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Readers' Picks: Rising Stars of Healthcare Research
Nicholas Stokowski | August 16, 2017
| Contributor Information
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Readers' Picks: Rising Stars of Healthcare Research
Nicholas Stokowski | August 16, 2017 | Contributor Information
The advancement of science in all areas of medicine and healthcare requires a steady influx of new minds and ideas. In response to our first collection, "Up-and-Coming Medical Researchers," Medscape readers nominated colleagues whose innovations in the lab or clinic offer hope for healthcare's greatest challenges. These pioneering researchers and their work deserve to be showcased and shared with a wider audience in healthcare, where they will most certainly serve as inspiration for others. We thank our readers and colleagues for the following outstanding nominations representing the fields of medical, pharmaceutical, and nursing research.
Image courtesy of Shinjini Kundu, PhD
Readers' Picks: Rising Stars of Healthcare Research
Nicholas Stokowski | August 16, 2017 | Contributor Information
Even before completing her medical education at the University of Pittsburgh, Dr Shinjini Kundu (who finished her doctorate last year at Carnegie Mellon) had made a name for herself as a medical scientist. Dr Kundu's groundbreaking work in artificial intelligence uses machine learning to train computers to scan medical images and spot minute evidence of disease that is too subtle or diffuse to be distinguished by the human eye. Using the techniques that she developed, knee osteoarthritis can be diagnosed from seemingly normal knee MRIs up to 3 years before symptoms manifest. The potential applications of Dr Kundu's research to many other diseases are as exciting as they are broad, and promise to revolutionize the future of medical diagnosis.
(Nominated by George Leef, MD)
Image courtesy of Fumihiko Urano, MD, PhD
Readers' Picks: Rising Stars of Healthcare Research
Nicholas Stokowski | August 16, 2017 | Contributor Information
Dr Fumihiko (Fumi) Urano is a driving force in the study of Wolfram syndrome, a rare prototype of endoplasmic reticulum disease. As director of the Wolfram Syndrome International Registry and Clinical Study at Washington University School of Medicine, Dr Urano's collaboration with colleagues around the world has allowed him to begin a clinical trial dedicated to the treatment of this devastating genetic disease. His current focus is on finding novel treatments for endoplasmic reticulum stress-associated disorders using regenerative gene therapy and gene-based diagnostics. Dr Urano is an advocate for patients with rare genetic disorders and a steering committee member of the rare disease data repository program at the US National Institutes of Health, which connects patients, physicians, and researchers with resources and treatment updates.
(Nominated by Marc Haynes, RN, BSN)
Image courtesy of Anthony J. Di Pasqua, PhD
Readers' Picks: Rising Stars of Healthcare Research
Nicholas Stokowski | August 16, 2017 | Contributor Information
A "wearable skin cancer treatment" is not a pipedream of the future but a therapeutic device that is moving closer to clinical reality, under the leadership of Dr Anthony J. Di Pasqua, an assistant professor of pharmaceutical sciences in the School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences at Binghamton University, and chief executive officer of DB Therapeutics, Inc. Dr Di Pasqua and his close collaborator, Kenneth J. Balkus, Jr, PhD, a professor of chemistry at the University of Texas at Dallas and member of the DB Therapeutics, Inc. leadership team, used their expertise in materials with biomedical applications to create a holmium-based bandage for the treatment of non-melanoma skin cancers. Dr Di Pasqua's scholarly research focuses on the development of novel delivery systems to enhance the efficacy of therapeutically active compounds while minimizing their side effects in patients and translating basic scientific concepts into therapeutic applications for use in the clinic.
(Nominated by Sara Asif, PharmD, MS, BCGP)
Image courtesy of Joshua Brody, MD
Readers' Picks: Rising Stars of Healthcare Research
Nicholas Stokowski | August 16, 2017 | Contributor Information
As director of the Lymphoma Immunotherapy Program at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, Dr Joshua Brody seeks novel ways to induce antitumor immunity, in preclinical models in his lab and in early-phase clinical trials in patients with lymphomas and other tumor types (breast cancer, head/neck cancer, lung cancer). His group has developed an approach called Flt3L-primed in situ vaccination, in which immune stimulants are administered directly into a patient's tumor to teach the immune system how to recognize tumor-associated antigens and then eliminate tumor cells systemically. Their "immunotransplant" approach combines immunotherapy with stem cell transplantation to treat patients with chemotherapy-refractory aggressive lymphoma, and they are collaborating with colleagues in industry to develop new applications and safer implementation of chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy for lymphoma and leukemias.
(Nominated by Gary Zeitlin, MD)
Image courtesy of Margo Brooks Carthon, PhD, RN
Readers' Picks: Rising Stars of Healthcare Research
Nicholas Stokowski | August 16, 2017 | Contributor Information
Nursing care is critical to reducing health disparities and achieving better health outcomes among ethnic and racial minority patients. As an associate professor of nursing at the University of Pennsylvania and a senior fellow of the Leonard Davis Institute for Health Economics, Dr Margo Brooks Carthon's research aims to understand the effects of nurse staffing and work environments on the outcomes of socially vulnerable populations. Dr Carthon recently completed a study that signaled a relationship between missed nursing care and readmissions among older black patients diagnosed with acute myocardial infarction. Her research suggests that care environments that support professional nursing are positively linked to outcomes of care among older minority patients. Her work on health policy led to her induction to the American Academy of Nursing in 2015.
