April 2018
My interest in neonatal renal physiology and injury has been a journey that began during my pediatric residency. It was during my PGY-2 year that I read an article in Pediatrics that discussed the short and long‐term risks of prematurity and chronic kidney disease. While I knew I was headed for a Neonatology fellowship, I approached Dr. David Askenazi at my home institution if there was a project appropriate for a budding Neonatologist with an interest in the kidney. Thus began my journey with AKI in the neonate!
Prior to medical school, I had completed my MPH and worked in a neurology lab. Building on my past interest in neurology, we developed a single-center study evaluting kidney injury in the neonate and its association with intraventricular hemorrhage (IVH), which was published in the journal Neonatology (November 2016). We have since analyzed this same relationship using the Assessment of Worldwide Acute Kidney Injury Epidemiology in Neonates (AWAKEN) study to evaluate this relationship on a multi-center level, which was recently presented at both PAS and SPR (manuscript pending). As lead on my first project, it was a rewarding experience and has further fueled my clinical-research career goals.
Most recently, I have worked with Dr. Askenazi in reducing the burden of nephrotoxic-medication induced AKI in the NICU with our QI project “Baby NINJA”. We recently presented Baby NINJA, Nephrotoxic Injury Negated by Justin-time Action QI Initiative in the NICU, at the most recent AKI & CRRT conference and at PAS this upcoming May. Our future goals are to continue Baby NINJA while incorporating kidney biomarkers in hopes to analyze correlation with serum creatinine.
Overall, I am continually interested in further evaluating the epidemiology of neonatal kidney injury to further link my research interests in nephrology with my clinical focus of neonatology. After graduation I will be joining a university associated private Neonatology group, and look forward to my continued work with Baby NINJA and other neonatal kidney projects.