Cersosimo, Eugenio MD

School of Medicine
Medicine
(210) 358-7200
cersosimo@uthscsa.edu

In July 2001, I joined the Division of Diabetes, Department of Medicine in the capacity of Assistant Professor, and I was immediately (12 months later) promoted to the level of Associate Professor. My transfer from the State University of New York (SUNY) at Stony Brook to the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio (UTHSCSA) was motivated primarily by the realization of co-investigators, peers and experts in the field of my exceptional academic and clinical accomplishments in the area of diabetes and metabolism. At that time, I was involved in a 5-year NIH-sponsored project addressing the topic of renal glucose metabolism and its potential usefulness in the treatment of diabetes. Upon transferring to the UTHSCSA, I also brought with me funds from the Juvenile Diabetes Research & Foundation to pursue a related project, dedicated to type 1 diabetes. All the equipment, critical material and supplies necessary to conduct these studies were transported to the Texas Diabetes Institute (TDI)Research Laboratory, where I established my new research program.

Having completed many years of training at the Mayo Clinic and Mayo Graduate School prior to joining SUNY, I was then recognized as one of the highest qualified and most productive young specialist in Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism in the nation. This was evidenced by the choice of my name to lead and implement the new Diabetes Care Center at SUNY, Stony Brook. In response to the overwhelming support and enthusiasm of medical administrators, peer physicians and faculty, as well as from patients, intramural funding became available for me to lead the development of a New Diabetes Care Center. As a result of this unique experience and initiative, when I arrived at UTHSCSA, the Department of Medicine also charged me with substantial clinical, teaching and administrative responsibilities.

My main areas of interest in clinical research evolved from glucose regulation and counter-regulation by the kidney in healthy individuals and in patients with diabetes to a much broader field, encompassing the role of gastrointestinal hormones, pancreatic islet cell physiology and insulin resistance. In addition, because atherosclerosis is the most common complication associated with high cardiovascular morbidity and mortality in patients with type 2 diabetes and insulin resistant states (i.e., obesity), I have expanded the TDI Laboratory and created the Vascular Unit.

Using private donations and public funds we acquired new equipment. The advent of a new micro-circulatory flow detector and ultrasonography imaging, we have enhanced tremendously our research capability. This expansion generated some pioneering work with findings in both young and adult patients, with diabetes and at high risk for developing diabetes. Continuing our investigations in this area of vascular endothelial dysfunction and inflammation, we advanced our clinical physiology studies into basic research.

As a consequence of the numerous opportunities for academic collaborations at UTHSCSA, in the past 15 years, together we have developed further interests in topics addressing the molecular mechanisms underlying the initiation and progression of atherosclerosis, with a focus on diabetes and obesity. Using primary cell cultures derived from smooth muscle layer of coronary arteries, we have been able to examine a wide range of potential abnormal pathways. All of which might help explain the predominance of accelerated atherosclerosis in patients with insulin resistance, including diabetes and obese subjects.

I am an attending physician and, in addition to providing care and follow-up of all research patients and subject volunteers, I have two clinics per week to care for Diabetes and Endocrine Disorders. In the outpatient clinic,my duties include routine physical exam, analyses of laboratory and imaging results, requesting and performing complex dynamic endocrine testing and diagnostic thyroid aspiration biopsies. My principal areas of clinical interests are medical management of diabetes with an emphasis on nutritional manipulations and, also designing and implementing intensive insulin therapy, using either device assistance(insulin pump)or multiple injections. I have a special interest in developing and implementing prevention strategies to reduce or delay the appearance of cardiovascular and renal complications. In this regard, I have opened a once a week Pre-Diabetes Clinic to exam and counsel first-degree relatives who may be at very high risk of developing the disease.

In all my activities, as an Associate Professor I have been able to share my experience, teach and supervise medical students, interns & residents, fellows, graduate and post-graduate students. I am responsible for two lectures given yearly to Second-Year medical students. In addition, I participate in Case Discussions during the same Endocrine & Diabetes Physiology Course. Interns an