CONTACT: DAVE PEDERSEN
2130 Medical Laboratories
Iowa City IA 52242
(319) 335-8032; fax (319) 335-8034
e-mail: david-pedersen@uiowa.edu

Release: June 22, 1999

UI College of Medicine honors six at Distinguished Alumni Awards ceremony

IOWA CITY, Iowa -- Six individuals were honored by the University of Iowa College of Medicine with Distinguished Alumni Awards at a June 11 luncheon.

John C. Cambier, Ph.D., Kathryn Edwards, M.D., and Robert Joynt, M.D., Ph.D., each received the college's Award for Achievement, which honors alumni for significant accomplishments in science and medicine.

Steven Jenison, M.D., and Paul J. Laube, M.D., received the Award for Service, presented to alumni for meritorious service to their community, state or nation.

Kenneth Yerington, a UI graduate who served as the director of financial management and control at the UI Hospitals and Clinics for 27 years, received the Award for Friendship. This honor is given to individuals, not necessarily alumni, for support and dedication to the UI College of Medicine and its missions of teaching, research and service.

John Cambier, a Springfield, Ill. native, received his master's degree in 1972, and his doctorate in 1975, at the UI. He serves as chief of the basic science division in the pediatrics department at the National Jewish Hospital in Denver, Colo. He also holds an appointment in the University of Colorado department of immunology.

He is widely regarded as an expert in the field of immunology and research related to the defense mechanisms of the body. He has published more than 200 research articles and currently serves as deputy editor for the Journal of Immunology. He also sits on the editorial board for the journal Immunity.

Kathryn Edwards was born in Williamsburg. She earned her UI medical degree in 1973 and is a faculty member at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine in Nashville in the school's pediatric infectious diseases division.

Edwards is noted for developing vaccines to prevent infectious diseases among children. She played a major role in the development and clinical evaluation of a new acellular pertussis vaccine. She headed the effort to design and coordinate clinical trials to compare potential vaccines for the disease. In 1996 the first acellular pertussis vaccine was licensed for infant use, and Edwards played a key role in getting the vaccine to the public.

Robert Joynt, originally from LeMars, earned his medical degree in 1952. He also received a master's degree and a doctorate in anatomy at the UI in 1963. Following a five-year appointment in the UI department of neurology, Joynt joined the faculty at the University of Rochester in New York. He was the founding chair of the neurology department at the university's School of Medicine and Dentistry, and over his career has served as dean of the medical school, as well as vice president and vice provost for health affairs. Joynt retired from his administrative duties in 1997 but continues his teaching activities.

Among his numerous professional accomplishments, Joynt is the editor of the multi-volume "Clinical Neurology," the preeminent modern text in that field. He served as editor of the journal Archives of Neurology for 15 years and has served as president of the American Academy of Neurology and the American Neurological Association.

A native of Ames, Steven Jenison earned his UI medical degree in 1981. He serves as medical director of the HIV/AIDS/STD Bureau for the State Public Health Department in New Mexico.

He is a leader in efforts to advance quality services and social support for HIV-infected persons backed by public and private funding. His work was key to state legislation that allowed New Mexico to be one of the first Western states to have a syringe exchange program for injection drug users.

Jenison also is credited with having developed a laboratory test, while a faculty member in infectious diseases at the University of New Mexico, to diagnose hantavirus pulmonary syndrome, a previously unidentified viral illness that caused deaths in New Mexico and Arizona in 1993.

Paul Laube earned his UI bachelor's degree in 1932 and medical degree in 1936. Returning to his hometown of Dubuque in 1951, he established a general surgery practice, which remained highly successful until his retirement in 1985. He also spent 30 years of his career as a member of the Board of Directors of Bethany House in Dubuque, a retirement community founded by his father.

Laube also has provided 47 years of leadership on the board of trustees at the University of Dubuque. Throughout his board service, he has been a member of the trustee's executive committee, served a term as president and since 1960 as secretary. He played key roles in establishing University of Dubuque Master of Science programs in nursing in Taiwan and Master of Business

Administration programs in Hong Kong, Singapore and Kuala Lumpur.

Kenneth Yerington, a West Liberty native, received his UI bachelor's degree in accounting in 1958.

In 1966, he joined the UI Hospitals and Clinics as controller. Six years later, he was appointed director of financial management and control at the hospital. Yerington was brought in to help usher in the then-new Medicare system. From technology advances to managed care reform, he led the UI Hospitals and Clinics through dramatic changes in health care financial management. He also taught students in the UI Graduate Program in Hospital and Health Administration. Yerington entered into phased retirement earlier this year.