UAMS Researchers Receive Grants Totaling $2.2 Million To Study Obesity, Diabetes Relationship

Researchers at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) are examining how obesity relates to diabetes development in a study funded by three collaborative grants totaling $2.2 million from the National Institutes of Health.
Governor Mike Huckabee announced the grants Aug. 18 and the importance of research in addressing medical problems caused by obesity. 

"As we promote healthy lifestyles in Arkansans, we must wrestle with treating the deadly and costly medical problems, like diabetes, that are caused by being overweight,” Huckabee said. "These UAMS scientists are conducting groundbreaking research right here in Arkansas that could find ways to prevent the development of diabetes.” 

Understanding the relationship between obesity and diabetes could lead to new treatments for diabetes – already the state's sixth leading cause of death. Almost 8 percent of Arkansas' population has diabetes and obesity is a main contributor to its development.

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Gov. Mike Huckabee visits with UAMS researchers (from left) Philip Kern, M.D., Charlotte Peterson, Ph.D., and Robert McGehee, Ph.D., after announcing $2.2 million in NIH grants the three received to examine the link between obesity and diabetes...

UAMS Receives $8.73 Million Bequest for Medical Research

The University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) has received $8.735 million for medical research in a bequest from Helen Guinn Adams of Fayetteville. Adams, widow of Roy A. Adams, died Jan. 1, 2004. The couple had no children.

 The money, one of the most sizeable gifts by an individual in support of medical research, will be used to create the Helen Guinn Adams Research Endowment.

 “We are deeply grateful to Mrs. Adams for this bequest,” said UAMS Chancellor I. Dodd Wilson, M.D. “A gift of this size will have transforming, long-lasting effects in its ability to bring about changes over time in health care through improved medical research.”

 Adams was born April 9, 1906, in Huntsville, the daughter of James Henry Guinn, a merchant, and Nannie Stotts Guinn. Adams graduated from the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville in 1929. She married Roy A. Adams of Fayetteville and the couple owned Adams Flower Shop there. Roy Adams died in 1968 and Helen Adams left the florist business.

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