Research Milestones
Duke Children’s Hospital & Health Center is known worldwide for its current and historical achievements in advancing health care, from the most common allergies to rare diseases. Today, Duke Children’s continues to invest in children's health with leading research programs focused on investigating brain tumors and other childhood cancers, birth defects, life-threatening food allergies, infectious diseases, and childhood obesity. Through these studies and others, Duke Children's is setting new benchmarks for the science behind caring for our patients.
The following are some of Duke Children's recent research and clinical milestones:
2000s
Duke pediatric geneticist Y.T. Chen leads a team that develops a breakthrough enzyme therapy treatment for Pompe disease, a debilitating, progressive and fatal genetic muscular disorder that afflicts a tiny percentage of babies born each year in the United States. Without treatment, these babies usually die before their first birthday. The new therapy improves heart and muscular function in these patients and can prolong and enhance their quality of life.
Duke researchers find that giving the flu vaccine to toddlers in the spring and fall guards against infection and is easier on parents than the fall schedule of two doses administered a month apart.
Duke investigators, led by Dr. Jonathan Stamler, are part of a team that develops a new drug that appears to be successful in treating newborns whose lungs are unable to properly oxygenate their blood. The researchers believe that the drug – called O-nitrosoethanol (ENO) – will be effective in improving oxygenation in patients with such disorders as asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), cystic fibrosis, and sickle cell disease.
Dr. Richard Auten, in conjunction with colleagues from other institutions, discover that an enzyme that protects the body from reactive chemicals called free radicals is crucial in preventing the inflammation that causes chronic lung disease in premature infants. The findings could lead to improved treatment options.
A team led by nurse Susan Hohenhaus and Dr. Karen Frush develops a web-based educational program to facilitate the use of Broselow Pediatric Resuscitation Tape, a tool used in pediatric emergency care settings to standardize the administration of important drugs to emergently ill or injured children.
1990s
Using thymus tissue that is normally thrown away after pediatric heart surgery, Dr. Louise Markert creates a new T-cell immune system for two children who would otherwise have died from a rare immune disorder known as DiGeorge Syndrome.
Development of new methods to protect the brain, heart and lungs of infants undergoing heart surgery and intraoperative use of echocardiography during infant heart repair (now a standard technique at most major pediatric heart surgery centers).
Dr. Catherine Wilfert pioneers the use of AZT to prevent the transfer of HIV from pregnant women to their children. By 1999, only four reported cases of HIV are transmitted from mother to child in North Carolina.
Devonte Moore becomes the first pediatric patient in the world to be treated with partial liquid ventilation. The treatment is performed by Duke Children's critical care physicians.
Duke Children's develops a more efficient, reliable method to screen babies for PKU, a genetic metabolic disease that can retard development. Dr. Joanne Kurtzberg performs the first umbilical cord blood transplant, using the cord blood in place of bone marrow to treat a child with leukemia.
1980s
Dr. Rebecca Buckley pioneers the use of bone marrow transplants to give Severe Combined Immunodeficiency Disease Syndrome (SCIDS) patients a healthy immune system.
Dr. Robert DeLong recommends iodinating water supplies in China to prevent goiter in children.
1970s
Dr. Thomas R. Kinney pioneers a statewide sickle cell screening program that has since been adopted nationally.
1960s
Dr. Alexander Spock pioneers new therapies to treat and ultimately prolong the lives of cystic fibrosis patients.
Dr. Madison Spach performs one of the first pediatric cardiac catheterizations. His research leads to a much better understanding of the function of heart.
1940s
Dr. Jay Arena develops the childproof cap and begins the first poison control movement in the country.
