his appointment in March.

“Dr. Holland relentlessly pursues quality improvement initiatives, research projects and growth opportunities to enhance and improve pediatric cardiovascular services, both in UofL pediatric clinics and at Norton Children’s Hospital,” said UofL Department of Pediatrics Chair Charles Woods, MD.

Holland is board-certified by the American Academy of Pediatrics, American College of Cardiology and American Society of Echocardiography. He joined UofL as a pediatric cardiologist in 2010. In 2015, he became the medical director for echocardiography, which is the use of ultrasound to obtain images of the structure and function of the heart. He also is chief of cardiology at .

Holland specializes in fetal, transthoracic and transesophageal echocardiography. Fetal echocardiography uses ultrasound to find details of heart defects before birth. Transthoracic echocardiography looks through the patient’s chest wall to see the heart, while transesophageal echocardiography uses a device that passes through the mouth into the esophagus to obtain images.

Holland attended the University of Pennsylvania where he graduated summa cum laude with a degree in bioengineering and then received his MD degree from the Medical College of Georgia in Augusta, where he was awarded membership in Alpha Omega Alpha Honor Medical Society.

Following his graduation from medical school, Holland served seven years with the U.S. Army Medical Corps. While in the Medical Corps, he completed an internship and residency in pediatrics at Tripler Army Medical Center in Honolulu and served as a pediatrician in Germany. He also earned the Bronze Star for exceptional service while deployed as a U.S. Army physician during Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan.

After finishing his military service, Holland completed a three-year fellowship in pediatric cardiology at New York-Presbyterian, the training hospitals of Columbia University and Cornell University, before coming to UofL.