USC professor at CHLA awarded $9.5 million by NIH for sickle cell disease research

By Ellin Kavanagh

Thomas Coates, MD, professor of pediatrics and pathology at the Keck School of Medicine of USC and section head of hematology in the division of hematology oncology at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, along with four other co-principal investigators, recently received a five-year, $9.5 million grant from the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute of the National Institutes of Health. The award will fund research into the underlying physiology of sickle cell disease (SCD) and identification of biomarkers that will aid in the development of new treatment options. … Read More »

November 20th, 2013|Announcements|

Rare fetal cardiac procedure performed for the first time in Southern California by USC physicians at CHLA

By Lorenzo Benet

A mother and her 25-week-old fetus are doing well after a USC surgeon and pediatrician performed a successful in utero cardiac interventional procedure on the fetus at CHA Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center late last month.

The minimally invasive procedure, known as a fetal aortic valvuloplasty, was a first for a Southern California hospital. Designed to treat a congenital heart defect known as critical aortic stenosis and evolving hypoplastic left heart syndrome, doctors succeeded in using a tiny balloon to open the fetus’s narrow aortic valve to increase blood flow to the body, improve left heart function and promote normal left heart growth during the critical third trimester growing stage. … Read More »

November 20th, 2013|Announcements|

Cardiovascular symposium takes the pulse of current research

By Jennifer Jing and Cristy Lytal

Researchers addressed the leading cause of death in the United States at the Los Angeles Area Cardiovascular Research Symposium and Research Award Reception, which brought together the region’s cardiovascular specialists to examine the developmental origins of heart health and disease.

Held at The Saban Research Institute of Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, the event was the first meeting of its kind since 1997, when the American Heart Association (AHA) disbanded local chapters in favor of regional affiliates. … Read More »

November 20th, 2013|Announcements|

Regulatory Science Students Visit Bay Area Manufacturers

By Laura Sturza

Six students from the USC School of Pharmacy’s regulatory science program received a dose of the real world this summer as they toured two of the San Francisco Bay Area’s major pharmaceutical and medical device companies. The students saw firsthand the operations at Boehringer Ingelheim, one of the world’s leading manufacturers of biopharmaceuticals, and Stryker, one of the world’s leading medical technology companies, on July 22.

Students from the program often tour companies in Southern California, with the goal of gaining additional views of real-world operations. … Read More »

November 20th, 2013|Announcements|

USC researchers to grow organs to unlock secrets of how cancer tumors develop

By Leslie Ridgeway

Using three-dimensional organ creation, Keck Medicine of USC researchers aim to discover clues to metastatic cancer growth by developing a first-ever integrated bioengineered/computational model of metastatic colon cancer.

David B. Agus, MD, director of the USC Center for Applied Molecular Medicine and professor of medicine at the Keck School of Medicine of USC, is the principal investigator of a $2.3 million, four-year “Provocative Questions” grant awarded recently by the National Cancer Institute (NCI), a division of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The project title is “An Integrative Computational and Bioengineered Tissue Model of Metastasis.” … Read More »

November 13th, 2013|Announcements|