September 27, 2019
In This Issue

Research Spotlight: CPCE Faculty Take On Research Leadership Roles

Call for Applications: CPCE is Offering Two T32-Funded Postdoctoral Training Programs

CPCE In the News:
‘Social Jet Lag’ May Contribute to Girls' Weight

Upcoming Events

Recent Publications
CPCE Faculty Take On Research Leadership Roles
CPCE is pleased to share the news that two of our Core Faculty members will take on research leadership roles at CHOP. Brian Fisher, DO, MSCE has been appointed Associate Chair for Research in the Department of Pediatrics, effective October 1, 2019. Joseph St. Geme, MD, Physician-in-Chief and Chair of the Department of Pediatrics, described Dr. Fisher's new role in an e-mail to the CHOP community: 

"Brian will play a key role in overseeing recruitment of research-oriented faculty, development of recruitment packages for research-oriented faculty, and assignment of research space, working closely with leaders in the Research Institute. He will also play a critical role in facilitating research activity in the Department of Pediatrics and supporting achievement of the Division-based research strategic plans. In addition, he will provide oversight for the mentoring program for research-oriented faculty, refining and strengthening this program. He will assume responsibility for co-chairing the Department Research Advisory Committee and co-chairing the Department Faculty Advising Program."
Jeffrey Gerber, MD, PhD, MSCE has been appointed Associate Chief Clinical Research Officer for the CHOP Research Institute. In a separate e-mail to the CHOP community, Chief Clinical Research Officer Richard Aplenc, MD, PhD, MSCE said Dr. Gerber would work with him "in the further development of biostatistics support services in the Research Institute. He will play a central role in the development and implementation of a new Research Institute strategy in epidemiology and health services research, which will include enhanced support and mentorship for clinical epidemiology investigators, particularly junior faculty and instructors."
Call for Applications: CPCE is Offering Two T32-Funded Postdoctoral Training Programs

CPCE is currently accepting applications for two T32-funded postdoctoral training programs for the academic year beginning July 1, 2020. Our training programs value inclusion and diversity, and we encourage applications from pediatricians whose insight and experiences will broaden and hence strengthen the scope and impact of child health research. We believe that pediatric researchers should reflect the diversity of the children in our communities.

  • The Pediatric Hospital Epidemiology and Outcomes Research Training (PHEOT) program trains the next generation of clinical scientists who will understand how to best measure and improve outcomes, assure patient safety, and manage costs for hospitalized children. PHEOT is open to fellows in all clinical specialties, as long as their primary research is in hospital epidemiology and outcomes. 
  • The Academic General Pediatrics (AGP) Fellowship offers research training to address key clinical, health services, and policy issues in primary care pediatrics. The goal of the fellowship is to prepare trainees to improve health and health care for underserved children through primary care research and leadership. Fellows are assigned clinical experiences for up to 10 percent of their time to enhance clinical skills, including skills necessary to work effectively across languages and culture.

Both fellowships typically fund trainees for two years, and include a stipend, tuition support, health insurance benefits, and some support for training related expenses such as books, software, or conference travel. Physicians who are United States citizens or permanent residents and have at least two years of postgraduate training are eligible to apply.

More information about the programs, including how to apply, is available here.
'Social Jet Lag' May Contribute to Girls' Weight

A study conducted outside of CHOP and published in JAMA Pediatrics found that certain sleep patterns were associated with higher fat mass and larger waist circumference in adolescent girls: particularly, evening chronotype, i.e. later bed time and later awakening, and "social jet lag," i.e. difference in sleep mid-point between weekdays and weekends. CPCE Core Faculty member Ariel Williamson, PhD and Director Alexander Fiks, MD, MSCE, along with Jonathan A. Mitchell, PhD, of the CHOP Division of Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition, provided an accompanying editorial. They advocate for further research on interventions to improve sleep duration and timing for the prevention and treatment of adolescent obesity, including the impact of delaying school start times. They also note that earlier sleep onset could further help to improve adolescent weight status. "The tailoring of messages to specific subgroups of adolescents ... may help pediatric clinicians become more effective and efficient in providing advice that addresses the epidemics of poor sleep and obesity in adolescence," they wrote.

Upcoming Events

Grand Rounds: Evidence-Based Practice and Then What? Implementation Science on a Broader Scale
Date: October 2, 2019
Time: 10:30 - 11:30 am
Location: CHOP Main Hospital, Stokes Auditorium
Implementation Science: The Translation Pipeline
Date: October 3, 2019
Time: 11:00 am - 12:00 pm
Location: CHOP Roberts Center for Pediatric Research, Room 1-120A
Automating the right thing to do: Digital Interventions
Date: October 3, 2019
Time: 2:00 - 3:00 pm
Location: CHOP Buerger Center Room 1212/1213
All three of the above events are part of the Ruth M. Colket Visiting Professor Series, which engages nurse and interprofessional colleagues with experts in nursing science. The speaker is Anne Sales, PhD, RN, a recognized expert in health systems learning, and an authority in implementation science. Learn more.

IDWeek 2019
Dates: October 2 - 6, 2019
Location: Walter E. Washington Convention Center, Washington, DC
IDWeek is the joint annual meeting of the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA), Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America (SHEA), the HIV Medical Association (HIVMA), and the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Society (PIDS). Learn more here.

