It has been a whirlwind of events over the past several months since CROMed-USA was established. We would like to say thank you to all members for supporting this new organization!

If you haven’t checked out our website yet, please make sure to look at it and get inspired:

We are currently working on 2 projects:

Medical Education FORUM in Zagreb.

CROMed-USA Meeting in St. Louis.

1. Medical Education FORUM in Zagreb.

- This unique gathering will bring together Croatian medical students and others who plan, support, and deliver medical education in Croatia. The FORUM will take place in the Hotel Academia on July 4th, 2023. We hope to have the agenda finalized by the end of May, so stay posted for next month’s email.

2. CROMed-USA Meeting in St. Louis.

-This first annual gathering will take place November 4-5, 2023 in St. Louis, MO. Please save the date and we are looking forward to seeing you there. Stay tuned for more information. Contact CROMed-USA if you are interested in taking part in organizing this event.

New at CROMed-USA

Membership Drive:

-Croatian-American Alumni, both in the US and in Croatia, are encouraged to join CROMed-USA today. Your membership fee is tax deductible and will help us improve medical education in Croatia.

To Our Platinum CROMed-USA Members:

You are now able to enjoy discounts on rooms in Maistra Hotels along the Croatian coast (15% off in season and 20% off out of season) and fixed low price in Maistra Hotels in Zagreb.

To all Croatian-American Alumni

Spring is truly here: a time for new beginnings and transformations. We encourage you to be inspired and we invite you to volunteer to assist our organization.

Become a member.

Donate funds.

Volunteer to participate in our programs.

Propose a new project.

We count on your support, and we thank you!

Marin Nola Pathology Scholarship Fund

Established by Anamarija M. Perry, MD and

Ivan Damjanov, MD, PhD

CROMed Interviews Anamarija M. Perry, MD and Ivan Damjanov, MD, PhD

CROMed: Thank you for starting a memorial fund, the Marin Nola Pathology Scholarship. Can you explain how this scholarship fund came about and whom it will serve?

Dr. Perry: The purpose of the Marin Nola Pathology Scholarship (MNPS) fund is to provide an opportunity for early career pathologists to get pathology subspecialty training in a pathology center of excellence in the US. The idea for the fund came about after the sudden and untimely death of Dr. Marin Nola in 2008. For us (i.e. Dr. Ivan Damjanov and myself) this scholarship is a way to honor the life and legacy of our dear friend Marin. Most importantly, we are sure that Marin, who was such a dedicated and passionate educator, would wholeheartedly support it. This project has been long in the making, but for various reasons we were unable to get it going until now. CROMed-USA and Dr. Ksenija Kos provided us with a framework and support for this idea, and we are very grateful for that.

CROMed: Why don't you tell us about Dr. Marin Nola?

Dr. Perry: Dr. Marin Nola was a Professor of Pathology at the University of Zagreb, School of Medicine. His area of expertise and research interest was hematopathology, but he was also a very solid general surgical pathologist. He was a brilliant teacher and mentor to countless medical students, residents, and young physicians (pathologists as well as clinicians). Above all, he was a great human being – selfless, persistent and stubborn, and an eternal optimist. He knew no limits, and believed that with hard work anything was possible. He was my very first mentor, cherished friend, and a person who showed me how great a career in pathology could be. He passed away nearly 15 years ago, but his life and legacy have been my inspiration, and I still try “to make him proud.” This scholarship is part of his legacy.

CROMed: What would you like to accomplish through the scholarship, that is, what are your short-term and long-term goals?

Dr. Perry: The short-term goal is to get all the little details in order (and there are quite a few), advertise the scholarship, choose our first “winner,” and bring him or her to the US (hopefully in the next year or so). We envision this as a 3-month “mini fellowship” in a pathology subspecialty of the scholarship holder's choice. If all goes well, we are hoping to award one scholarship every year.

CROMed: Why would a junior pathologist from Croatia apply for this stipend?

Dr. Perry: Great question! I think that the best way to answer this is to speak from my own experience. When I was a 4th-year medical student in Zagreb, already set on being a pathologist, I had an opportunity to spend six weeks with Dr. Ivan Damjanov at the University of Kansas in Kansas City. This experience was extremely precious for me. I was able to see how others do pathology and get a different perspective on pathology altogether. In fact, I liked it a bit “too much,” so I moved to the US for my pathology residency. What I am trying to say is that different experiences and input from different sources are very important in the early stages of our career. As I always say to my trainees, we are here to help you learn. Ultimately, you take from us what you like and what best fits your practice. Moreover, our pathology visitors will have an opportunity to see a large number of specimens from different subspecialties and to work alongside some great pathologists and teachers. And last but not least, this scholarship will cover nearly all expenses of our scholarship winners (i.e. travel, lodging, food, incidentals), which is significant financial support.

CROMed: Do you think that there is interest in Croatia for this type of educational experience? Did you talk with anyone in Croatia? Are there any other scholarships for junior pathologists in Croatia?

