User:DeknMike/sandbox

Note: at 23:04, 31 March 2019‎ user Liance improperly posted a REDIRECT Draft:Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation as if this were a new article. It is still there. I have retrieved it here to continue working the issues raised.

AngusWOOF Commented: It's still heavily influenced by the company and structured like it is from their website. Needs more outside sources. Remove bias statements such as "OMRF has a reputation as a great place to work" 23:21, 31 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Rebuttal: The foundation provided only a handful of sources, beyond the work of the archivist.  Most of the content was from outside sources

- Conflict of Interest (CoI) note: On 9 Feb 2019, I was hired by OMRF to lead an independent rewrite of the article to help create a more encyclopedic article with a broader base of information sources. I have no other connection with OMRF, except that I have acquaintances that have worked there, and once worked at the nearby medical center.

The Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation (OMRF), located in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, is an independent, nonprofit biomedical research institute. It is funded by a mix of public donations and competitive grants. Established in 1946 by 25 alumni of the University of Oklahoma School of Medicine and 15 business leaders from around the state, is one of the oldest independent medical research institutions in the country. It sits adjacent to the campus of the Oklahoma Health Center. OMRF is a member of the Association of Independent Research Institutes. Using a cross-disciplinary approach to medical research, OMRF’s scientists have accumulated more than 700 U.S. and international patents and have spun off 11 biotech companies.

=Areas of Research= The motto of the Foundation is "That More May Live Longer." The early research was focused on understanding the nature of what made a person healthy, and understanding what happens when immunity malfunctions. OMRF scientists continue to study how the human immune system forms — or fails to form — immune responses, and to create and test effective treatments.

At one time, the Foundation operated a research hospital, where patients would come for ongoing study and experimental treatments. The 14-room hospital opened in July, 1951 and the first patient was Lillian Sims. Other patients allowed researchers to study the effects of idleness and of nutrition. Many children came as a last-ditch hope in their waning days of serious illness. The hospital closed in 1976 and now only does out-patient study and consults to nearby hospitals.

OMRF uses a cross-disciplinary approach to medical research that has helped its scientists generate more than 700 U.S. and international patents. The top areas of study are heart disease, Cancer, Diabetes, Alzheimer’s disease, and immune-response diseases such as Lupus, Sjögren's syndrome, Multiple Sclerosis and Arthritis

Alzheimer’s and brain diseases
In 2000, OMRF scientists created an inhibitor that, in vitro, stopped the enzyme thought to cause Alzheimer's disease. The biotechnology company CoMentis has since built on that discovery to create an experimental drug for the treatment of Alzheimer’s. In 2007, they uncovered a molecular mechanism that links an Alzheimer’s susceptibility gene (known as E4) to the process of disease onset. OMRF’s scientists continue to focus on the mechanisms that cause neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson's Parkinson's disease, Huntington's Huntington's disease and ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease) Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis.

Cancer and Immunobiology
Technology developed in the laboratories led to the creation of a test for assessing breast cancer risk in women. Marketed as OncoVue, the test is produced by Intergenetics, Inc. and available in clinics the U.S.

With a research-grade magnetic resonance imaging facility, OMRF scientists are developing methods of using MRI to speed the process of identifying and treating brain, liver and bladder cancers. In 2006, OMRF scientists were the first to reverse the process of cell division, a discovery detailed in the journal Nature that may have implications for the prevention and treatment of cancer and birth defects.

Heart and blood diseases
OMRF research into recombinant human activated protein C (rhAPC) was used as the core understanding for two different drugs, treating two different medical conditions, with differing results. CEPROTIN was developed for patients (usually children) with life-threatening blood-clotting complications related to severe congenital Protein C deficiency. Xigris is an Activated protein C (APC) for treatment in sepsis (blood poisoning) that was approved in Novermber 2001. CEPROTIN was approved in 2007. While CEPROTIN continues to be a significant therapy for those with Protein C deficiency, the story of Xigris shows that not all treatments work the same for all people, and that research must be continuous. Eli Lilly created Xigris to treat sepsis, and early trials seemed to show it worked, but subsequent studies were terminated prematurely because of lack of efficacy After multiple studies, the root cause was when the patient was at risk for extended bleeding, because rhAPC has anticoagulant properties. The deep research in labs such as OMRF’s cardiovascular biology helps discover both treatments and when to use them.

Lupus and autoimmune diseases
OMRF’s largest research program is dedicated to the study and treatment of systemic lupus erythematosus and other autoimmune diseases. This group has identified antibodies that appear in the blood years before the clinical onset of lupus. They also are studying the role a common virus may play in triggering lupus.

=Education programs= In 1956, OMRF established its Sir Alexander Fleming Scholar Program, a summer research training program for Oklahoma high school and college students. Since then, more than 500 students have received this one-of-a-kind training as Fleming Scholars.

