October 17, 2017

Randall Jenkins, M.D. R '85, was appointed Oct. 3 as the inaugural holder of the Y.B. Talwalkar Professorship in Pediatric Nephrology. School of Medicine Dean Sharon Anderson, M.D., and OHSU Provost Elena Andresen, Ph.D., presided over an investiture attended by Dr. Jenkins, members of the Talwalkar Family Charitable Fund, Department of Pediatrics colleagues and leaders from the OHSU and Doernbecher Foundations.

After earning his medical degree at Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio, Dr. Jenkins completed his pediatric residency and a pediatric nephrology fellowship at OHSU between 1980 and 1985. During this time, he studied under Y.B. Talwalkar, M.D., who was an alumnus and faculty member at the University of Oregon Medical School, the OHSU School of Medicine's predecessor. Dr. Jenkins then spent nine years at the University of Kentucky and University of Louisville studying hypertension and dialysis systems before returning to Oregon to combine his clinical care and research activities with service on the local IRB (institutional review board) and as a volunteer faculty member at OHSU. He joined the OHSU faculty in 2011. In addition to being professor of pediatrics in the OHSU School of Medicine, he is head of the Division of Pediatric Nephrology, director of the outpatient hemodialysis unit and director of ambulatory flow for OHSU Doernbecher Children's Hospital. Through his continuing focus on hypertension and dialysis systems, he observed a tendency for premature infants to develop high blood pressure near the time they leave the newborn intensive care unit for home. After collecting data on more than 100 such infants, he and colleagues David Rozansky, M.D., Ph.D., and Ladawna Gievers, M.D., associate professor and assistant professor of pediatrics, respectively, recently published a paper detailing this newly-discovered type of hypertension. He continues to pursue studies examining the cause and mechanism of this type of high blood pressure.

The Talwalkar Family Charitable Fund – a private family fund based in San Francisco – supports organizations that help high risk children break the cycle of generational poverty, provide innovative STEM education for children, and advance medical research to improve the lives of children. In 2016, the Talwalkar Family Charitable Fund established the Y.B. Talwalkar Professorship in Pediatric Nephrology to honor Dr. Y.B Talwalkar's legacy and advance OHSU's goal to attract and retain the nation's best physicians, specialists and researchers for years to come. The Talwalkar family can think of no better way to commemorate their father's life work and the positive impact he had in the medical field and community at large.

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A tribute to Y.B. Talwalkar

Pictured (top, left to right): OHSU Provost Andresen, Dr. Jenkins, School of Medicine Dean Anderson, and Dana Braner, M.D., Credit Unions for Kids Chair of Pediatrics, during the Oct. 3 investiture.

(above, right): Abhi Talwalkar, son of Dr. Y.B. Talwalkar, addresses attendees of the ceremony for the professorship in his father's name.