NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, Columbia University Medical Center and Weill Cornell Medical College presented their annual Public Service Award to Senator Arlen Specter yesterday for his sustained efforts to increase support for biomedical research and enhance mental health care services at their reception during the 2012 American Psychiatric Association Meeting in Philadelphia.

May is National Stroke Awareness Month and NewYork-Presbyterian is working to spread awareness about stroke.

An internationally recognized glaucoma researcher and clinician, George A. Jack Cioffi, MD, has been appointed chairman of the Department of Ophthalmology at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, and ophthalmologist-in-chief at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center, effective March 1.

Every year, more than 100,000 Americans will need a life-saving organ transplant, yet in 2011 fewer than 22,000 transplants took place in the United States. In New York only 18 percent of New Yorkers who are eligible to donate are registered as organ donors, in stark contrast to the national average of 42 percent.

February is Heart Month and NewYork-Presbyterian is celebrating with events at our two heart centers: The Vivian and Seymour Milstein Family Heart and The Ronald O. Perelman Heart Institute.

Despite advances in the diagnosis and treatment of unruptured brain aneurysms, outcomes have remained stagnant over the last 10 years. This can be explained by the dramatic proliferation of minimally invasive endoscopic coiling procedures at lower-volume community hospitals, where outcomes are inferior.

One of the foremost authorities on pediatric minimally invasive surgeries, Dr. Pasquale Casale has been appointed chief of pediatric urology at NewYork-Presbyterian/Morgan Stanley Children's Hospital and professor of urology at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons.

By employing complex machine learning techniques to decipher repeated advanced brain scans, researchers at New York-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell were able to provide evidence that a patient with a severe brain injury could, in her way, communicate accurately.