Fame came anyway.

Najjar and her brother Sean were students together at Monte Vista High School in Spring Valley. Sean was on the wrestling team before eventually moving into mixed martial arts. “He was like, ‘Come to the fighting gym with me,’” Najjar recalls. She wasn’t very active at the time but was curious about the sport. “I went to my first boxing class and I fell in love.”

Soon, she began helping her brother sell tickets to his fights and promoting his merch while learning to coach. As she improved her skills, she quickly became one of the most sought-after boxing trainers in the area. While Sean now occasionally competes in jiu-jitsu tournaments, Najjar found a space in the boxing world that few women occupy: mitt holding. Ever seen a fighter in training, jabbing at a strike pad while the person clutching the pads deftly matches their strikes and absorbs the impact? Najjar is that person.

Her talents garnered her the nickname “Mitt Queen” amongst her male counterparts in the gym. Now 36, the Carmel Mountain resident counts pro fighters, high-profile athletes, and celebrities among her trainees.

“She made herself into her own. She carried the torch,” says Berlin Kerney, a boxing coach at Bomber Squad Academy in El Cajon. He has known Najjar since she was 18. “I feel like she helped [women] think it’s possible to achieve a level that wasn’t really seen before. There was no market, no spot for a female mitt holder. I see a lot of [women] now doing the same thing that she has done.”

But her rise took time. In 2020, when Covid was keeping us indoors, Najjar quit her job at Louis Vuitton (her other love is high fashion) to begin filming her workouts.

“I cleaned up my whole Instagram, got rid of everything, [and] said, ‘I’m going to stick to just mitt work and I’ll show a little bit of myself,’” Najjar says. “I posted my first video with [pro boxer] Jonny [Mansour], and it went viral.”

She began posting regularly, growing over months from hundreds of views per video to sometimes over a million. It’s easy to get lost in her clips. She’s quick, nimble, strong—often meeting the punches of men nearly twice her size.

As her account took off, she caught the attention of actor Michael B. Jordan, who direct messaged her, asking her to be in the latest installment of the Creed franchise, boxing movies set in the Rocky universe. “I didn’t know who he was,” Najjar says. She had to Google him before responding. “He was like, ‘You’ve never seen Creed? Black Panther?’ I was like, ‘No, I live and breathe fighting.’”

Next thing she knew, she was moving to Atlanta, Georgia for a year to work as a trainer for the cast and play herself, Ann “Mitt Queen” Najjar, in 2023’s Creed III. Pro boxers like Canelo Álvarez, José Benavidez Jr., Florian Munteanu, and Tony Bellew shared the big screen with her, acting as characters or as themselves.

“That’s the cool thing about the movie. All the fighters are real; all the refs are real. All the commentators are real,” Najjar says. “I worked with [pro boxer Terence Crawford] on the movie set. He went 28 rounds straight with me. No budging.”

But being a great mitt holder isn’t as simple as knowing how to catch a punch. One of the most important skills a coach can have, mitt holding requires balance, skill, and the ability to clearly communicate with your fighter as they move around—as well as hours of daily practice. Doing it well is a key step on the road to creating a world champ.

“When you’re the holder, you’re guiding,” Najjar says. She determines her trainees’ combinations—as she calls out movements, they follow her lead.

Bomber Squad Academy strength and conditioning coach Tez Avant says Najjar’s competitive nature is a huge part of what makes her so good at what she does. “If there’s an obstacle, she wants to beat it. No matter who’s there, she wants to try to beat them,” he says. “I think that’s the thing that will keep her thriving.”

Najjar trains four to six hours a day. When she’s not in the gym with clients, she’s running to improve her cardio and posting on social media, hoping to inspire more young women to become holders.

“I was Sean’s little sister, and now, my brother is the Mitt Queen’s brother,” Najjar says with a smirk. Sometimes, a bit of sibling rivalry is all you need to become great.

The post Inside the Ring with Ann “Mitt Queen” Najjar appeared first on San Diego Magazine.