(Nominated by Eileen Lake, PhD, RN)
Image courtesy of Richard Bedlack, MD, PhD
Readers' Picks: Rising Stars of Healthcare Research
Nicholas Stokowski | August 16, 2017 | Contributor Information
Dr Richard Bedlack describes his research goal as "finding the cure for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) in the most hopeful, patient-centric ways I can think of." At Duke University, Dr Bedlack leads programs that engage patients in truly unique ways. His ALS Clinical Research Learning Institutes are "crash courses" in research and advocacy, designed to empower patients and families to be "research ambassadors." His ALSUntangled program scientifically reviews complementary, alternative, and off-label ALS treatments to help patients make more informed decisions. Through his ALS Reversals programs, he has validated 34 people who appeared to have ALS and then had dramatic (sometimes complete) recovery of motor functions. He is now reviewing the demographics, disease characteristics, treatment regimens, antibody panels, and genomes of these people. He is also conducting small, largely virtual clinical trials using the same treatment regimens that these patients were on at the time of their improvement. By better understanding ALS reversals, he hopes to make them happen more often.
(Nominated by Bret Stetka, MD)
Image courtesy of Eric J. Ip, PharmD
Readers' Picks: Rising Stars of Healthcare Research
Nicholas Stokowski | August 16, 2017 | Contributor Information
Dr Eric J. Ip is chair and associate professor of clinical sciences at the Touro University California College of Pharmacy. He also co-heads the Diabetes Care Management Program as a clinical pharmacist at Kaiser Permanente Mountain View Medical Offices, where he optimizes glycemic and cardiovascular care for adults with diabetes mellitus. He is one of the nation's leading researchers in the area of anabolic steroids and performance-enhancing drug abuse in both men and women. His current focus is on exploring psychiatric traits and infectious disease risk among anabolic steroid users.
(Nominated by Katherine Knapp, PhD)
Image courtesy of Vanita Aroda, MD
Readers' Picks: Rising Stars of Healthcare Research
Nicholas Stokowski | August 16, 2017 | Contributor Information
Dr Vanita Aroda is Scientific Director of the MedStar Community Clinical Research Center (MCCRC) in Hyattsville, Maryland, where she oversees the conduct of clinical trials. Dr Aroda's research interests include diabetes prevention and novel therapeutics in diabetes and obesity. She has served as an investigator on numerous studies, including the National Institutes of Health–funded Diabetes Prevention Program and Diabetes Prevention Program Outcomes Study, the Glycemia Reduction Approaches in Diabetes: A Comparative Effectiveness (GRADE) Study, and the Vitamin D and type 2 diabetes (D2d) Study. She also has a keen interest in the interpretation and translation of clinical trial evidence to clinical care, in engagement of patients and clinicians in clinical research, and in sharing forward the generous mentorship she herself received.
(Nominated by John Buse, MD, PhD)
Image courtesy of Kevin Deane, MD, PhD
Readers' Picks: Rising Stars of Healthcare Research
Nicholas Stokowski | August 16, 2017 | Contributor Information
Dr Kevin Deane's career as a physician-scientist and rheumatologist at the University of Colorado has focused on preclinical rheumatoid arthritis (RA). His team is trying to understand how genetic and environmental factors as well as RA-related biomarkers can predict the future onset of disease in people who currently feel well. This led to the implementation of the first US prevention trial, called StopRA. A major focus of Dr Deane's research is to understand the role of mucosal inflammation in the development of RA. Rooted in the concept that RA-related antibodies are generated at body sites other than the joints, Dr Deane's work has shown that the lung is an important site of RA-related autoimmunity. He and his colleagues are investigating other mucosal sites, with the hope that this will lead to novel preventive approaches to RA that can target these sites long before joint symptoms develop.
(Nominated by Sterling West, MD, MACP, MACR)
Image courtesy of Erika Nurmi, MD, PhD
Readers' Picks: Rising Stars of Healthcare Research
Nicholas Stokowski | August 16, 2017 | Contributor Information
Dr Erika Nurmi's research seeks to guide treatment decisions for neuropsychiatric disorders on the basis of personalized genetic factors. At the University of California Los Angeles Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior, Dr Nurmi directs a molecular and computational genetics laboratory, investigating genetic contributions to mental illness vulnerability in children and adolescents, and the pharmacogenomic therapy of mental illness. Her recent work focuses on unraveling the genetic susceptibility to obsessive-compulsive and tic disorders and genetic influences on treatment. Dr Nurmi aspires to integrate her roles as researcher, teacher, and clinician, with the overarching goal of developing biologically based, individualized treatments for mental illness.
Extraordinary Physicians: 12 Doctors Who Break the Mold
In this slideshow, we highlight the accomplishments of a cross-section of America's physicians, a group that illustrates medicine's continuing evolution and diversity.Medscape Features Slideshows, March 2017
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Nicholas Stokowski
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Disclosure: Nicholas Stokowski has disclosed no relevant financial relationships.
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