=Honors and Affiliations= National Institutes of Health (NIH) added OMRF to it’s cadre of eleven Autoimmunity Centers of Excellence (ACE) to evaluate the safety and efficacy of treatment strategies for autoimmune diseases and to explore the immune mechanisms underlying the agents evaluated in clinical trials. The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) created the Autoimmunity Centers of Excellence (ACEs) to encourage and enable collaborative research – across scientific disciplines, across medical specialties, and between basic and clinical scientists – in the search for effective treatments for autoimmune diseases.

=Buildings= Starting with the first building in 1950, OMRF has grown in size to now occupy six buildings. OMRF is headquartered within the medical complex area of Oklahoma City, adjacent to University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center (the medical and dental schools), between the Veteran’s Hospital and Children’s Hospital. OMRF's core facilities and equipment are available to researchers throughout Oklahoma. There are currently six buildings in the campus. (A research hospital opened in 1951 but closed in 1976.)

=Leadership= Dr Stephen Prescott became President of OMRF in 2006. He had already established his credentials as a leader in studies of the basic mechanisms of human disease, authoring more than 250 scientific articles and training 40 research students and postdoctoral fellows. At the University of Utah, he founded the Eccles Program in Human and Molecular Biology & Genetics and was executive director of the Huntsman Cancer Institute. He has been elected to the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Association of American Physicians, the American Society for Clinical Investigation, the Royal College of Physicians in Ireland, and the Royal Academy of Medicine in Spain. He is the founder of the biotechnology company LineaGen. In addition to serving as President of a cancer research center, Dr Prescott also serves on medical and scientific advisory committees for the National Institutes of Health, the American Heart Association and the American Cancer Society.

=Donors & Funding = OMRF is funded primarily through grants and independent contributions. Two-thirds (65.3%) comes from government grants, and most of the rest comes from contributions and grants from other sources. A substantial part of the non-government contributions come from sources across Oklahoma, in small towns and the main cities, continually reinforcing OMRF’s role as Oklahoma’s medical research foundation. Independent rating service Charity Navigator notes 91.1% of the charity's $75 Million of expenses are for the programs and services it delivers and only 6.1% on administrative expenses. Charity Navigator has a rating score that assesses financial health, accountability and transparency; for 2017, they assessed OMRF as Category 4 of 4 (the highest) with a score of 93.94.

Early Funding
As an independent foundation not attached to a parent hospital or significant bequest, the Foundation struggled in its early years to create sufficient funding to hire top talent. Formal research started in 1953, and ongoing operations during the 1950s involved unique and varied fundraising approaches. For example, the Oklahoma State Coaches' Association took collections during halftime at sporting events; the first four years netted OMRF more than $56,000, mostly in coins. Many people still remember buckets being passed at OU and OSU football games. A number of community-based initiatives were created, including farmers dedicating acreage of their crops as an annual pledge, and mass-marketing solicitation for memorial gifts. The foundation has received gifts of cars, houses, and jars of change. When times were lean, staff members would occasionally take to the streets of Oklahoma City to solicit donations from passers by. However, most of the early funding came from the many oil and gas companies creating overnight fortunes, most often from the family matriarch. The sometimes extreme generosity and frequent challenges among company owners in the early years provided much-needed operating funds and most of the money to build the first Foundation buildings. All but the first of its seven buildings came from major gifts to the Foundation.

Unusual Donations
The Oklahoma Association of Mothers' Campaign started its long-standing support of OMRF in 1953. Women throughout Oklahoma raised funds to provide the foundation with equipment such as a respiratory gas analyzer, inverted microscopes, an oxygen unit, fraction collector and even television sets for hospital patients' rooms.

Wheat Donations. In 1961, hundreds of Oklahoma wheat producers decided to donate a portion of their crops to OMRF. More than 450 farm families participated in the program, which donated in excess of 9,000 bushels of wheat to OMRF its first year. In 1962, farmers were mailed checks for $3.25, which was then the cost of enough seed to plant one acre of wheat. That acre was dedicated to OMRF. The foundation had wheat pledged as donations through the 1970s.

Sr. Carl Bailey of Stroud donated a second hospital to OMRF. Guymon veterinarian W.F. Dunaway and his wife, Mada Louise, named OMRF the beneficiary of a significant charitable remainder trust, and the current OMRF clinic bears their names. The estate of an Alva farmer and rancher, Ed Massman, built the Massman Cancer Research Building. The estate of Rose Woodworth of Ardmore built OMRF's Acree-Woodworth Research Building.

In 1931, Lynn Riggs published a play he called “Green Grow the Lilacs” which Rogers and Hammerstein adapted as the musical Oklahoma! When he died, he willed his 1% royalty to his 4 siblings. When his brother William Edgar Riggs died, OMRF received rights to that one-quarter share. As of the end of 2018, it has generated over $700,000 in earnings.

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Category:Non-profit organizations based in Oklahoma Category:Medical districts Category:Organizations based in Oklahoma City Category:Medical research institutes in the United States Category:Biomedical research foundations Category:Medical and health foundations in the United States Category:Organizations established in 1946 Category:Biotechnology organizations