Historically, white men have been the dominant group included in research—which meant medications coming into the market could be ineffective or even harmful for other groups. There is not comprehensive data on the diversity of today’s research participants, but a 2022 study found in trials that gathered racial data—less than half of which do—the vast majority of enrollees were still white, even in research on diseases which disproportionately affect certain groups.

A review by FCB Health New York of federally registered clinical trials from 2000 to 2020 found that zero percent of diabetes clinical trial patients were Native American, yet the disease hits Native communities the hardest. Similarly, Black patients die of heart disease at a higher rate than any other race, but they make up just three percent of clinical trial enrollees for the illness.

In early 2023, San Diego transplant Dr. Renarda Jones founded Diverse Research Now to educate marginalized communities about the benefits of participating in clinical trials and help scientists develop lasting community relationships. The organization’s various programs help participants find clinical trials that suit their needs, help patients understand how trials work, and provide “study buddies” that advocate for participants at trial visits.

“In order for us to have a drug that’s going to work for everyone, we have to test it on everyone,” Jones says.

The post Diverse Research Now Looks to Bring Racial Equity to Medical Trials appeared first on San Diego Magazine.

But San Diego is on the case.

This April, UC San Diego was awarded a $7.35 million multidisciplinary grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to support research that helps us better understand marine contaminants in the era of climate change. With the goal of ensuring safe, healthy, and equitably accessible seafood for all, UCSD’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography reestablished the Scripps Center for Oceans and Human Health (SCOHH), partnering with various schools and science centers to bring the project to life.

The five-year grant funds the studies of eight principal investigators, along with scientists, postdoctoral researchers, and staff. It’s critical work on a planet where ocean temperatures have soared two degrees over the course of the last century—and where fish, though rich in nutrients like selenium and omega-3 fatty acids, increasingly carry harmful pollutants.

In 2019, marine biogeochemist Dr. Amina Schartup determined that mercury concentrations might increase when fish (including Atlantic bluefin tuna, swordfish, and cod) change their diets, a possible consequence of rising sea temps. As part of the grant, Schartup’s team will examine how climate change affects the marine food web and, subsequently, seafood health.

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Oceanographer Dr. Anela Choy will work with Schartup to chart models to simulate the cycling of methylmercury and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs, industrial chemicals banned in the US in 1979) and explore potential human exposure under different climate change scenarios.

“We need to understand the food pathways [of potentially harmful metals in the animals] … that end up on our dinner plates,” Choy says.

Another of SCOHH’s research programs, co-led by Scripps marine biologist Dr. Amro Hamdoun and Dr. Geoffrey Chang, professor at the Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences at UCSD, will examine the process by which chemicals enter animals’ cells. Using sea urchins as models because their genome is similar to that of humans, Hamdoun will study how pollutants accumulate in sea creatures at the molecular level and, in turn, are absorbed by the people who consume them. Eventually, the team hopes to understand how organisms (including humans) survive or adapt to contaminants and how we might protect ourselves from seafood pollutants.

The aim of all this work is to help San Diegans make informed choices about the food they eat. “Through work with a community advisory team, we will be reaching out to different groups, including the fishing and aquaculture community, agencies that manage and set guidelines related to healthy ecosystems and seafood, the food system (including chefs, nutritionists, and consumer groups), and other scientists,” says Dr. Theresa Talley of California Sea Grant, Scripps Institute of Oceanography.

“We will collaboratively build an understanding of each group’s information needs surrounding environmental health literacy [so we can help] fill those needs.”

Among those stakeholders are local immigrant groups like the United Women of East Africa. “Certain fishes like mackerel [are] part of immigrant culture,” says National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries ecologist and Scripps professor Dr. Sarah Mesnick, who is leading the community engagement program alongside Talley. “We need to educate and learn from each other on which fish may be a healthier option. Or that you could use the entire fish, from head to tail, which immigrant communities have been doing for generations, thereby reducing waste and increasing sustainable consumption.”

Feedback from community members will help NSF, NIH, and governments understand how to replicate SCOHH’s programs elsewhere in the state and, someday, the country—so everyone can have cleaner seas and safer seafood.

The post UCSD Studying The Links Between Global Warming & Pollutants in Fish appeared first on San Diego Magazine.

