TYLER, Texas — UT Tyler received over $200,000 from the National Institutes of Health to research medications and treatments to help people suffering from chest trauma with bleeding and retained clot formation and other types of bleeding.
According to a statement from the university, the project will identify clot-busting agents that can be safely and effectively given to the compartment surrounding the lung to dissolve clots that are big enough to impair the lungs.
Dr. Steven Idell, UT Tyler professor of medicine and senior vice president for research, is serving as the principal investigator for the one-year NIH project.
Idell said this research could benefit people who have chest trauma with bleeding and retained clot formation and other forms of bleeding, including post-surgical bleeding, or coagulation disorders, such as those associated with cancer.
This bleeding may cause hemothorax, which occurs when blood collects in the space between the lung and chest wall (or pleural cavity), Idell said.
“The results will inform dosing in anticipation of clinical trial testing that is currently scheduled to begin early in 2024 and sponsored by the clinical stage start-up company called Lung Therapeutics, Inc.,” said Idell, who is a UT Tyler Health Science Center pulmonary physician and researcher.
Idell has collaborated with NIH for more than 35 years.
Other co-investigators involved in lung/respiratory research are Dr. Ali Azghani, UT Tyler professor of biology; Dr. Andrey Komissarov, UT Tyler professor of cellular and molecular biology; and Dr. Galina Florova, UT Tyler associate professor of cellular and molecular biology.