Jacobs School Leads the Way at Pulmonology Conference

By Keith Gilogly

In addition to presenting numerous abstracts and chairing a symposium session, researchers from the school earned a scholarship award for the third year in a row recognizing an outstanding research abstract.

The conference, held in Orlando, Fla., from May 15 to 21, is the largest worldwide meeting focused on lung disease and critical care medicine, says Francois Fadell, MD, MBA, associate professor of medicine.

Fadell leads a pulmonary and critical care medicine working group composed of himself, two fellows, and nine internal medicine residents, many of whom attended this year’s ATS conference.

Typically, a school or research group might present two or three abstracts at the conference — not so for the Jacobs School.

“Fourteen abstracts from one institution presented by one group and co-authored by those nine residents, two fellows, and one faculty is exceptional. It’s not the usual,” says Fadell, who is also associate program director of the internal medicine residency program.

With close to 7,000 abstracts accepted to the conference, only about the top 3 percent win a scholarship award, Fadell says. The Jacobs School winning abstract was titled “A Real-World Comparison of Dupilumab and Mepolizumab in Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease Patients With Type 2 Inflammation: Impact on Healthcare Utilization and Outcomes.”

Dupilumab has already been established to treat COPD, but mepolizumab was approved only a few months ago, Fadell says. “ATS found this really innovative because it’s new. They don’t have head-to-head comparisons of those two medications,” he says.

The scholarship award recognized all who contributed to the abstract, while the submitting author, pulmonary disease and critical care fellow Yu-Che Lee, MD, received paid travel to the conference. 

Much of all the abstracts’ research data came from the TriNetX health care database and from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s NHANES, or National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, Fadell says.

He adds that Raphael Fraser, PhD, and Rebekah J. Walker, PhD, Jacobs School faculty from the Department of Medicine’s Division of Population Health, provided support and essential statistics analysis.

The additional abstracts and research presented by the UB team covered a range of pulmonology and disease topics, from biologics to pulmonary hypertension to COVID-19 to social determinants of health to medical education.

One of the group’s abstracts, titled “Impact of Climate Change Skepticism on ILD-Related Mortality in the US,” discussed how climate change skepticism may correlate with distrusting scientific health recommendations, leading to more inflammatory lung conditions and increased COPD mortality.

Another abstract, “Rapid Response and Code Simulation Education for Internal Medicine Interns,” explored how simulation training can enhance first-year internal medicine residents’ objective performance and confidence handling resuscitation and hospital emergencies.

At the conference, Jacobs School internal medicine resident Robert Ranger, MD, shared research on proton pump inhibitors and mortality rates in idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis patients.

“One of the most valuable aspects of attending ATS was the opportunity to engage with leaders in pulmonary and critical care medicine from around the world,” he says. “Exposure and opportunity to present research, network and establish mentorship for professional development is very important in our early careers.”

For first-year resident Sharif Abbas, MD, seeking expert feedback was invaluable. Some of Abbas’ shared research looked at how certain drugs affected COVID-19 pneumonia mortality rates.

“One of the most valuable aspects about my participation in ATS was the ability to obtain feedback from experts in pulmonary, critical care, and sleep medicine. Being the largest thoracic diseases conference worldwide, ATS helped expose me to cutting-edge research and emerging therapies that will shape the future of our practice.” 

Second-year resident Paige Baez, MD, was co-author on all the accepted abstracts and presented the winning abstract comparing dupilumab and mepolizumab at the conference.

“For me, this was the first research conference I attended,” Baez says. “It was a very inspiring event to see so many like-minded physicians and professionals there not only to present research but to learn. It really reminded me how much this profession values lifelong learning.”

Also at the conference, Fadell chaired a symposium session titled “Pulmonary Rehabilitation in Non-COPD Patients: Updates on the Evidence, Clinical Indications and Physiology.”

Building on research shared at the conference last year, Fadell and collaborators from partnering universities presented the latest on pulmonary rehabilitation and breathing exercises that reduce COPD mortality and could benefit patients with other lung diseases.