Dr. Eng (right) reviews the EKG of a toxicology patient with 4th year MSUCOM student Emily Ryan.

Doing quintessential preventive medicine, MSUCOM faculty and alumni are getting involved in the fight against bioterrorism in any way they can.

Take Janet Eng, DO, for instance. Dr. Eng, an assistant professor of internal medicine at MSUCOM, is also a medical toxicologist for Ingham Regional Medical Center. Most of her clinical emergency work deals with overdoses, poisonings, and adverse drug interactions. However, as an expert in the pharmacology/biochemistry of drugs and chemicals, she is well versed in the hazards of biological and chemical warfare agents. She points out, for instance, that the symptoms of some chemical warfare agents could be easily confused with the organophosphates found in home and garden products.

This expertise landed Dr. Eng a position on the City of Lansing Terrorist Preparedness Team, a taskforce comprising local medical, EMS, and law enforcement personnel. Formed in summer 2000, the taskforce has assessed the community's ability to respond to emergencies, including chemical and terrorist events. The committee has discussed a simulated train derailment and chemical spill and conducted a security assessment for the Department of Justice on government and university buildings.

Walid Ghurabi, DO, (Class of 1976) the medical director of the Emergency Center at UCLA-Santa Monica, sits on a bioterrorism taskforce for the UCLA campus system and advises Santa Monica emergency personnel. A specialist in emergency medicine, Dr. Ghurabi routinely trains paramedics and other "first-responders" in emergency medicine and is now helping emergency and hospital personnel identify the indications of biological or chemical warfare.

Peter Gulick, DO

"Part of this process involves training people to look for the right things," Dr. Ghurabi says. "We have learned, very quickly, that cases of inhalation anthrax can be detected with chest X-rays and that it does not have-like the flu-a runny or stuffy nose symptomology. Knowing this gives us an advantage."

As Dr. Ghurabi suggests, education-for the health professionals and the public-is the best defense against terror and its resulting hysteria. Just ask Peter Gulick, DO.

After the recent mail contaminations, Dr. Gulick, associate professor of internal medicine, went back to the books. Realizing that it had been many years since he had studied anthrax, Dr. Gulick contacted the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and obtained as much information as he could.

Dr. Gulick has helped train local hospital personnel to be vigilant for signs of biological/chemical warfare. A specialist in infectious diseases, Dr. Gulick is on call at both Lansing hospitals and has helped educate emergency room professionals on what to look for and, he stresses, how to avoid panic.

He says, for instance, that anthrax infection can sometimes be misrecognized and consequently dismissed: "the blood cultures of an infected patient initially will look as if they are contaminated," he explains.

Dr. Gulick has been instrumental in helping the Lansing hospitals develop a protocol for identifying and handling anthrax cases.

As the Sept 11 attacks and subsequent mail contaminations made clear, fear can go a long way in disrupting our lives and giving the terrorists what they ultimately want. Thanks to physicians across the country like Dr. Eng, Dr. Ghurabi, and Dr. Gulick, we can reclaim some of our ease.