Category: Innovative Discoveries Series

Fighting the Old Man’s Friend: Improving Outcomes for Patients with Pneumonia

Community-acquired pneumonia remains one of the major causes of morbidity and mortality worldwide. Recent advances in diagnostics, therapeutics and preventive strategies may significantly improve outcomes from this illness. This presentation will explore recent advances in care for patients with pneumonia and strategies for implementing them. Dr. Metlay is Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School […]

Diagnosis and Management of Influenza in the Acute Care Setting

With poor rapid tests, and non-specific symptoms, rapid diagnosis of influenza continues to challenge providers. However, expeditious recognition and treatment of influenza is critical as more and more studies show the benefits of early treatment in high risk populations. Andrea Dugas is an Assistant Professor and Attending Physician in the Department of Emergency Medicine at […]

The State of Immunization: Understanding Law, Policy, and Resistance

Although the introduction of vaccines has been an enormous public health boon to many diseases, including the major childhood diseases, the possible eradication of these diseases has been compromised by the increasing number of parents and guardians who choose not to vaccinate their children. These decisions are enabled by legislation in most states that was […]

Familial Hypercholesterolemia New Insights New Opportunities

Familial Hypercholesterolemia (FH) is the most common inherited disorder to cause premature morbidity and mortality. It is under-recognized and under-treated. FH provides a genetic model for the cholesterol hypothesis linking cholesterol intake to cardiovascular disease. The discovery of the FH mechanism dramatically improved understanding of lipid metabolism in the body. This talk will examine new […]

Tools for Studying the Genetic Basis of a Complex Disease

Susceptibility to most common diseases is complex, and based on both genetic and environmental risk factors. This presentation will discuss basic concepts and current tools to identify and interpret genetic and epigenetic variation, and pitfalls in associating variants with disease risk. Dr. Barthold is a pediatric urologist/clinician scientist at Nemours. She completed an American Foundation […]

A New Paradigm for Outcomes Assessment

There are several large initiatives that have potential to create a paradigm shift in the way outcomes measurement is practiced. These include the PROMIS, Neuro-QOL and adaptations for rehabilitation populations, the TBI-QOL and SCI-QOL and all have been developed using innovative item banking procedures and Item Response Theory. All of these scales utilized extensive qualitative […]

A Quantitative Model for Glagov Remodeling in Atherosclerosis

Glagov phenomenon describes how atherosclerotic vessels change shape under an increasing disease burden (see Glagov et al, New England Journal of Medicine 1987). Specifically, lumen areas remain constant or increase slightly before contracting as intima areas increase. This presentation will introduce a mathematical model for Glagov remodeling and allow clinicians and researchers to understand the […]

Mindfulness Based Interventions for Maternal Child Health

Mindfulness interventions have been found to decrease symptoms and health issues and to improve overall health. We conducted two mindfulness based studies at Thomas Jefferson University to determine effects of mindfulness on maternal child health. The first study that will be presented was a one year pilot Mindfulness in Pregnancy in the Ob/Gyn Dept with […]

Mindfulness Based Interventions to Prevent Toxic Stress

This presentation will describe current research on adverse exposures and the use of mindfulness based programs for new mothers in treatment for opioid addiction. Mindfulness Based Parenting has shown improvements in parenting and behavior change. The presentation will describe the mechanisms of mindfulness based training and findings from research. A pilot project that aims to […]

The Complex Network of Human Disease: Applying Network Theory to Medicine

Recent research has advanced a network-based approach to human disease based on the hypothesis that a disease phenotype is rarely a consequence of an abnormality in a single effector gene product, but reflects various pathobiological processes that interact in a complex network. Networks have been studied in mathematics, computer science, engineering and social sciences for […]