July 2010 Newsletter
Prematurity and Respiratory Outcomes Program (PROP)
The Divisions of Neonatology of the University of Rochester and the State University of New York at Buffalo have joined forces to take research of lung disease and dysfunction associated with premature birth to the next level. They are the joint recipients of a five-year, cooperative U01 grant from the National Institutes of Health, National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, that will make this upstate N.Y. team an integral part of a national network of neonatologists, pulmonologists, epidemiologists, immunobiologists and molecular biologists focused to the premature infant.
The goal of PROP (Prematurity and Respiratory Outcomes Program) is to identify biomarkers and mechanisms responsible for persistent or recurrent symptomatic respiratory disease in the first 12 months following premature birth. The centers in the network will share ideas, plan and carry out nationwide studies for more than 1,000 babies, track their growth, nutrition and respiratory support, enter data into pooled and shared databases, and pilot new approaches to the complications of lung immaturity in the premature infant. The upstate N.Y. center is one of only six which were awarded funding to engage in this research collective.