Obstetrics & Gynecology

News and Events

Programs and providers of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Weill Cornell Medicine are often the focus of news stories and features appearing in major national media. We invite you to review some stories that typify the breakthrough accomplishments of our remarkable team and highlight the impact our care has had on patient’s lives.

$1.1 Million Grant Funds Research on Rare Neurodevelopmental Disorder

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A $1.1 million grant from the parent-caregiver-led Rare Bird Foundation to Weill Cornell Medicine is supporting the launch of a natural history study for a rare neurodevelopmental disorder that causes developmental delays and seizures called MEF2C Haploinsufficiency syndrome (MCHS).

Currently, there are no specific therapies for MCHS, which affects about 400 people worldwide. Patients with the condition may experience developmental delays, difficulties communicating, and frequent seizures. The goal of the study, coined the Volāre Study, is to collect vital information about the condition to lay the necessary groundwork for future clinical trials of therapies for MCHS.

“The drive for this study comes from the parents of children with MCHS,” said principal investigator Dr. Zachary Grinspan, director of the Pediatric Epilepsy Program at Weill Cornell Medicine and vice chair of health data science for the Department of Pediatrics at Weill Cornell Medicine and NewYork-Presbyterian Komansky Children’s Hospital of Children’s Hospital of New York. “They share a sense of urgency to bring treatments to their kids and to others who have the disease. It makes the work very personal and meaningful for our team.”

Vodcast: The Impact of Infertility on Mental Health

In the latest episode of Back to Health, Dr. Elizabeth Anne Grill discusses the emotional journey that couples can experience during infertility. She offers invaluable insights on coping strategies that foster emotional resilience when feelings of grief, anger, and despair arise. Watch the episode here.

Learn more about the Back to Health podcast here.

New Precision Medicine Approach Identifies a Promising Ovarian Cancer Treatment

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A pairing of two experimental drugs inhibits tumor growth and blocks drug-induced resistance in ovarian cancer, according to a preclinical study led by Weill Cornell Medicine investigators. The research reveals a promising strategy against this hard-to-treat malignancy, and more generally demonstrates a powerful new approach for the identification of effective regimens to treat genetically diverse cancers.

Ovarian cancer is genetically diverse in the sense that it can be driven by mutations in many different genes. This complicates the standard strategy of developing drugs to target common driver mutations. In the study, published July 7 in Cell Reports Medicine, the researchers applied a new precision medicine approach focused not on individual mutations but instead on the activation of growth signaling pathways specific to ovarian tumor cells. Using this pathway level data, they identified a new combination treatment strategy that selectively targets ovarian tumor cells and reduces ovarian tumor growth in preclinical models.

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