Hershel Raff, PhD

Professor, Medicine, Physiology and Surgery; Director, Endocrine Research Laboratory

Locations

Aurora St. Luke's Medical Center
2801 W. KK River Pkwy., Suite 260
Milwaukee, WI 53215

Contact Information

Biography

Hershel Raff is Professor of Medicine in the Division of Endocrinology and Molecular Medicine and also a Professor in the MCW Pharmacy School. He holds secondary appointments in the Departments of Physiology and Surgery. He is the Director of the Endocrine Research Laboratory at Aurora St. Luke's Medical Center of the Aurora Research Institute. He received a BA in Music from Union College in Schenectady, NY. He earned his PhD in Environmental Physiology from the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health. He was a post-doctoral fellow in Endocrinology at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). Dr. Raff came to MCW in 1983 as an Assistant Professor and rose to the rank of Professor in 1991. He is also an Adjunct Professor in Biomedical Sciences at Marquette University.

Education

Johns Hopkins University, PhD - Environmental Physiology
University of California-San Francisco, Postdoctoral Fellowship in Endocrinology

Research Interests

Dr Raff's laboratory has two main research areas of interest. His basic research on the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis focuses on the short and long term consequences of neonatal hypoxia. His laboratory has discovered that activation of the synthetic pathway for corticosterone (the main glucocorticoid of the rodent) by neonatal hypoxia is mediated by a novel second-messenger cascade. His clinical research focuses on the development of diagnostic endocrine tests and, in particular, using the measurement of salivary cortisol to evaluate the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis in a variety of human stress models.

Dr. Raff is heavily involved in medical, graduate, pharmacy and undergraduate education. He is Course Director of the second year medical student Endocrinology/Reproduction Integrated Unit. He teaches first year endocrine physiology to medical and pharmacy students and Advanced Endocrinology for graduate students. Dr. Raff is the author of two textbooks: Vander's Human Physiology, an undergraduate textbook, and Medical Physiology: A Systems Approach, a medical student-level textbook. He also teaches Applied and Rehabilitative Systems Physiology at Marquette University College of Health Science. He was an inaugural inductee into the MCW Society of Teaching Scholars in 1991 and was elected to Alpha Omega Alpha as a Faculty Member by the MCW senior medical student class of 2005.

Publications as listed on PubMed

Assay-Specific Spurious ACTH Results Lead to Misdiagnosis, Unnecessary Testing, and Surgical Misadventure-A Case Series.

(Greene LW, Geer EB, Page-Wilson G, Findling JW, Raff H.) J Endocr Soc. 2019 Apr 01;3(4):763-772.
Glucocorticoid Receptor Mutations and Hypersensitivity to Endogenous and Exogenous Glucocorticoids.

(Santen RJ, Jewell CM, Yue W, Heitjan DF, Raff H, Katen KS, Cidlowski JA.) J Clin Endocrinol Metab. 2018 Oct 01;103(10):3630-3639.
Programming of the Adult HPA Axis After Neonatal Separation and Environmental Stress in Male and Female Rats.

(Gehrand AL, Hoeynck B, Jablonski M, Leonovicz C, Cullinan WE, Raff H.) Endocrinology. 2018 07 01;159(7):2777-2789.
Effect of a melanocortin type 2 receptor (MC2R) antagonist on the corticosterone response to hypoxia and ACTH stimulation in the neonatal rat.

(Goldenberg AJ, Gehrand AL, Waples E, Jablonski M, Hoeynck B, Raff H.) Am J Physiol Regul Integr Comp Physiol. 2018 Jul 01;315(1):R128-R133.
Differentiation of pathologic/neoplastic hypercortisolism (Cushing syndrome) from physiologic/non-neoplastic hypercortisolism (formerly known as Pseudo-Cushing syndrome): response to Letter to the Editor.

(Findling JW, Raff H.) Eur J Endocrinol. 2018 03;178(3):L3.
Insulin sensitivity, leptin, adiponectin, resistin, and testosterone in adult male and female rats after maternal-neonatal separation and environmental stress.

(Raff H, Hoeynck B, Jablonski M, Leonovicz C, Phillips JM, Gehrand AL.) Am J Physiol Regul Integr Comp Physiol. 2018 01 01;314(1):R12-R21.
Increase in the circulating endocannabinoid 2-arachidonoylglycerol is associated with gabapentin use in septic ICU patients.

(Raff H, Kramer DJ, Hillard CJ.) Endocrine. 2017 10;58(1):203-204.
DIAGNOSIS OF ENDOCRINE DISEASE: Differentiation of pathologic/neoplastic hypercortisolism (Cushing's syndrome) from physiologic/non-neoplastic hypercortisolism (formerly known as pseudo-Cushing's syndrome).

(Findling JW, Raff H.) Eur J Endocrinol. 2017 May;176(5):R205-R216.
Is the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis disrupted in type 2 diabetes mellitus?

(Raff H, Magill SB.) Endocrine. 2016 Nov;54(2):273-275.
Sex differences in adult rat insulin and glucose responses to arginine: programming effects of neonatal separation, hypoxia, and hypothermia.

(Gehrand AL, Hoeynck B, Jablonski M, Leonovicz C, Ye R, Scherer PE, Raff H.) Physiol Rep. 2016 Sep;4(18).
CORT, Cort, B, Corticosterone, and now Cortistatin: Enough Already!

(Raff H.) Endocrinology. 2016 09;157(9):3307-8.
Do the Effects of the Triorganotin Tributyltin on the Hypothalamic-Pituitary-Adrenal Axis In Vivo Contribute to Its Environmental Toxicity?

(Raff H.) Endocrinology. 2016 08;157(8):2996-8.