GE HealthCare Foundation donates $3M to establish professorship honoring noted radiologist
The GE HealthCare Foundation is donating $3 million to establish a new professorship in honor of a noted radiologist.
University of Wisconsin school of medicine leaders will reward the Thomas Grist, MD, “Distinguished Chair in Radiology Research” to the department’s incoming vice chair. GE’s initial $600,000 award will help further Grist’s “legacy of innovation in clinical care, imaging research and education,” the university noted.
UW hopes to recruit a new VC of research sometime in 2025, Scott Reeder, MD, PhD, Department of Radiology chair, said in an announcement from the Madison, Wisconsin, school.
“This professorship will provide sustained resources for that individual, not only to support their own research but also to further the department’s mission,” Reeder said. “This is a wonderful way to bring top talent to the university.”
Grist, a diagnostic radiologist with the School of Medicine and Public Health, joined UW in 1991. He and Wisconsin radiologists worked closely with GE HealthCare during his time with the school, producing breakthroughs in MR and CT imaging. GE scanners are now shipped worldwide with protocols and software developed at UW-Madison, “thanks largely to the enduring partnership fostered by Grist.”
He co-invented a technique called Time-Resolved MR Angiography (TRICKS), which helped change how doctors perform diagnostic MR angiography. The procedure uses images of blood vessels to examine the vascular system, with GE adopting the application for its machines.
Reeder held the vice chair of research position before succeeding Grist as department chair earlier this year. The faculty has grown under Grist’s tenure, now including 157, with UW seeking to add about 25 more.
“It is incredibly gratifying that Tom’s legacy is being honored in this way,” Reeder said in the announcement.
Marty Stempniak has covered healthcare since 2012, with his byline appearing in the American Hospital Association's member magazine, Modern Healthcare and McKnight's. Prior to that, he wrote about village government and local business for his hometown newspaper in Oak Park, Illinois. He won a Peter Lisagor and Gold EXCEL awards in 2017 for his coverage of the opioid epidemic.