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Novel research to advance medical knowledge

Advancement through partnership

Over the years, individuals from Carilion and Virginia Tech have partnered many times to advance medical care. For example, Paul Estabrooks, associate professor of human nutrition, foods and exercise, leads Virginia Tech's translational obesity research program at Carilion's Riverside facility in Roanoke, Va. He has designed a weight-loss study funded by a $2.5 million, five-year grant from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases. This important project uses financial incentives and environmental changes to encourage healthy behaviors among employees at businesses with fewer than 500 employees. Additionally, with funding from the Carilion Research Acceleration Program (RAP), Estabrooks and Elena Serrano, also an associate professor of human nutrition, foods, and exercise at Virginia Tech, are working with Carilion Clinic Pediatrician Mike Hart on a new childhood overweight and obesity study.

RAP has also funded Carilion Clinic-Virginia Tech partnerships to improve early diagnosis of developmental disorders in children and to create IT-based training tools for interns, for instance. A number of recent efforts are featured on the Virginia Tech Carilion Research Institute website.

New research foundations

Virginia Tech and Carilion Clinic are delighted that these individual practitioner and researcher partnerships are now being expanded by the Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine and Research Institute (VTC) enterprise. A number of seed grants from the VTC Research Institute support collaborative research on medical challenges that include heart care, cancer, infectious disease, obesity, and technology development. For instance, the researchers and clinicians are studying water-only fasting in hypertensive, obese adults; screening and intervening to reduce cardiovascular risks during pregnancy; and early defects in immunosurveillance mechanisms during ovarian cancer progression. 

That is just the beginning. VTC will fuel robust research that will extend from the laboratory to the bedside and practitioners' offices -- translational medicine for every day issues.

Student researchers

And VTC researchers will mentor students, tomorrow's physician-researchers.

Indeed it is the vision of the VTC Research Institute that all investigators – researchers, clinicians, and students – be partners in the work to understand the molecular basis for health and disease and to develop diagnostic tools, treatments, and therapies that will contribute to preventing and solving existing and emerging problems in contemporary medicine.

VTC School of Medicine students, who are partnering with clinicians as they help patients, are an important resource for the research institute's mission to be a premier institute of interdisciplinary and translational research within the medical sciences. And the VTC Research Institute will support Carilion Clinic's training needs for residency and fellowship programs and collaborate with the Carilion Clinic in support of the strategic growth of clinical specialty programs.

In keeping with the Virginia Tech and Carilion Clinic collaborations of the past, we are confident of a productive and highly interactive relationship across disciplines and between school and institute faculty members enhanced by partnerships to mentor students.

Facilities and faculty

Further, VTC will enhance the exceptional educational and research opportunities with world-class facilities and top-notch faculty.

With input from some 50 scientists from many disciplines, the physical plant will be flexible and facilitate opportunities for interactions among investigators. VTC's Roanoke campus, which will be ready by August 2010, is adjacent to an existing Virginia Tech research center and a new clinical facility, and close to Carilion Roanoke Memorial Hospital.

The research institute's approximately 75,000 square feet of research and office space will accommodate up to 42 research groups. Seasoned faculty members with proven track records in top quality research, publications, and teaching will be the first hires to enable VTC to become quickly self-sustaining. Clinicians will also maintain laboratories within the institute. The collaborative environment between basic and clinical researchers created by VTC provides critical interdisciplinary opportunities for novel research and education.

We have every reason to look forward to a creative and productive research and learning environment and are excited about the benefits to patient health care to come soon.