At a training day sponsored by Johnson & Johnson, senior ER nurses practiced the craft of surgical sewing by way of a method closest to the real thing -- stitching together portions of raw chicken.

NEW YORK – In October, Dr. Amy Giannotti-Guralnick contacted AFORAM to discuss a gift to Rambam in her name and those of her husband Giovanni and their daughter Sasha to honor the 80th birthday of her father, Dr. Henry Guralnick.

CHESTNUT HILL, MA – On November 4th, Board Member Relly Dibner and her husband Brent graciously hosted the 2nd AFORAM New England Strategic Planning Session at their home in Chestnut Hill.

BOSTON – The proceeds of the Kol HaNeshama Music Festival, held on December 6th, were earmarked for Rambam's Pediatric Arts and Medical Clowning Programs.

Dental chairs, defibrillators, incubators, infusion pumps, microscops and medical monitors are examples of expensive hospital equipment generously contributed over the years by British Friends under the directorship of Ms. Anita Alexander-Passe.

MONTREAL – Molecular geneticist and nephrologist Prof. Karl Skorecki, Director of Medical and Research Development at Rambam, was hosted in mid autumn by Rambam's Montreal Friends.

TORONTO – The Toronto native son, who immigrated to Israel with his wife and children in 1995 -- in his case, making aliyah directly to Rambam Health Care Campus from the Division of Nephrology in the Departments of Medicine, Pediatrics and Clinical Biochemistry at the University of Toronto – was also made most welcome in the city of his birth.

An Interview with Professor Myriam Weyl Ben Arush
Head, Miri Shitrit Pediatric Hematology & Oncology Department, RHCC
Deputy Director, Children's Hospital, RHCC
Chair, Israel Society of Pediatric Hematology Oncology

Dear Friends of Rambam,

In January 2010, we sadly departed from Baruch (Bruce) Rappaport, loving husband to Ruth, dear father to Irith, Noga, Vered and Shoshana, a cherished friend, a man of giant deeds, and a true visionary who loved to see his dreams come true.

PARIS – Light rain scrawled neon squiggles across the pavement and rippled the river's surface, whose buoyant lights fractured into stained glass shards.

Tel-Aviv based, internationally celebrated theater troupe Mayumana thrilled spectators with a show of Momentum – a high-voltage dance and music performance that took place on November 26th at the Rappaport Auditorium in Central Carmel. The Minister of Science and Technology, Prof. Daniel Hershkowitz, was among the speakers. The event was organized by the Israeli Friends Association, with all proceeds earmarked for stroke prevention and treatment programs at Rambam.

In a real mass casualty event, human lives would be at stake, but this was a NATO-sponsored tabletop drill for multinational players – a board game with emergency personnel represented by hypodermic syringes labeled Surgeon, Registered Nurse [RN] and so forth, and patients represented by tiny cardboard rectangles marked with each individual's age, gender, vital signs and bodily injuries.

Two groups of Norwegian student nurses from two well-known nursing schools, one in Bergen and the other in Oslo, recently came to Israel to complement their training at home with practical studies at Rambam

JERUSALEM – Prof. Shmuel Eidelman has been awarded the Israeli Medical Association's Certificate of Merit for 2009 in expression of esteem for his decades of service to medicine and the public health system.

DIJON – On December 4, 2009, in the city where she grew up, studied medicine and learned her pediatric specialty, and where her mother lives, Prof. Myriam Ben Arush, Director of Rambam's Pediatric Hematology and Oncology Department, was honored with the rank of Chevalier de la Legion d'honneur, France's highest decoration.

 On October 22nd, Rambam dedicated Israel's first emergency medical facility fortified against conventional and chemical warfare.

In July, specialist physician in adrenal, thyroid and parathyroid surgery Dr. Michal Mekel joined the team of Prof. Michael Krausz, Director of Department of Surgery A and one of Israel's best and busiest endocrine surgeons.

Meet Eitan Nechin (26), professional musician and London-based journalism and film student with a harrowing summer adventure to relate – and to show for it, crawling up both sides of his lower right leg, a pair of raw surgical scars whose mahogany hue and lizard shape suggest Maori carvings or aboriginal tattoos signifying a young man's rite of passage.

 In September, Dr. Arie Gordin, newly appointed in charge of the Pediatric Otolaryngology (ENT) Service, returned to Rambam from a six-month research fellowship at Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester, New York and a two-year clinical fellowship at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto. 

In August 2005, Prof. Ian Gralnek, Director of Hospital-Wide Ambulatory Care Services and Senior Physician in the Department of Gastroenterology at RHCC, and the Academic Advisor for U.S. Clinical Affairs of the Technion American Medal Students Program, made aliyah to the Rambam campus from Los Angeles.  Most recently in L.A., he had served as Director of the UCLA Center for the Study of Digestive Healthcare Quality and Outcomes, and Associate Director of the UCLA/VA Center for Neurovisceral Sciences & Women's Health.