UAMS Receives $2.2 Million NIH Award: Studying How to Prevent Ventilator-Associated Pneumonia
The University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS), in Little Rock, Pulaski County, Arkansas, announced on November 4 that it has received a five-year, $2,228,500 research award from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to study how ventilator-associated pneumonia develops and how it might be prevented. The funding comes through the NIH Director's New Innovator Award program (award DP2A1200953), supported by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, which backs early-career investigators pursuing innovative ideas.
The project is led by Clay Jackson-Litteken, an assistant professor of microbiology and immunology. His team will focus on Acinetobacter baumannii, a bacterium that persists in hospital environments and frequently develops antibiotic resistance, examining how it goes on to cause pneumonia in intubated patients.
Ventilator-associated pneumonia is among the most difficult hospital-acquired infections in intensive care. Nearly half of patients placed on ventilators develop the infection: the breathing tube that keeps patients alive also gives bacteria a pathway into the lower airways, and the organisms involved are often drug-resistant, leaving clinicians with limited treatment options and prolonging hospital stays.
Jackson-Litteken's approach includes building infection models that better reflect clinical conditions and exploring ways to intervene at the level of the endotracheal tube itself, blocking bacterial colonization and invasion before pneumonia takes hold. The team hopes the work will yield prevention strategies that can be put into practice at the bedside.
UAMS is Arkansas's only academic medical center. The university said the federal award will sustain the laboratory's work in this area over the next five years and support the training of researchers in the field.
(Source: University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences)
Source: University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 阿肯色医科大学地区中心（资料图）。图片来自 Wikimedia Commons，CC BY-SA 4.0。 / A UAMS regional center (file photo). Image via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.