8th Annual Ellen Hyman-Browne Memorial Lecture
Date: October 3, 2019
Time: 4:00 pm
Location: Abramson Research Center, 123-ABC
Robert “Skip” Nelson, M.D., PhD, Senior Director of Pediatric Drug Development (CHILD) and Pediatric Development Team Leader in Immunology at Janssen Pharmaceutical Companies of Johnson & Johnson will present “Accelerating Pediatric Drug Development: Balancing Protection and Access.” Learn more here.

Improving Outcomes in Children with Heart Disease
Date: October 4, 2019
Time: 12:00 - 1:00 pm
Location: Roberts Center, 2nd floor, 2-180
Presented by Michael O'Byrne, MD, MSCE. Please RSVP to CPCE@email.chop.edu.

Global Health in Our Own Backyard: Controversies, Initiatives, and Innovations for Our Local Underserved Populations
Date: October 4-5, 2019.
Location: Colket Translational Research Building
Registration is now open for the 11th Annual CHOP Global Health Conference "Global Health in Our Own Backyard." This Philadelphia-based Conference will explore the intersections between domestic, local and international global pediatric health to better reach the underserved here in the United States. We will take inspiration from innovative programs in the U.S. and from around the world, and think critically about how to apply both South-North and national lessons to provide better, more equitable care in the United States. For more information, click here.

A road to the True North: Innovation that Matters
Date: October 11, 2019
Location: Colonial Penn Center Auditorium, 3641 Locust Walk
Time: 12:00 - 1:20 pm
The Leonard Davis Institute at the University of Pennsylvania hosts Karen Murphy, PhD, RN, executive vice president, chief innovation officer and founding director of the Steele Institute for Healthcare Innovation at Geisinger. Learn more here.

Fighting Asthma Disparities Summit
Date: October 18, 2019
Time: 8:00 AM - 4:30 PM
Location: Roberts Center for Pediatric Research
The 11th Annual Asthma Disparities Summit will explore the benefits and logistics of engaging community-based resources to support families in managing their child’s asthma. Please register by October 10. Learn more here.

Novel methods from behavioral economics and their application to the Habit Formation Trial
Date: October 29, 2019
Time: 12:00 - 1:00 pm
Location: Roberts Center, 2nd floor, 2-180
Sponsored by the CHOP Clinical Trials Research Affinity Group (RAG) and presented by Iwan Barankay, PhD, Associate Professor of Management, Wharton School, and Mary Putt, PhD, ScD, Professor of Biostatistics, Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. Learn more here.

American Public Health Association Annual Meeting & Expo
Dates: November 2-6, 2019
Location: Pennsylvania Convention Center, 1101 Arch St. Philadelphia
APHA's Annual Meeting and Expo is the largest and most influential annual gathering of public health professionals. Learn more here.
Recent Publications

Pulmonary vein stenosis (PVS) in children is a little-understood disorder, and its incidence is around 0.0017 – 0.03%, with most pediatric centers seeing about 2-3 cases per year. Echocardiography is the first-line imaging modality to evaluate patients with suspected PVS, but it is dependent on the skills of the operator, as well as being limited by other conditions in the patient. This study evaluated the diagnostic performance of pulmonary CT angiography (CTA) in children with PVS, as CTA is a little-used alternative to echocardiography. Hansel Otero, MD and colleagues found that CTA is a reliable image technique for ruling in PVS in young children. 

Anticoagulation in children has significant disadvantages, and may negatively affect quality of life (QOL). There are currently no FDA-approved indications for use of anticoagulants in children other than unfractionated heparin and the recently-approved dalteparin sodium, as well as very little research in children for this problem. This manuscript by Andrew Glatz, MD, MSCE and others laid out the methods for a trial to provide preliminary safety and pharmacokinetics data on the prophylactic use of apixaban versus standard of care in the pediatric cardiology population. 

Tetralogy of Fallot (TOF) is the most common cyanotic congenital heart disease, affecting nearly 1,700 children in the United States every year. The best way to treat these patients who are symptomatic in the neonatal period is not yet universally agreed upon. In this study, Jill Savla, MD, Jennifer Faeber, PhD, Yuan-Shung Huang, MS, and Theo Zaoutis, MD, MSCE collaborated with others to compare the outcomes of complete versus staged surgery (i.e. initial palliative procedure for possible later complete repair). They found that complete neonatal repair for TOF is associated with greater early and late adjusted risk for mortality compared with mortality after staged repair and beyond completion of repair.

Consensus guidelines from the Pediatric Infectious Disease Society (PIDS) and the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) recommend obtaining blood cultures in children hospitalized with moderate to severe community-acquired pneumonia (CAP). “Moderate to severe” in these guidelines, however, is not strictly defined. Moreover, characteristics of children at increased risk of bacteremia remain unknown. In this study of generally healthy children hospitalized with CAP, the prevalence of bacteremia was low, and no individual feature or combination of features strongly predicted the presence of bacteremia. Jeff Gerber, MD, PhD, MSCE and colleagues, recommended that the practice of routine performance of blood cultures in children hospitalized in non-ICU setting should therefore be discouraged.  

About CPCE

We are a pediatric research center dedicated to discovering and sharing knowledge about best practices in pediatric care by facilitating, organizing and centralizing the performance of clinical effectiveness research -- research aimed at understanding the best ways to prevent, diagnose and treat diseases in children. CPCE’s multidisciplinary team conducts research on a diverse range of clinical effectiveness topics.

CPCE E-News is edited by Holly Burnside. Please feel free to contact us with questions or feedback.