Pamela Woodard, M.D., is a professor and chair of the department of radiology, at Washington University in St. Louis. She is also a professor in multiple departments: biomedical engineering where she oversees and advises Ph.D. students, and in internal medicine (cardiovascular medicine) and pediatrics where she performs magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and computed tomography (CT) imaging of patients.
Woodard chose WashU for her academic career because it has a strong research mission. Her passions are translational research in imaging and mentoring trainees.
She engages in both as the lead principal investigator on a NIBIB-funded training grant for postdoctoral clinician-scientists. They learn the skills to transition to independent investigators capable of taking imaging research from the laboratory to patients.
A total of 25 residents/fellows at WashU have completed the NIBIB-funded Training Opportunities in Translational Imaging Education and Research (TOP-TIER) program since it began in 2017, according to Woodard.
“In this role, I can talk to clinician trainees about how to get NIH funding, including the NIH grant writing process. As physicians, they know the public health impact of technology on a diagnosis or treatment of a certain disease process,” she said.
The program also serves as a pipeline for hiring radiology faculty. “Many clinician-scientists join our faculty because they not only are excellent radiologists, but also know how to obtain funding, can develop their own laboratories and programs, and mentor other individuals,” said Woodard.
Budding physician-scientist
Woodard became interested in medicine when she began meeting women physicians who served as role models. Her father, a local hospital administrator, introduced her to female physicians at the hospital. “Those encounters influenced my decision to go into medicine because I saw that it was a viable career option for women.”
Woodard went to medical school at the Duke University School of Medicine and became interested in radiology during a second-year rotation, when she met Charles Putman, M.D., an attending physician and former chair of the radiology department.
“He was double boarded in internal medicine and radiology, which was unusual even then, and would take the team down to radiology and show them images of our patients. I was very impressed with how well you could see the pathology on imaging,” she said. Woodard chose to specialize in radiology and completed a residency in that field at Duke University.
Putman also influenced her decision to become an imaging researcher. “He was a strong proponent of research in imaging and advocated for the creation of NIBIB at NIH. Having an institute with a focus on biomedical imaging has always been important to radiologists," she said.
Shaping her imaging research career
Medical students at Duke were required to spend one year conducting research. Woodard spent her year in the molecular biology lab and found research fascinating. During her residency in radiology, she became interested in cardiovascular imaging and conducted research in CT imaging of pulmonary embolism. She continued this research focus as a fellow and young investigator in cardiothoracic imaging at WashU’s Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology, which she now directs.
That research interest led to NIH funding of a multicenter trial that determined that spiral CT is the best method of detecting acute pulmonary embolism, which has become the standard of care.
Since then, Woodard has been an NIH-funded principal investigator on other cardiovascular imaging research projects using MRI and/or positron emission tomography (PET) imaging.
“One of the first projects I worked on was in translating a magnetic resonance (MR) navigator sequence that could track and correct for motion caused by respiratory movement during MRI scans. That research became foundational for the first cardiac MR clinical service established 12 years later at WashU,” said Woodard. That sequence is also used widely commercially in pediatric congenital heart patients, which Woodard says is immensely satisfying.
She also leads an ongoing research project that uses PET imaging to learn more about plaque biology in patients with atherosclerosis that can cause asymptomatic narrowing of carotid arteries. The project has a two-fold purpose: to stratify the risk of these patients for a stroke and assess the role of a peptide receptor that Woodard’s team identified as a potential target in the development of carotid atherosclerosis.
“As a result of this project, we hope to identify individuals at higher risk of ischemic stroke from plaque rupture who may benefit from carotid surgical intervention,” she said.
Rewards/challenges/lessons learned
One of the most rewarding aspects of her work is leading the TOP-TIER clinician-scientist training program because it gives her the opportunity to take mentorship to the next level. “I enjoy educating the next generation of clinicians about how to be good imaging scientists, educators, and leaders,” said Woodard.
A time-consuming aspect of her leadership position she likes least involves paperwork. She is responsible for briefly reviewing every grant coming from her department and signing a transmittal form. Although she likes learning about the work each investigator is doing, the sheer volume of grants for 193 faculty can be staggering at times.
Over her decades-long career, Woodard has learned several lessons.
- Perfection is the enemy of the good. “Don’t get hung up on the perfect grant submission because you’ll never know what is perfect in the eyes of the reviewers. Put down the research with the greatest impact and what most inspires you. Then follow NIH guidelines and submit it.”
- Learn to delegate. “I hired a lab manager for my research who helps me pull together progress reports and submit FDA documents and clinical trial updates. Having her allows me to facilitate the research of others.”
- Seek out multiple mentors with different types of expertise. “One person might be an outstanding scientist and an expert in grant writing while another might be very active in national societies and could be your sponsor. A third person might be a great teacher.”
When she’s not working, Woodard unwinds with gardening, walking in public parks, and spending time with her family.