PRESS RELEASES   Importance of imagination 09/19/2004 Published in The Oklahoman The imperative words of Albert Einstein possess a signal thought for Oklahomans at this juncture of history: "Imagination is more important than knowledge." The Presbyterian Health Foundation, working with the imaginative minds of many, intends to participate in the creative transformation of life for Oklahoma. Our mission is the support of medical research and translational biotechnology and molecular technology to companies who serve the common good. Since our birth in 1985 we have expended $93.9 million in grants supporting research that improves human health. We began with $64 million and our total asset worth is now $187 million. The Presbyterian Health Foundation Research Park, valued at $85 million, has thirty companies and agencies at work taking the thought of Einstein seriously, to "Create, Market, Communicate, and Translate Imagination" in the medical sciences to serve and save human life. "Creating Imagination.” One learns to use imagination with evidence based knowledge by being in the environment of imaginative people ― mentors. The Presbyterian Health Foundation encourages mentorships at several levels, beginning with high school at the Oklahoma School of Science and Mathematics. Young scholars from OSSM have an opportunity of working in the research labs of major scientific leaders at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center and the Oklahoma Medical Research Center. The Presbyterian Health Foundation was a major donor of land that is the site of the science and math school, and we continue to support the mission of this great school. The Presbyterian foundation also supports the Summer Undergraduate Research Program at which students from many of Oklahoma’s colleges and universities can have a high-quality mentoring experience at the Health Sciences Center labs with major scientific research mentors. The Presbyterian foundation has committed $5 million to the M.D./Ph.D. program that trains physician-scientists. These highly skilled dual-degree scholars will become leaders in research. All of these programs are training future leaders for the growing need of highly skilled jobs in Oklahoma. Not only is technology the source of 75 percent of the new growth in America's economy, it is fundamental to new growth for Oklahomans. "Marketing Imagination." One of the new companies in the Research Park is Inoveon, the industry leader in detection, staging and monitoring diabetic retinopathy. Each year 200,000 American go blind. Diabetic retinopathy is the leading cause of preventable blindness. This creative and imaginative company was formed by using the National Institutes of Health gold standard of care technology using high-resolution, seven-field, color retinal imaging to evaluate and monitor this disease. If the condition of diabetic retinopathy is detected in time, a photocoagulation of retina procedure can prevent blindness in about 90 per cent of the cases. Potentially, hundreds of thousands, may be saved from the enormous loss of sight. Inoveon's iScan technology uses digital information which is transmitted from the primary-care physicians office, anywhere in the world, to Inoveon to read and evaluate. The largest pediatric diabetes facility in the United States, the Barbara Davis Center in Denver, is contracted with Inoveon. This is one example of marketing our biotechnology capacity in Oklahoma. "Communicating Imagination." This year the Health Sciences Center has received over $124 million in grants and awards, up from $15 million when our foundation began in 1985. The Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation has had a 20.6 percent increase in rewards in the last 12 months. This has a huge impact of the economics of our state, but more than that, the promise of increased good health and the victory over numerous deadly diseases. For example, each of 41 funded scientists at The Medical Research Foundation and 99 scientists at the Health Science Center bring an average of $825,000 in outside the state funding; to Oklahoma. The Health Sciences Center employs 20,000 persons at an average of $45,000 each per year. Sixty percent of the Health Center's employees are non-hospital staff. Science has become a major industry in Oklahoma. "Translating Imagination." We want to see the translation of concepts to solutions, research to retail, taking discovery to the place where people are served. This business of translating scientific ideas through biotechnology and companies that serve profound human needs is costly. But its costs are minimal compared to the cost of disease. Research science in America spent $95 million to fight high blood pressure disease; the medicines created now save $3 billion per year, and tens of thousands of lives. Construction has begun on the Cytovance Biologics manufacturing building in the Presbyterian Health Foundation Research Park. Seventy-five percent of the new imaginative ideas in molecular-based therapies will be "discovered" in labs too small to manufacture biologics. Oklahoma is ready to serve those research labs throughout the nation and the world. Applied imagination is better than knowledge when our mission is to save and enhance life. Anderson is president of the Presbyterian Health Foundation. E-mail: manderson@phfokc.com; Website: www.phfokc.com