Chair named for ousted surgeon

Written byKerry Grens

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After spending millions on behalf of a heart surgeon's legal dispute, the University of Minnesota has agreed to shell out another half million honoring his name. linkurl:John Najarian,;http://www.surg.umn.edu/surgery/faculty/najarian_john_s.html a heart surgeon formerly at the center of a major legal dispute between the University of Minnesota and the US government, will lend his name to a newly endowed chair at the university, the __Pioneer Press__ linkurl:reported;http://tinyurl.com/2xlx59 this week. Although Najarian cost the school $32 million to settle the lawsuit and was forced to leave his position as chair of surgery, the school will contribute $500,000 to the $2 million endowment. Najarian was a transplant surgeon who got in trouble in the early 1990s after developing and distributing an anti-rejection drug, anti-lymphocyte globulin, without license. The court linkurl:acquitted Najarian;http://www.the-scientist.com/article/display/13380 and he has remained at the university since, but the university president at the time of the lawsuit considered him guilty of misconduct and an independent faculty committee "found Najarian unfit to do research on human subjects," the __Press__ reported. A university administrator told the __Press__ that Najarian's "clinical contributions to humanity" were still worthy of celebration. A hat tip to the Chronicle of Higher Education's linkurl:news blog;http://tinyurl.com/247ab3 for spotting the article.

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Meet the Author

Kerry Grens
Kerry served as The Scientist’s news director until 2021. Before joining The Scientist in 2013, she was a stringer for Reuters Health, the senior health and science reporter at WHYY in Philadelphia, and the health and science reporter at New Hampshire Public Radio. Kerry got her start in journalism as a AAAS Mass Media fellow at KUNC in Colorado. She has a master’s in biological sciences from Stanford University and a biology degree from Loyola University Chicago.
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