Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine Research

Mount Sinai’s Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine and the Mount Sinai-National Jewish Health Respiratory Institute possess unique strengths in pulmonary investigation and has established a robust portfolio of collaborative research efforts as we endeavor to discover how lung diseases develop, how they spread, who is vulnerable, and what actions can be taken to control or cure them. 

Several multi-center clinical trials are underway, as well as fundamental science and translational research efforts.  Select research in progress includes:

  • Charles Powell, MD, Institute CEO, supported by major NIH grants, is exploring the genomics of lung cancer tumors in order to determine endotypes and phenotypes (distinct traits and characteristics) with the goal of creating personalized treatment strategies.  Dr. Powell has recruited Hideo Watanabe, MD, PhD from Dana Farber to extend lung cancer research to include studies of single cell genomics and epigenetic regulation of lung development and lung cancer differentiation.   
  • Linda Rogers, MD, Clinical Director of the Asthma Program, recruited in 2014 to Mount Sinai, explores severe asthma in urban populations and asthma in the elderly. She is an investigator in the Digital Medicine program to evaluate mobile health applications such as the Asthma Health Study.   Current grants support her studies in inhaled steroids for the treatment of asthma and methods for reducing airway reactivity.  Dr. Rogers is the site PI for the ALA Airways Network at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. 
  • David Rapoport, MD, is the Director for the Center of Integrative Sleep Medicine.  Dr. Rapoport and his research and clinical team were recruited in 2015.  The goals of the program are to study sleep pathophysiology and study the effects that sleep and sleep disorders have on other organ systems as well as to maximize the opportunities for training and support for young academic researchers in this area.  Dr. Rapoport’s team includes Indu Ayappa, PhD who holds a K24 award, Neomi Shah, MD who is a K23 funded investigator, and Neurologist Andrew Varga, MD. 
  • Sidney Braman, MD, Clinical Director of the COPD Program, is site PI for the PCORI RELIANCE COPD Network trial at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. 
  • Adam Morgenthau, MD, Director of the Sarcoidosis Clinic, is conducting multiple clinical trials on potential therapeutics for the treatment of the disease, and has a provisional patent on a new sarcoid therapeutic strategy that targets serum amyloid alpha.   
  • Maria Padilla, MD, Clinical Director of the Advanced Lung/ILD Program, has a number of clinical trials underway on potential treatments for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, the most common form of Interstitial Lung Disease, which is often caused by environmental toxins.  
  • Juan Wisnivesky, MD, DrPh, Chief of the Division of General Internal Medicine and Vice-Chair for Research, is a Pulmonologist Clinical investigator with interest in comparative effectiveness evaluation in respiratory diseases that include asthma, lung cancer and COPD.  He is mentor of the Pulmonary Journal Club and mentor to Pulmonary research fellows. 
  • Gerry Turino, MD, Director of Lung Research at Mount Sinai Morningside and Professor of Medicine, Critical Care, and Sleep Medicine, a leading expert in COPD research, is advancing work on COPD biomarker development and treatment strategies.

Mount Sinai’s extensive and diverse patient population, sophisticated technologies dedicated to data capture and analysis, culture of collaborative, interdisciplinary research, and commitment to personalized treatment, will support expanded Institute research efforts. National Jewish Health’s large network related to COPD trials will be of particular importance moving forward as we develop new studies with the goal of halting the increase in the incidence of COPD and reducing the distress experienced by patients with the disease.

The research programs for the Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine are listed below:

The research centers for the Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine are listed below:

The research laboratories for the Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine are listed below:

These are the research initiatives in the Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine in the Department of Medicine. 

Below are some links to find our clinical trials:

COPD:
Neil Schachter, MD
Edward Eden, MD  

ILD:
Maria Padilla, MD   

Asthma:
Linda Rogers, MD  
Gwen Skloot, MD  
Juan Wisnivesky, MD, MPH, DrPH   

Additional Clinical Trials:

PI: Lisa Richman, MD
The PETAL Network - clinical trials for the Prevention and Early Treatment of Acute Lung Injury


PI: Adam Morgenthau, MD
A Phase 2/3 Randomized, Double Blind, Placebo Controlled Trial Evaluating the Safety and Efficacy of Kiacta TM for the Treatment of sarcoidosis.
The clinical trial is designed to assess the safety and tolerability of KiactaTM in the treatment of chronic sarcoidosis.  I have collaborated with Transparency Life Sciences (TLS), a drug development company based on open innovation, to utilize crowdsourcing and mobile health technology to develop protocols that are focused on parameters most relevant to clinical decision-makers and patient needs.

In September 2014, as a result of my collaboration with TLS, TLS launched an online tool to solicit feedback about the protocol, clinical trial design and utilization of mobile health technology intended for use in the clinical trial evaluating KiactaTM in sarcoidosis.  The answers to the questions posed in the survey tool were used to fine tune the design of the protocol for the impending trial.  More than 200 researchers, physicians and patients participated in the survey.  The crowdsourcing provided valuable information, which improved the design of the trial and will likely enhance patient participation.

Site PI: Lynne Richardson, MD / Site Co-I: PI: Kusum S. Mathews, MD, MPH
PETAL Clinical Trials Network
The first clinical trial is entitled “Re-evaluation of Systemic Early neuromuscular blockade (ROSE).” ROSE is an open label, randomized clinical trial for patients with moderate to severe acute respiratory distress syndrome. ROSE will assess the efficacy and safety of early neuromuscular blockade with cisatracurium breslylate in reducing mortality and morbidity.
My Role/Research Aims: (a) To establish an operational and data framework for clinical trials in the ICU. (b) To assist in clinical trial operations and management for PETAL studies. (c) To establish an ICU repository of data for critically ill patients at Mount Sinai. 

PI: Linda Rogers, MD
Airways Clinical Research Centers - conducts large clinical trials that will directly impact patient care for COPD and asthma. 

Co-I: Sidney Braman, MD
Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (pcori) 

 

 

 

Below are some helpful resources for physicians/scientists in the Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine:

Mount Sinai-National Jewish Respiratory Institute

Lung Cancer Screening at Mount Sinai

The Tisch Cancer Institute

The Immunology Institute at Mount Sinai