{"id":16169,"date":"2016-09-05T10:30:21","date_gmt":"2016-09-05T14:30:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/?p=16169"},"modified":"2016-09-05T10:30:21","modified_gmt":"2016-09-05T14:30:21","slug":"miller-gift-establishes-endowed-chair-in-medical-physics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/miller-gift-establishes-endowed-chair-in-medical-physics\/","title":{"rendered":"Miller gift establishes endowed chair in medical physics"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"President<\/a>

President Clements with Sheila and Waenard Miller, M.D. The Millers received a platter crafted of wood from a tree that once stood on Clemson\u2019s campus.<\/p><\/div>\n

Cardiologist Waenard L. Miller \u201969<\/span> has spent his career on the cutting edge of medicine, raising the level of care for patients higher and higher. Now the gift that he and his wife, Sheila, of Frisco, Texas, have given will ensure that future Clemson graduates can do the same. The two have donated $2 million to\u00a0Clemson to establish the Dr. Waenard L. Miller, Jr. \u201969 and Sheila M. Miller Endowed Chair in Medical Physics.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cMy vision of the medical physics program is a multidisciplinary collaborative endeavor associated with excellence in research, exponential growth in innovation and outstanding educational opportunities for students,\u201d Miller said.<\/span><\/p>\n

Miller earned his physics degree from Clemson in 1969. He received his medical\u00a0degree from the Medical University of South Carolina and completed his internal medicine residency and a fellowship in cardiology at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School. He also holds master\u2019s degrees in nuclear physics, biology and medical management.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Millers met when they were in high school in Greenville. Sheila\u2019s father, Bernyrd C. McLawhorn, was a Greenville physician with degrees in physics and medicine. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe had a common language in physics, but I was equally inspired by his knowledge of medicine and his commitment to his patients,\u201d Miller said. \u201cMy father-in-law was clearly the role model for my eventual choice of medicine as my vocation.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Sheila fondly remembers the friendship between her father and her future husband. \u201cWhen I was dating Waenard, I knew I had to get to the door immediately, because if I didn\u2019t get there right away, the two of them would go off in a corner and start talking about black holes, and we\u2019d be late for wherever we were going,\u201d she said.<\/span><\/p>\n

Miller, in Air Force ROTC at Clemson, was commissioned as a second lieutenant upon graduation and sent to graduate school in nuclear physics. He then served at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in the foreign technology division as a physicist and later transferred to the Aerospace Medical Research Laboratory. There he became intrigued with the combined concept of physics and biology.<\/span><\/p>\n

Miller began practicing medicine near Dallas in 1983 and co-founded the\u00a0Legacy Heart Center\u00a0(LHC) in 1995. Under his leadership, LHC became renowned for leading-edge cardiovascular care. <\/span>Texas Monthly<\/i><\/span> magazine named him a \u201cTexas Super Doctor\u201d for eight consecutive years. President Clements described Miller as one of the University\u2019s most accomplished alumni.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWaenard and Sheila already have established a significant legacy. We are so honored that they have decided to partner with Clemson to enhance their legacy even further,\u201d Clements said. \u201cThis wonderful gift will allow us to expand our internationally acclaimed biomedical research program and help meet the demand for medical physicists in the health care industry.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The endowed position will be a joint appointment in Clemson\u2019s departments of\u00a0physics and astronomy and bioengineering. While collaborating with medical partners of Clemson University, the research conducted by the endowed chair holder will be at the interface of science and engineering with clinical translation as the outcome.<\/span><\/p>\n

Mark Leising, former chair of the physics and astronomy department and interim dean of the College of Science, said,\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cDr. and Mrs. Miller\u2019s gift will invigorate our medical physics education and research programs. Bringing more physicists and physical science techniques to medicine will continue to improve patient care and fill an important need of our state.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Martine LaBerge, chair of Clemson\u2019s bioengineering department, noted that medical physics research is at the forefront of patient care. \u201cWith this generous gift,\u201d she said, \u201cClemson University will continue to lead the field of medical diagnostics and will make a significant impact in basic and applied research to improve patient outcomes.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The Millers\u2019 gift is a part of the successful $1 billion\u00a0Will to Lead for Clemson campaign. <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Cardiologist Waenard L. Miller \u201969 has spent his career on the cutting edge of medicine, raising the level of care for patients higher and higher. Now the gift that he and his wife, Sheila, of Frisco, Texas, have given will ensure that future Clemson graduates can do the same. The two have donated $2 million […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":15843,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[24,8],"tags":[531,1903,2384,2589,2851,2854,3217],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-16169","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-clemson-forever","category-my-clemson","tag-cardiology","tag-medical-physics","tag-research","tag-sheila-m-miller","tag-summer-fall-2016","tag-summer-fall-2016-forever","tag-waenard-miller"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2016\/08\/Forever-Waenard-Miller.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16169","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16169"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16169\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15843"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16169"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16169"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16169"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=16169"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}