The Cincinnati Center for Eosinophilic Disorders (CCED), a joint effort between the Divisions of Allergy and Immunology and Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition, has had a year of tremendous growth both in staffing and in clinical services. There was a 7% growth in the number of new families that came to the CCED, and indeed, the CCED drew patients from around the world with 80% of the 380 patients seen coming from outside the Children’s Hospital catchment area. This multidisciplinary, collaborative center utilizes eosinophilic specialists from the Divisions of Allergy, Gastroenterology, Nutrition, Social Work, and Psychology, and Otolaryngology who see these patients and their families in their initial week-long evaluation.
Sean Jameson, as the Program Coordinator, along with Bridget Buckmeier, the Lead Research Coordinator, managed the growth of six new CCED staff, taking the group to ten full-time members. The CCED successfully recruited Dr. James Franciosi, a pediatric gastroenterologist trained at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, who has expertise in eosinophilic gastrointestinal disorders; this allows expansion of the CCED’s capabilities. The CCED has enhanced the services provided to its families with the development of The Eddy project (a patient traveling journal) that is tracked on our website, as well as the development of a weekly “patient education day” for new and existing patients. The CCED has developed the framework for a local family support group which begins in 2008.
During the past fiscal year, the CCED published 17 articles on eosinophils. A recent publication (Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Collins, M., et al. 2008) reported the clinical, pathologic, and molecular characterization of familial Eosinophilic Esophagitis (EE) in 59 members of 26 families. Further, the initial results on the effect of a new biological therapy (Anti-IL-5) for eosinophilic disorders revealed positive findings which has prompted the pharmaceutical industry to conduct large scale clinical trials. This resulted in a recent publication (New England Journal of Medicine, Rothenberg, M. et al. 2008) on the treatment of patients with Hypereosinophilic Syndrome with Mepolizumab. The group continues to work on two investigator initiated studies in which Dr. Marc Rothenberg, CCED Director, holds the Investigational New Drug (IND) file with the Food and Drug Administration; these studies concern mepolizumab and fluticasone). In addition, the CCED has expanded its comprehensive longitudinal database to >1900 patients, including detailed phenotypic data and biologic samples. This database supports a variety of research projects focused on genetics, natural history, molecular pathogenesis, and outcomes research.