Dr. Perry: I think that there will be interest for this scholarship. I am not quite sure how many people will apply, but surely some will. I know that many pathologists in Croatia pursued some additional education in various foreign countries, either one of the European countries or the US. I did not talk to any junior pathologists yet, but I had an opportunity to talk to some of my more senior pathology colleagues in Croatia, who support this idea. As for other potential scholarships for pathologists in Croatia, I do not think that anything similar is available.

CROMed: When will you review the results and decide whether to continue this initiative, expand it, or change to something else?

Dr. Perry: Let’s bring our first pathologist, see how it goes, and of course get his/her impressions. We are committed to making this work for the benefit of the pathology community in Croatia and ultimately for our patients. On the other hand, it has been my experience that pathologists and trainees in the US love to work with pathologists from foreign countries. The exchange of knowledge and experience goes both ways, just as Marin would like it!

CROMed: Who is Anamarija M. Perry?

Dr. Perry: I was born in Zadar, Croatia in 1980, and in 2004 I graduated from Zagreb Medical School. I started my pathology residency in 2006 at the University of Cincinnati (Cincinnati, Ohio), followed by a two-year hematopathology fellowship at the University of Nebraska. Currently, I am a hematopathologist and an Associate Professor of Pathology at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan. I practice hematopathology, teach my numerous trainees, and also do translational research in lymphoma pathology. I published over 50 papers and 3 books. My husband Kyle is also a pathologist, and we have two daughters, 8 and 5 years old who keep us pretty busy.

CROMed: First, thank you for starting a memorial fund named the Marin Nola Pathology Scholarship. I understand that you worked very closely with the late Dr. Marin Nola. Would you mind telling us how you remember him and why you decided to start this scholarship?

Prof. dr. Damjanov: Thank you for asking us to do this interview. As Anamarija responded to questions about the Marin Nola Scholarship fund, I have decided to write a letter to Marin about the scholarship fund and include in it some of my thoughts and memories of him. I am sure that this endowed scholarship would have pleased Marin. I believe, moreover, that that he would have approved the establishment of this scholarship, and for three reasons: he believed in education; he believed that young Croatian physicians could profit from spending some time in the US during their formative years; and he believed that by teaching other Croatian doctors and students about the lessons they themselves have learned in the US, these US-based Croatian doctors would show that teaching is the best way of learning. Hence, this letter.

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Dear Marin,

Since early adulthood I was more a pessimist than an optimist, until I read a quote of Winston Churchill that goes like this: "I am an optimist. It does not seem too much use being anything else." Upon reading this, I decided to change my approach to life, and I have taught myself to be an optimist.

And then, one day, I met you and learned what it means to be a real optimist. If there is an optimism gene, you had it in your genome. From you I learned why it is essential to be optimistic; that optimism is contagious; and that we must be optimistic and believe that things can be improved; and that optimism is faith in a better future.

Interacting with you, I began to believe that the sky is the limit, and that even the wildest and craziest ideas that you and I discussed could be fully realized. Those ten years that we worked together on educational projects changed me profoundly, and I am still grateful for them. Among other things, you convinced me that I should devote more time to promoting medical education in Croatia. I followed your advice, and the funding of the Marin Nola Scholarship fund is a token of that commitment, intended, in part, to show you that I am still trying to live up to your expectations.

When you died suddenly in 2008, at the age of 44, I promised myself that I would continue working on the educational projects that you and I began many years ago.

The opportunity to establish a Marin Nola Scholarship fund under the aegis of CROMed-USA is my tribute to you. It is also the fulfillment of a promise I made to myself. We finally managed to establish a scholarship, an idea that you and I discussed at length some 15 years ago. It seems that it will finally become operational, after so many years, following several unsuccessful starts and misdirected attempts.

My dear Marin, your infectious optimism paid off. Your exhortations to never give up and try again and again seem to have worked. I hope that you will agree that this is a good start and that you will wish us the strength to persist and see that the money that we have endowed to the fund is put to good use.

Cheers from your old friend who thinks of you often, asking himself repeatedly:"Would Marin have approved of this?"*

Ivan

CROMed: Who is Ivan Damjanov?

Prof. Dr. Damjanov: I graduated from Medical School in Zagreb in 1964. I came to the US in 1967, completed my training in Pathology, and in 1975 I got my first grant from NIH to start my own laboratory at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine, Farmington, CT. Thereafter, I worked as Professor of Pathology at Hahnemann Medical College and Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia. In 1964 I became Chairman of the Department of Pathology at the University of Kansas, Kansas City, where I worked until my retirement in 2018. I wrote or edited more than 30 pathology books, published more than 350 scientific papers, and received several awards from my peers as well as medical students. I am a corresponding member of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts, and I hold an honorary doctor degree from Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic.

CROMed: Thank you both for you time. It was a pleasure taking with you. We thank you for your generosity. Your thoughtful gift in memory of Dr. Marin Nola will keep his legacy alive.

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* On the occasion of Dr. Marin Nola’s death, I wrote an open access article about him. It can be found on Pubmed, with the following link: Damjanov I. “Obituary: Marin Nola (1964-2008): Can One Imagine Croatian Pathology Without Him?” Croat Med J. 2008 Oct; 49(5): 674–7. doi: 10.3325/cmj.2008.5.674. PMCID: PMC2585763.