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10 clinical sites awarded NIH grant to study urban pediatric asthma
The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases has awarded a 7-year, $70 million grant to 10 clinical sites to study urban pediatric asthma, according to a press release.
The Inner-City Asthma Consortium was established in 2002 “to research the causes of inner-city childhood asthma and to evaluate and develop new immune-based therapies,” according to the release.
Robert A. Wood
Inner-city children are disproportionately affected by asthma and environmental allergies,” Robert A. Wood, MD, director of the division of pediatric allergy and immunology at Johns Hopkins Children’s Center, one of the awarded research sites, said in the release. “We need to unravel the reasons behind this phenomenon, and this grant will enable us to do so."
The NIH grant will allow researchers “to work toward clinical disparity and to define key triggers of asthma flare-ups in order to devise preventive strategies,” the release said.
Children’s prenatal and postnatal periods are being studied to determine factors that might increase asthma risk. A family history of asthma, hay fever or eczema, indoor air pollution, stress and airway infections and living conditions that include exposure to cockroaches and mouse dander are risk factors already identified by the investigators.
Consortium members also are focused on “developing more effective clinical strategies for managing the disease, including asthma attacks,” the release said.
Other awarded sites include the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center; Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York; National Jewish Health, Denver; Boston University School of Medicine; Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago; Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center; George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences, St. Louis; Children’s Research Institute, Washington, D.C.; and Henry Ford Health System, Detroit and the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health.