La Jolla–based Fore Genomics provides a genetic health screen for children that reports on more than 500 different conditions with pediatric onset, giving parents the opportunity to better understand their kids’ health. Humans have over 20,000 genes. By sequencing the whole genome—100 percent of the DNA—Fore Genomics can examine for variants in the genes to determine to which conditions an individual is predisposed. All it takes is a cheek swab.

“Your DNA can tell you if you’re at risk of developing disease later in life,” Matthew Pelo, Fore’s CEO and founder, explains. The test is designed for seemingly healthy children with no symptoms. With early detection, proactive decisions can mitigate health risks before issues even arise.

“Some diseases can be managed through diet, some through lifestyle. With others, you can take medication and potentially delay the onset of symptoms indefinitely,” Pelo says. Pre- and post-test counseling is included with the screening, so parents can be equipped with a tailored care plan for their little one’s health.

For the Moseleys’ child, the screening came up clear. “The only result they found was that ibuprofen isn’t going to work as well for him, which is a good thing to know,” Mandy says. “Babies can’t communicate when pain meds aren’t helping.”

Since Fore Genomics retests each year (a service included in the base price), they will know if any new red flags arise. “If something does come up, we are going to be ahead of it,” Morgan says. She is specifically on the lookout for diabetes, which runs in her family but often goes undetected. “My mom didn’t know she had it and almost died. That’s probably the biggest reason why I wanted to get him tested.”

Currently, the price tag is around $1,500. Pelo says the test cost over $10,000 when he originally launched it at a research institute in New York. He’d like to bring the price down even further, he explains, but it’s an expensive screening to run. Currently, this type of testing is not covered by insurance, so if parents are interested, they have to foot the bill themselves.

To some parents, like the Moseleys, the insight might sound priceless. To others, it could be a portal to a world of anxiety. To avoid stressful news with no course of action, Fore Genomics originally opted to report only on conditions with treatment plans. Pelo tells me that parent advocates pushed for more info. “Even if there’s no approved treatment option, there are still clinical trials, advocacy groups, Facebook groups. There are other ways to get involved,” he says. “Based on their guidance, we’ve expanded what we screen for.”

Genetic testing is not a rare occurrence. Almost every newborn in the US undergoes a state-mandated genetic screening—in California, it covers 80 conditions, including sickle cell disease and rare metabolic disorders. Fore Genomics goes further, testing for hundreds more conditions. “We’re basically newborn screening on steroids,” Pelo says, adding that Fore’s is currently the most comprehensive test that can be done on a child. “We want to give parents access to more information.”

This type of testing differs from NIPT (non-invasive prenatal testing), which screens for conditions in the womb. “There are a couple of companies expanding what can be done [with] NIPT,” Pelo says. “But even then, there are a lot of concerns on what you can and should be reporting on.” Disability advocates have questioned the ethics of terminating a pregnancy based on genetic complications, drawing parallels between NIPT and eugenics. The Fore Genomics Genetic Health Screen is designed for newborns, infants, and children under the age of 5. “The child is already here,” Pelo says. “We want them to live the healthiest life possible.”

A major concern raised by direct-to-consumer DNA tests is data privacy. Companies like 23andMe or Ancestry.com utilize DNA for genealogical purposes, which exempts them from being HIPAA-compliant. Since Fore Genomics uses genetic testing for health and medical reasons, the company still falls under HIPAA and cannot disclose an individual’s health information without consent. However, even under HIPAA, a genetic testing company can sell your data—as long as it’s stripped of any identifying details. According to Pelo, Fore doesn’t do that. “We take data privacy and security very seriously,” he says.

Fore Genomics has to think about the child’s consent, as well. The company only screens for conditions with pediatric onset—not diseases that may arise later in life, like Alzheimer’s or ALS, even though that information is available in the genome. Pelo says it’s up to the child to decide whether they want that knowledge when they come of age.

How long does Fore Genomics hold onto an individual’s sequenced DNA? “Potentially forever,” Pelo says. “The DNA you’re born with is the DNA you die with. So, sequencing at birth can potentially tell you stuff 40 or 50 years later.”

