NCCAM Welcomes Six New Members To Advisory Council

NIH News Release National Institutes of Health		National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM)
For immediate release: Friday, August 23, 2002		Contact: NCCAM Press Office, 301-451-8876

The National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) welcomes six new members to its National Advisory Council on Complementary and Alternative Medicine. The Council is the principal advisory group to NCCAM, a component of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The Council's purpose is to provide recommendations on the conduct and support of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) research at the NIH--including research training and information dissemination efforts derived from NCCAM's research.

The new members are:

• Zang-Hee Cho, Ph.D., Professor, Department of Radiological Sciences, Psychiatry and Human Behavior, and Ophthalmology, University of California at Irvine;
  

• Kristina M. Collins, D.C., Owner and Chiropractor, Old Dominion Chiropractic, Inc. in McLean, Virginia;
  

• Murray Goldstein, D.O., M.P.H, Medical Director, United Cerebral Palsy Research and Educational Foundation in Washington, D.C.;
  

• Michael R. Irwin, M.D., Professor and Director, Norman Cousins Center for Psychoneuroimmunology, University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) Neuropsychiatric Institute in Los Angeles, California;
  

• Barbara Timmermann, Ph.D., Regents Professor, Department of Pharmacology/Toxicology, College of Pharmacy at the University of Arizona; and
  

• Benjamin Chi-Kuo Yang, C.A., O.M.D., Commissioner and Member, State of California Industrial Medical Council in San Francisco, California.

Dr. Cho is a physicist who is an inventor of PET (Positron Emission Tomography) and established one of the first MRI laboratories at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology. He has applied his expertise in the physics of imaging to an interest in the neuroscience of acupuncture. He developed the first acupuncture functional MRI technique to explore connections between acupoints and the brain. Dr. Cho is an elected member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences and is National President of the Association of Korean Physicists in America.

Dr. Collins is a Chiropractor and owner of Old Dominion Chiropractic, Inc. in McLean, Virginia. As a licensed chiropractor, she provides chiropractic health care services to patients receiving care at this facility. She graduated magna cum laude from Life University in Marietta, Georgia--receiving her doctorate degree in chiropractic medicine. Among Dr. Collins' professional interests are detection and correction of vertebral subluxation, and educating the public about the health benefits of chiropractic care. She has obtained professional status in the use and practice of six chiropractic techniques, and is a member of several professional chiropractic associations.

Dr. Goldstein is Medical Director of the United Cerebral Palsy Research and Educational Foundation in Washington, D.C., and is a leader among doctors of osteopathic medicine. He wrote A Challenge to the Profession: Initiate Evidence-Based Osteopathic Medicine Now and was selected to serve on a committee developing a National Center of Excellence for Osteopathic Manipulation Research. He served on the Commission on Alternative Health Care, U.S. Olympic Committee on Sports Medicine, and produced The Scientific Status of the Fundamentals of Chiropractic: A Report to Congress, and The Research Status of Spinal Manipulative Therapy. He is a former director of the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, NIH, and a former Assistant Surgeon General, United States Public Health Service.

Dr. Irwin is Professor and Director of the Norman Cousins Center for Psychoneuroimmunology at the University of California, Los Angeles. His expertise is psychoneuroimmunology, psychopharmacology, and neurobiology of alcoholism. He conducts research on how stress and depression affect the body's ability to fight disease--especially in older adults. His research focuses on how moderate loss of sleep reduces cellular immune function and alternations of neuroendocrine and immunological mediators of the immune system. He is associate editor of Psychosomatic Medicine and served on the editorial board of Brain, Behavior and Immunity. In addition, he was elected president of the Psychoneuroimmunology Research Society.

Dr. Timmermann is Regents Professor of Pharmacology/Toxicology at the University of Arizona College of Pharmacy, and is Principal Investigator/Project Director of an international cooperative biodiversity group project involved in the discovery and development of drugs from plants and microbes in Latin America. She is also Principal Investigator at the University of Arizona Center for Phytomedicine Research, which is supported by the NIH Office of Dietary Supplements and NCCAM. She has served as a research advisor/educational sponsor for numerous postdoctoral associates, visiting scientists, doctoral and undergraduate students.

Dr. Yang is Commissioner and Member of the State of California Industrial Medical Council, Department of Industrial Relations for the State of California. He has a long career in the teaching and practice of acupuncture. He has served as Commissioner, State of California Acupuncture Control Committee and on several acupuncture boards and examination committees since the early 1990s. A doctor of Oriental medicine, Dr. Yang has been a licensed acupuncturist in California for over 20 years. He previously taught acupuncture at San Francisco College of Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine.

The National Advisory Council on Complementary and Alternative Medicine meets three times a year; all meetings are announced in the Federal Register. With the addition of 6 new members, the Council now comprises 18 members. Council members are appointed by the Secretary of Health and Human Services to serve terms of from 2 to 4 years.

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The National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) is dedicated to exploring complementary and alternative medical (CAM) practices in the context of rigorous science, training CAM researchers, and disseminating authoritative information to the public and professionals. For additional information, call NCCAM's Clearinghouse toll free at 1-888-644-6226 or visit the NCCAM Web site at nccam.nih.gov.

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