Mary Ann and J. Milburn Smith
Child Health Research Core
Xiaobin Wang, MD, MPH, ScD Program Director
Child Health Research is a new program that was launched with a magnificent gift from Mrs. Mary Ann Smith in memory of her late husband. Investigators in Child Health Research partner with physicians from Children’s Memorial Hospital other hospitals in the Chicago area and with community and government organizations to study children’s health and the factors that affect it. This work encompasses various areas of pediatric non-bench research, including epidemiology, pediatric practice based research, and outcomes research intended to develop new insights into disease treatment and prevention. The results of this combined research are used to bring about lasting solutions to complex health problems facing children and families.
Dr. Wang has set in motion a strategic planning process to determine the future direction of the program. She is especially interested in the following areas of clinical and population-based research: (i) prenatal and childhood origin of adult diseases, including obesity, hypertension, and diabetes, (ii) research on environmentally induced morbidity and mortality and gene-environment interactions, and (iii) developmental pharmacology and pharmacogenomics in infants and children, which may lead to the development of predictive medicine and individualized prescription.
Examples of work already under way demonstrate Children’s Memorial’s continuing leadership in injury prevention and its commitment to fostering healthy lifestyles in the primary care setting. Jenifer Cartland, PhD, Director of the Child Health Data Laboratory (CHDL), a sub-program of the Population-Based Research Program, released a report on childhood injury in Illinois with overwhelming evidence that guns are a leading factor in childhood injury. A second report looked at injury patterns by community area in Chicago and provided recommendations for community-based groups to reduce violent and unintentional injury. CHDL is a repository of current and archival information on child and adolescent health in Chicago and Illinois. Also, with generous funding from the Otho S.A. Sprague Memorial Institute, Katherine Kaufer Christoffel, MD, MPh, launched an ambitious consortium initiative to tackle the growing epidemic of childhood obesity. The Consortium to Lower Obesity in Chicago Children (CLOCC) is a multi-organizational effort to halt the epidemic of obesity and type II diabetes in the Chicago. Helen Binns, MD, MPH, and Adolfo Ariza, MD, are also addressing this issue by working with pediatric primary care practices to prevent childhood obesity.