Mandy and Morgan Moseley’s son is now 10 months old, and they are expecting a baby girl in 2025. They intend to order a Fore Genomics genetic health screen for her, as well. Many of the conditions in Morgan’s family predominantly affect women, and Morgan herself has a blood clotting disorder, as well as fertility challenges and Hashimoto’s disease. “Men don’t usually have thyroid problems or issues with fertility,” she says.

“Knowing that she’s going to be female, I’m more excited to get her tested.”

The post Can You Predict the Future Health of Your Child? These Scientists Say Yes appeared first on San Diego Magazine.

Palomar is also collaborating with Sharp HealthCare to expand offerings for both organizations’ patient populations: In North County, Sharp patients can access services from Palomar Health, while Palomar patients will have more care options for specialties not currently covered, like transplants and advanced oncology procedures.

But even before launching its new alliances, Palomar was drawing national recognition, including a spot on Newsweek’s list of the world’s best hospitals for six consecutive years. In 2024, it was one of only five healthcare systems nationwide to earn a specific award recognizing the forensics and trauma teams’ work to support victims of sexual abuse, domestic violence, elder abuse, and human trafficking.

Though the org closed its labor and delivery ward in Poway in 2023, Palomar Medical Center Escondido recently rebuilt its Level III NICU to expand capacity from four to 12 beds. The Escondido maternity facility was named among US News and World Report’s best hospitals for maternity care in 2024.

And while the organization is expanding its reach through partnerships, Palomar, like many providers in the healthcare industry, has struggled to recruit and retain staff. According to National Nurses United, half of Palomar’s registered nurses and more than half of its caregivers left between January 2022 and May 2024. But amidst these challenges, Palomar Medical Center Escondido’s emergency department (ED) won the 2023 Lantern Award, which recognizes EDs that provide excellent care to patients and a healthy work environment for staff members.

This year, Palomar Health launched a new ambulatory surgery center at its Escondido hospital, where patients can expect cutting-edge treatments like robotic spinal and orthopedic surgeries, robotic urology procedures, and ophthalmologic laser procedures.

And, in 2026, the organization will open the Palomar Behavioral Health Institute (PBHI), an 84,700-square-foot facility where adolescents, adults, and geriatric patients can access services such as medication therapy and management, support groups, education, therapy, and inpatient mental health treatment. PBHI will also be the West Coast’s first home of the Help for Heroes program, providing mental health and substance abuse treatment for veterans, active duty service members, and retired military personnel.

The post Palomar Health to Open New USD Wellness Center appeared first on San Diego Magazine.

“There are a couple of critical reasons why we’re building this tower,” explains Chris Abe, vice president of operations at Rady. The existing emergency department was built for 20,000 visitors annually, but, now, Rady—which serves not only San Diego County, but parts of Riverside and Imperial counties—receives around 120,000 emergency visits a year. The pediatrics ICU has been overflowing into other spaces to accommodate the number of children who need beds.

To ensure that the tower is especially suitable for young patients and as efficient and technologically advanced as possible, the design teams included people who take care of patients and work in hospital rooms. Representatives from all levels—physicians, social workers, nurses, housekeepers, and others—met with the architects and general contractors to discuss how to create the perfect rooms.

“The other thing that is incredibly important in this design, since we treat kids, is to have a healing environment with the right colors and images around,” Abe says. “We’ve had a neonate here for over a year-and-a-half and a couple cardiac kids waiting for hearts for over a year, so you really need to create an environment that feels like home for these kids.”

And while Rady has dealt with nurse strikes this year, research has been full steam ahead. Rady Children’s Institute for Genomic Medicine (RCIGM) is working to expand its ability to identify and treat genetic conditions. RCIGM was founded 10 years ago as Rady’s first research institute.

“We were an experiment, based on the belief that the genome, the DNA, would be transformative to pediatrics,” says Dr. Stephen Kingsmore, RCIGM president and CEO. “Our mission is to apply genome information to the practical care of children, from sick babies to teenagers coping with depression.”

The institute’s current study, BeginNGS, screens babies for rare genetic diseases before they present with any symptoms, reducing the need for emergency care and extraneous procedures. Scientists are aiming to increase the number of diseases they’re capable of identifying early and are already adding new conditions to the test weekly, Kingsmore adds.

