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Media Inquiries: 434-924-5679 U.Va. WINS FUNDS FROM NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH TO START DIGESTIVE HEALTH RESEARCH CENTER |
| The University of Virginia Health System has been awarded a $6 million five-year federal grant that will fund the operation and staffing of a new Digestive Health Research Center at U.Va. The center will bring vital research from the laboratory to the bedside, potentially serving thousands of patients with digestive diseases in Virginia and the eastern seaboard.
The center, one of only 16 facilities of its kind in the nation and the only one in the commonwealth, will bring together basic science and clinical investigators in 12 academic departments at U.Va. and will help the University attract new digestive experts. The grant money is from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and places U.Va. at the forefront of digestive health research. “This is a major accomplishment for us and for the University because only a few of these national centers investigate the areas of digestive diseases that are U.Va. specialties,” said Dr. Fabio Cominelli, director of the Digestive Health Center of Excellence at U.Va. and chief of the division of gastroenterology and hepatology. “This new center should allow us to attract the best digestive researchers in the world. And for patients, it will mean multiple expertise, state-of-the-art therapeutics, the latest technology and research and the most advanced diagnostic tools and clinical trials for digestive diseases. One overriding objective will be translating basic research discoveries to the clinical arena.” Seventy percent of the grant funds will be used to support digestive research at U.Va. labs in three core areas: inflammatory bowel diseases such as Crohn’s disease and colitis; gastrointestinal cancers including colorectal, pancreatic, gastric and esophageal cancer; and GI infections including hepatitis, Helicobacter-pylori infections and infectious diarrhea. Other funds will support four pilot projects at U.Va. to test innovative ideas in digestive disease research. Up to fifty researchers will be associated with the new research center. The center will support three scientific core groups: a morphology/imaging core, directed by Dr. Theresa Pizarro, assistant professor of internal medicine; a molecular biology/gene expression core, directed by Dr. Steven Cohn, associate professor of internal medicine; and an immunology/cell isolation core, directed by Dr. Peter Ernst, professor of internal medicine. Cominelli is also organizing an enrichment conference of NIH-funded Digestive Disease Research Centers in the Mid-Atlantic to exchange ideas and research results. The first conference will take place in Charlottesville in 2005. Researchers will attend from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Vanderbilt University, the University of Pennsylvania and Massachusetts General Hospital, in addition to U.Va. “This is research that should translate into clinical discoveries very quickly,” Cominelli said. “This new center provides incredible support for all the clinical work aimed at treating and curing digestive diseases that goes on every day at U.Va.” June 14, 2004 |