Browsing by Author "Chaaban, Hala"

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    Biobanking for necrotizing enterocolitis: Needs and standards
    (Elsevier, 2019) Chaaban, Hala; Markel, Troy A.; Canvasser, Jennifer; Good, Misty; Surgery, School of Medicine
    Background Necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC) is a devastating gastrointestinal disease that primarily affects premature infants. Despite medical advances, mortality and morbidity from NEC are still unacceptably high. This is partly because of the lack of specific biomarkers and therapies for this disease. Availability of high-quality biological samples and the associated data from premature infants are key to advance our understanding of NEC, and for biomarker discovery and drug development. To that end, the NEC Society Biorepository was established with the goal of promoting studies in human infants through sharing specialized biospecimen and data procurement for NEC research. Objective In this review, we will discuss the required infrastructure for biobanks, discuss the importance of informatics management, and emphasize the logistical requirements for sharing specimens. Finally, we will discuss the mechanism for how tissues and material will be shared between the institutions. Conclusion We have developed a state-of-the-art biobank for human infants to advance the field of NEC research. With the NEC Society Biorepository, we seek to facilitate and accelerate the basic and translational studies on NEC to provide hope to the infants afflicted with NEC and their families.
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    New directions in necrotizing enterocolitis with early-stage investigators
    (Springer Nature, 2020-08) Markel, Troy A.; Martin, Colin A.; Chaaban, Hala; Canvasser, Jennifer; Tanner, Heather; Denchik, Heather; Good, Misty; Surgery, School of Medicine
    The 2019 Necrotizing Enterocolitis (NEC) Symposium expanded upon the NEC Society's goals of bringing stakeholders together to discuss cutting-edge science, potential therapeutics and preventative measures, as well as the patient-family perspectives of NEC. The Symposium facilitated discussions and shared knowledge with the overarching goal of creating "A World Without NEC." To accomplish this goal, new research to advance the state of the science is necessary. Over the last decade, several established investigators have significantly improved our understanding of the pathophysiology of NEC and they have paved the way for the next generation of clinician-scientists funded to perform NEC research. This article will serve to highlight the contributions of these young clinician-scientists that seek to elucidate how immune, microbial and nervous system dysregulation contributes to the pathophysiology of NEC.
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    Opportunistic dried blood spot sampling validates and optimizes a pediatric population pharmacokinetic model of metronidazole
    (American Society for Microbiology, 2024) Randell, Rachel L.; Balevic, Stephen J.; Greenberg, Rachel G.; Cohen-Wolkowiez, Michael; Thompson, Elizabeth J.; Venkatachalam, Saranya; Smith, Michael J.; Bendel, Catherine; Bliss, Joseph M.; Chaaban, Hala; Chhabra, Rakesh; Dammann, Christiane E. L.; Downey, L. Corbin; Hornik, Chi; Hussain, Naveed; Laughon, Matthew M.; Lavery, Adrian; Moya, Fernando; Saxonhouse, Matthew; Sokol, Gregory M.; Trembath, Andrea; Weitkamp, Joern-Hendrik; Hornik, Christoph P.; Best Pharmaceuticals for Children Act – Pediatric Trials Network Steering Committee; Pediatrics, School of Medicine
    Pharmacokinetic models rarely undergo external validation in vulnerable populations such as critically ill infants, thereby limiting the accuracy, efficacy, and safety of model-informed dosing in real-world settings. Here, we describe an opportunistic approach using dried blood spots (DBS) to evaluate a population pharmacokinetic model of metronidazole in critically ill preterm infants of gestational age (GA) ≤31 weeks from the Metronidazole Pharmacokinetics in Premature Infants (PTN_METRO, NCT01222585) study. First, we used linear correlation to compare 42 paired DBS and plasma metronidazole concentrations from 21 preterm infants [mean (SD): post natal age 28.0 (21.7) days, GA 26.3 (2.4) weeks]. Using the resulting predictive equation, we estimated plasma metronidazole concentrations (ePlasma) from 399 DBS collected from 122 preterm and term infants [mean (SD): post natal age 16.7 (15.8) days, GA 31.4 (5.1) weeks] from the Antibiotic Safety in Infants with Complicated Intra-Abdominal Infections (SCAMP, NCT01994993) trial. When evaluating the PTN_METRO model using ePlasma from the SCAMP trial, we found that the model generally predicted ePlasma well in preterm infants with GA ≤31 weeks. When including ePlasma from term and preterm infants with GA >31 weeks, the model was optimized using a sigmoidal Emax maturation function of postmenstrual age on clearance and estimated the exponent of weight on volume of distribution. The optimized model supports existing dosing guidelines and adds new data to support a 6-hour dosing interval for infants with postmenstrual age >40 weeks. Using an opportunistic DBS to externally validate and optimize a metronidazole population pharmacokinetic model was feasible and useful in this vulnerable population.