Clinical trials started about a year ago. “San Diego County is one of the only places in the world where babies get that [screening] at birth,” Kingsmore says. Rady hopes to partner with other institutions across the country so more children’s hospitals can do the same. “We’re going from pediatrics being an art to being a science,” Kingsmore says

The post Rady Children’s Hospital to Open New $1.2B Facility in 2028 appeared first on San Diego Magazine.

Researchers at UC San Diego have developed a type of bioplastic capable of eating itself when exposed to the moisture and sugars found in compost heaps and landfills. The plastic itself is a type of thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU), a material typically found in footwear and memory foam, but it contains bacterial spores from a strain called Bacillus subtilis. What makes this combination of materials work is the nature of the spores, which, according to Jon Pokorski, a nanoengineering professor at UCSD’s Jacobs School of Engineering, become a type of bacteria that can use TPUs as a food source.

While this is an immensely promising discovery, the method is still being tested on a very small scale. The spore-studded TPUs haven’t made it onto the shelves and into our homes at this point in time, so you don’t have to worry about stepping on a banana peel and seeing your Crocs go all Silence of the Lambs on themselves just yet.

The post UCSD Develops Plastic-Eating Bacteria to Eliminate Pollution appeared first on San Diego Magazine.

Over billions of years, Busch explains, plants have evolved to take up carbon dioxide (CO2) from the air. They absorb it through their leaves, build their own biological material using the carbon, and then release the oxygen, which is the O2 that we breathe. In other words, every part of a plant has been constructed from CO2, powered by sunlight via photosynthesis. “Plants are very good at this,” he says. “So making them a little better will go a long way.”

For the past seven years, Busch and his team at The Salk Institute’s Harnessing Plants Initiative have been engineering plants to grow larger and deeper roots that also contain more suberin, a polymer found in the roots of all land plants that is legendary for sucking up carbon.

Busch says this recipe—deeper and more suberin-rich roots—will keep carbon locked beneath our feet for longer. Because suberin is slow to decompose (it’s like jawbreakers for soil microbes), it becomes “a very stable currency in the carbon bank of the soil,” he explains.

Once Busch and his team master these magic roots on a model lab plant— and they are well on their way—they plan to transfer these traits to common crops to solve more than one problem: By the 2080s, the world population is expected to soar to 11 billion, and humanity will be growing more food to meet demand. “So combining food production with carbon sequestration was a no-brainer,” Busch says.

This is the masterplan: Farmers throughout the world adopt these “Salk Ideal Plants” as new growing specimens. As they feed Earth’s larger population, they will also be banking carbon beneath the sun drenched soil in a vast network of mega-roots. If everything goes to plan, Busch expects that in a couple of decades, his program will be responsible for pulling two gigatons of carbon out of the atmosphere each year, which would be equivalent to taking 400 million gasoline-powered cars off the road. “We just need to work very hard for it,” he says.

Inside his lab, Busch picks up a small, translucent, cylindrical container with a tiny trial plant inside. The rice stalk is growing in clear agar gel, making its roots visible. The root system stretches downward like a mass of tributaries, small parts of something greater. “A lot of roots, huh?” Busch says, with a wide grin.

The post Salk Institute’s “Super” Plants Hope to Combat Climate Change appeared first on San Diego Magazine.

UCSD offers senior clinics as part of its primary care services and houses accredited geriatric emergency departments. But older adults can now opt to receive medical care at home, a move that helps ease transportation burdens and avoid the stress of a hospital visit, says Dr. Parag Agnihotri, UCSD Health’s chief medical officer of Population Health Services.

UCSD at Home also increases seniors’ access to tools like blood pressure monitors or bed sensors to track respiration, which can be installed in patients’ houses. In its four years of existence, the program has had 4,000 participants. Those patients saw their hospitalization rates drop by 30 to 40 percent and reported very high patient satisfaction in surveys.

