Innovators

UH CLINICAL RESEARCH CENTER RECEIVES $4M NIH GRANT TO STUDY HIV

Through the science of health, people with HIV are living longer. But we’re now finding that HIV is acting as a chronic infection, contributing to continued inflammation and causing other diseases in the body. Addressing inflammation is the focus of groundbreaking research at the UH Clinical Research Center.

Although new HIV therapies are safer and effectively halt the progression of the disease into AIDS, the accumulation of visceral abdominal fat, fat in the liver and around the heart remains a common and significant health challenge for those living with HIV. This fat is linked to increased systemic inflammation and risk of cardiovascular disease. Under the direction of Grace McComsey, MD, Vice President of Research and Director of the UH Clinical Research Center, Rainbow Babies & Children's Foundation John Kennell Chair of Excellence in Pediatrics, UH through its collaboration with Case Western Reserve University has received a $4 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to study whether a promising class of drugs never before studied in HIV can help alleviate fat abnormalities as well as systemic inflammation and cardiovascular risk in these patients. She and her team will also test the effectiveness of glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists (GLP-1RAs) in lessening insulin resistance, inflammation and cardiovascular risk. Results of the study should help providers better manage inflammation in all patients affected, not just those with HIV. “The UH research team – the HIV metabolic center – is a pioneer in investigating inflammation in HIV and linking comorbidities to diabetes, cardiovascular disease, bone disease and obesity,” said Dr. McComsey.*

The UH research team is also examining other health conditions related to long-term HIV status, including neurocognitive dysfunctions such as memory loss in people as young as 30 years old, and the effects of vitamin D deficiency on bone growth and asthma in pediatric patients with HIV.

Dr. McComsey has also received several other grants that have been earmarked to study the inflammatory response pathways of zinc deficiency and HIV, heroin use in HIV patients and the effect of gut dysfunction on comorbidities.

*Grace McComsey, MD, was named a 2020

Woman of Note by Crain’s Cleveland Business.

IMPROVING LUNG FUNCTION IN PRE-TERM BABIES

African-American pre-term babies (premies) often experience recurrent wheezing throughout infancy that can impact long-term health and is associated with an increased risk of infant mortality. Two hallmark studies by Anna Maria Hibbs, MD, Eliza Henry Barnes Chair in Neonatology, and fellow researchers at UH Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital and at other hospital sites examine the effects of supplemental vitamin D and oxygen on wheezing conditions.

“In the D-Wheeze study, we have found something that is available over-the-counter that can really make a difference,” said Dr. Hibbs.

The Pre-Vent study examines the effects of ventilation and oxygen therapy in premature babies who have unstable breathing patterns and immature breath control leading to an abnormally low level of oxygen in the blood.

An NIH grant is supporting a study by Dr. Hibbs into the effects in patients from birth to 6 months of age. A separate grant is funding the study of longer term outcomes in patients up to 2 years old.