March 2, 2006
Clinical research scholars named
The NIH Multidisciplinary Clinical Research Career Development Program at the UW has accepted its second group of clinical research scholars. The program, funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) with a $13 million grant over five years, is part of an NIH-wide initiative to strengthen clinical research across the nation.
The program, also known as K-12 grants, trains outstanding individuals to design, execute, and oversee clinical research in multidisciplinary team settings, and to develop future clinical research leaders in disciplines critical to the overall mission of the NIH. Dr. Richard Deyo, professor of medicine and health services, directs the program at the UW.
The eight new clinical research scholars are:
- Dr. Elizabeth Broussard is a gastroenterology fellow at the UW. She graduated from Cornell University Medical College, and then completed her internal medicine residency in 2003 at the UW. Her research background has been laboratory-based, but she is now interested in adding a clinical aspect to her work. She seeks to understand the role of a newly identified hemoglobin receptor in humans with hemochromatosis, a disorder of iron metabolism.
- Dr. Ian de Boer is a UW nephrology fellow. He graduated from the Oregon Health and Science University School of Medicine in 1999 and completed his internal medicine residency at the University of California, San Francisco in 2002. He has been involved in determining the role of vitamin D metabolism in diabetic patients. de Boer plans to collaborate with endocrinologists and cardiologists by using clinical trials to study the impact of vitamin D on cardiac disease.
- Dr. Daniel Doherty is an acting assistant professor of pediatrics at the UW. He completed his M.D. and Ph.D. at the University of California, San Francisco, in 1998, and then his pediatrics training at the UW. He has done extensive work in characterizing Joubert’s Disease, a relatively rare hindbrain malformation in children. Doherty hopes to extend his understanding to evaluate other forms of hindbrain malformation, particularly for in utero fetuses.
- Dr. Soren Gantt is a pediatric infectious disease fellow at the UW. He earned his Ph.D. in 2000 and his M.D. in 2001 from New York University School of Medicine, and then completed his pediatrics residency in 2003 at the UW. Gantt has substantial experience in HIV-1 immunology and would like to extend his work in preventing maternal-fetal transmission of HIV, and to improve our understanding of HIV-related mastitis in nursing mothers.
- Dr. Bahirathan Krishnadasan is a newly appointed assistant professor in the Division of Thoracic Surgery. He earned his M.D. from the University of California, Davis, in 1996, and completed his surgical residency and cardiothoracic surgery fellowship at the UW. He is interested in evaluating the effectiveness of newly introduced endoscopic approaches to the diagnosis and treatment of lung cancers.
- Dr. Eduardo Mendez, a head and neck surgical oncology fellow at the UW, graduated from the University of Maryland School of Medicine in 1999, and completed his residency in otolaryngology/head & neck surgery at the UW. He has worked to define genetic expression profiles of patients with squamous cell tumors of the upper aero-digestive tract, and now seeks to refine the profiles of patients who are susceptible to spreading disease.
- Dr. Stephanie Page is a UW endocrinology fellow, and also received both her M.D. and Ph.D. degrees and her internal medicine training here. She has studied the impact of testosterone at the cellular level, and is now gaining understanding of the risk-benefit ratio of testosterone replacement in older men. Page will use the award to extend her work into clinical trials.
- Dr. Hilaire Thompson is a postdoctoral fellow in the School of Nursing. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in 2003. She is experienced in evaluating the acute management of patients who have sustained traumatic brain injury. She seeks to address gaps in knowledge about treatment, and is particularly interested in understanding the impact of cerebral perfusion pressures on outcomes and the optimal management of hyperthermia in these patients.
The new group will join eight scholars named last year.
Six other institutions have similar NIH clinical research career development programs.