Additionally, the program aims to keep seniors out of the emergency room by managing illnesses or acute episodes at home. Physicians check on patients daily via video monitors. The ER to Home program has been available for two years and recently served its 3,000th patient. Analysis shows that participants have a 50 percent lower chance of going back to the ER.

“Hospitals are not good for seniors,” Agnihotri says. “There are many studies that show when seniors are hospitalized, the surroundings cause increased delirium and confusion. It increases risks of falls and more confinement to bed, so they lose muscle mass. It leads to avoidable physical frailty.”

The institution also provides digital healthcare at home for younger populations who have diabetes, high blood pressure, or certain behavioral health issues.

While UCSD is trying to keep people out of its hospitals whenever possible, it’s also trying to improve management and outcomes with patients who do come in.

Its Mission Control Center, for example, is powered by AI that uses real-time data and predictive analytics to ensure that patients at any three of UCSD Health’s campuses get needed care efficiently and don’t fall through the cracks or experience undue delays during transitions.

Right now, Mission Control is a prototype focused on increasing efficiency in the hospitals. But the hope, says Chief Health AI Officer Dr. Karandeep Singh, is that it will one day expand to help manage outpatients.

That’s not the only way artificial intelligence is changing the game at UCSD. The institution is using an algorithm to help reduce deaths from sepsis, a severe bacterial infection. It’s brought down mortality from sepsis by 17 percent, Singh explains.

UCSD is also looking into utilizing generative AI to help improve patient safety and quality of care. Right now, to determine how well they’re doing on those two fronts, faculty and staff have to review patient charts and patient safety reports, processing massive amounts of information.

“Can generative AI help us read the charts and identify root causes more quickly?” Singh asks. “Can it help us look at even more charts than what we do now? I think we’re trying to see if AI can be an assistant to our staff to do more breadth on top of the depth.”

The post UCSD Health Is Keeping Medical Care Close to Home appeared first on San Diego Magazine.

Sharp.com is about 20 years old at this point, and it was time for an upgrade, says Dan Exley, the interim chief information and innovation officer. The platform can assist patients with things like billing and scheduling, but also help family members get information—with patient consent, of course—about hospitalized relatives.

According to Exley, more than 325,000 San Diegans have created accounts on the Sharp app in the past six months. And Sharp’s hospitals are getting more connected, too. Almost all patient beds now have iPads that contain details about patients’ hospital stay, tools to communicate with the care team, and educational information.

Exley says the iPads help with equity, ensuring that patients and their families can all access the same information from their care team, regardless of their understanding of medicine or the language they speak.

“It lowers the barrier to care,” he adds. Sharp is also exploring ways to ethically use AI in clinical settings.

That includes working to get ambient voice and digital scribe services to more physicians. If providers have their patient’s consent, they can record conversations and save their focus for face-to-face discussions. The recording will capture things that typically wouldn’t be noted in patients’ charts, like a patient expressing concerns over visiting a grandchild because they are immunocompromised. Doctors can also then edit and tweak the information from the recording to ensure accuracy.

“Physicians say, ‘My notes are richer,’” Exley explains. “They capture more meaningfully the nature of the conversation.”

Exley adds that Sharp hopes to continue advancing this technology. In the future, patients may be able to toggle over to a screen showing doctors’ visit notes with less technical jargon.

Sharp is also looking at how generative AI can help in analyzing data. “Our uses of AI always have a human in the loop, but it supercharges our decision making,” Exley says.

Many of Sharp’s latest developments begin at the Prebys Innovation and Education Center. Opened in 2023, the center includes a wet lab for new technologies, where staff can experience developments as a patient would in the hospital setting and give feedback.

The organization is also integrating tech from other companies. When Apple launched its Vision Pro device, Sharp was an early adopter, creating the Spatial Computing Center of Excellence to identify ways the technology could enhance patient care, like helping surgeons who perform complex procedures by allowing them to manipulate anatomy in 3D.

“What Sharp has been doing with technology and innovation in the past few years is making sure we have platforms that help our patients and our caregivers and help us do [data] analytics,” Exley says. “Those themes will continue to drive our innovation.”

The post Sharp HealthCare Looks to the Future With AI and Apple’s Vision Pro appeared first on San Diego Magazine.