TYLER, Texas — Medical professionals in East Texas are working every day to fight COVID-19, not just for the region, but for the world.
Important research at the UT Health Science Center at Tyler may provide doctors another weapon to add to their COVID-19 arsenal.
Dr. Anna Kurdowska is a cellular molecular biologist working at the UT Health Science Center in Tyler. Recently, her work has garnered interest as a potential COVID-19 treatment.
Dr. Kurdowska and her research partner Jon Florence have done extensive research on treatment for acute lung injury, often a symptom in severe COVID-19 cases, using BTK inhibitors.
"The fact that COVID-19 causes some form of acute lung injury made it very attractive to look at BTK treatments." Dr. Kurdowska said.
Dr. Kurdowska’s research has shown BTK inhibitors to have a positive impact on acute lung injuries.
“Treated subjects would have normal lung function and basically the lungs were completely healthy after the treatment,” Dr. Kurdowska said.
BTK is a protein involved in a patient's body's production of cytokine, which causes inflammation.
“Normal levels of cytokines are essential because they regulate things like fever. We know fever is critical for us to fight the infection," Dr. Kurdowska explained. "But if we have too much of a good thing, there is too much inflammation and we have problems. In our public studies, we're able to show that these cytokines go down in treated subjects.”
Patients with severe cases of COVID-19 often have high levels of cytokine, inspiring doctors to turn to Kurdowska’s research as a potential treatment.
Dr. Suman Sinha, Chief of Pulmonary Medicine at Christus Trinity Mother Frances, says his hospital is already considering utilizing BTK inhibitors.
“We are considering using it in the very near future,” Dr. Sinha said, “If it shows a promise in mechanistically addressing one of the problems that we find in sepsis associated with the COVID-19 disease, then protocols can be written in which those drugs can be used in what we call an off label manner.”
Kurdowska says she has been in contact with several groups who began testing BTK inhibitors as a COVID-19 treatment. They recommend moving forward with trials.