Inside Pediatrics Fall/Winter 2024

PULMONOLOGY

DRIVE FOR THE 5% DEVELOPING TREATMENTS

FOR THE MOST SEVERE CYSTIC FIBROSIS CASES

T he evolution of cystic fibrosis (CF) life expectancy for patients skyrocketing from early teens in the 1970s to well over 50 years today. But Children’s of Alabama specialists continue dogged efforts to help the 5% of CF patients who don’t qualify for or respond to groundbreaking disease-modulating drugs— which Children’s faculty helped develop and test—that have transformed CF treatment over recent years. University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) Cystic Fibrosis Therapeutics Development Center—a joint pediatric and adult endeavor—boasts more than 25 years of prominence in CF research. Nationally recognized as one of the top centers of its kind, it’s one of only 13 national resource centers for the more than 90 clinical trial centers that comprise the CF Clinical Trials Network. treatment is considered one of the major success stories in medicine, with average Co-directed by Isabel Virella-Lowell, M.D., and George “Marty” Solomon, M.D., the

5% CLINICAL TRIALS AND RESEARCH COULD HELP THE

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