Related Links

Herman B Wells Center for Pediatric Research
Indiana Children's Health Services Research
Indiana Pediatric Research Network (PResNet)

About Pediatrics Research

The Department of Pediatrics research program has expanded dramatically during the past decade with total external funding of $27 million last year. In 2007, IUSM ranked #8 in NIH funding ($16.6 million) relative to other pediatric departments. Other academic departments that have large NIH research funded programs at Riley Hospital include Child Psychiatry, Pediatric ENT and Genetics. If NIH funding in other academic departments at Riley Hospital were included, the total funding would be $26.2 million which would place Riley #4 in funding among “free-standing children’s hospitals”.

Bench research occurs in the Herman B Wells Center for Pediatric Research. Since the Wells Center opened in 1991, it has undergone major space expansions in 1997 and in 2003. In 2008, an additional 6,000 sq ft of bench laboratory space was made available for the development of the new type I diabetes basic research program. The Wells Center will again expand in 2009/2010 when the new IUSM Research III Building is completed. The Wells Center space will approximate 55,000 sq ft of “wet lab” space in addition to faculty and staff offices, core facilities, auditorium, restrooms, and conference rooms (>120,000 gross sq ft). Dr. Mervin Yoder, the Director of the Wells Center and the Associate Chair for Basic Research, plans to expand existing programs and to develop the areas of neuroscience, translational research (with Dr. Denne) and molecular medicine.

Major NIH funded programs in the Wells Center include gene therapy, hematopoietic stem cell transplantation, comparative stem cell biology, developmental hematology and immunology, cardiac developmental biology, molecular oncology and pulmonary biology. A type I diabetes basic research program has just been initiated with $12 million of support and the recent recruitment of a new senior faculty leader. The Pediatric Department/Wells Center faculty are principal investigators on 4 NIH Program Project and U-Grants. The majority of the Wells Center researchers have secondary appointments in basic science departments. Many are members of the IU Simon Cancer Center or other Centers at IUSM.

The Department of Pediatrics has large externally funded (NIH, CDC, AHRQ, HRSA, etc.) clinical and translational research programs in the following areas: 1) adolescent medicine/sexually transmitted diseases; 2) health service research; 3) NICHD neonatal clinical trials network; 4) Type I diabetes TrialNET and 5) NCI Children’s Oncology Group. The Adolescent Medicine Section has approximately $3 million per year in federal research funding. The faculty in Adolescent Medicine hold 5 RO1s and 2 mentored research awards, serve as PIs on STD Center Projects/Cores and participate in 2 national research centers including the adolescent NIH Trials Network. Adolescent Medicine and the Children’s Health Services Research Program are based in the new IUSM Health Information and Translational Sciences (HITS) Building. The Children’s Health Services Research Program has seven general pediatric research faculty; 85% of their salaries, fringe benefits and research costs are covered by external grants and contracts. The areas of research include; 1) the use of information technology to improve knowledge of children’s health care and quality of health services; 2) disseminating research through health policy research, clinical policy analysis and advocacy; 3) services for vulnerable children—children with special health care needs, children in poverty, and children facing social and cultural barriers; 4) community pediatrics and Medical Home; and 5) practice based research network.

Our Neonatology Section has 42 faculty, 12 of whom are PIs on NIH grants and 11 faculty serve on NIH study sections. Our neonatal group has participated in the NICHD Neonatal Clinical Trials Network since the Network was founded.

Our Pediatric Endocrinology and Diabetes section has more than 40 ongoing clinical research studies with external funding from the NIH, March of Dimes and the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. Our diabetes program has ongoing clinical research in the following areas: 1) NIH type 1 diabetes TrialNet study; 2) immunomodulation in new onset type 1 diabetes; 3) insulin infusion pumps in children with type 1 diabetes; 4) evaluation of health surveillance in type 1 diabetes; 5) adolescent transition study; 6) utility of new technology in the daily management of type 1 diabetes; and 7) type 1 diabetes genetics consortium. In addition to the areas of clinical research related to diabetes, the section has ongoing externally funded clinical research programs in metabolic bone disease, hypothyroidism, Crohn’s disease, precocious puberty, congenital adrenal hyperplasia and Turner’s syndrome.

The Hematology/Oncology Section annually enters approximately 200 children newly diagnosed with cancer into clinical research studies through the NCI Children’s Oncology Group (COG), ranking the IUSM/Riley Pediatric Cancer Program #4 nationally in patient accrual to clinical trials in the Children’s Oncology Group. The faculty are active participants and serve in leadership roles in the NIH funded Indiana University Simon Cancer Center. Riley is one of two sites in the world with federal funding for Phase II clinical trials for new chemotherapeutic treatments for plexiform neurofibromas. Riley is one of 21 centers in the country funded by the NCI to conduct Phase I clinical trials in pediatric oncology.

The Pediatric Gastroenterology Section has more than $1 million in external research funding. The group participates in multicenter research studies of pediatric non-alcoholic steatohepatitis, hepatitis C, biliary atresia, cystic fibrosis liver disease, acute liver failure, Inflammatory Bowel Disease, and eosinophillic esophagitis. Several of these studies are NIH funded including translational research on energy metabolism in Inflammatory Bowel Disease.

In 2007, the department made a $6 million commitment to significantly expand NIH supported clinical and translational research. Scott Denne is the director of this program and Associate Chair for Clinical Research. An Advisory Committee has been named and research nurses hired; an infrastructure has been put in place for IRB and administrative support and for a pilot funding program. Space has been allocated to this program and recruitment of clinical investigators is underway. A protocol Development Team has been put in place to interface with basic and clinical scientists to design and implement high quality, feasible, fundable clinical/ translational research projects. Scott Denne is Co-PI and five other pediatric faculty have majors roles in the new NIH funded Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA).

There is a long history of highly productive collaboration between the faculty in the Department of Pediatrics and faculty in other departments in the School of Medicine and in other schools within Indiana University and Purdue University, including the Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering.