Research Description
In the era of precision medicine, we hope to tailor diabetes treatment according to a patient’s genetic profile. A deeper understanding of the role of genetics is needed to personalize treatment, maximize efficacy, and reduce the risk of side effects. The overall goal of this study is to recruit individuals with different genetic predispositions to developing type 2 diabetes, recall them for physiologic testing, such as measuring glucose and hormone levels following a short course of a recently approved antidiabetic drug, called SGLT2 inhibitors. We hope to determine whether a patient's genetic profile influences their response to this drug. We also aim to assess whether the clinical benefits of SGLT2 inhibitors on glucose control, cardiovascular outcomes, and renal outcomes differ by a patient's genetic risk for developing diabetes-related complications through examining the electronic health records of patients followed within a healthcare system. Achieving the proposed aims will help develop precision medicine approaches in diabetes treatment and demonstrate how genetics can identify patients most likely benefit from SGLT2 inhibitor therapy.Research Profile
What area of diabetes research does your project cover? What role will this particular project play in preventing, treating and/or curing diabetes?The area of diabetes research that my project covers is pharmacogenetics of sodium-glucose transporter-2 inhibitors. My project will deepen our understanding of the role of genetics in diabetes drug response and the use of genetic information to identify patients with type 2 diabetes who have a high genetic risk for developing diabetes-related complications. The long-term goal of my project is to advance personalized patient care and develop novel strategies for precision medicine in type 2 diabetes.
If a person with diabetes were to ask you how your project will help them in the future, how would you respond?My research project will help healthcare providers and patients select treatment options that are most likely to offer benefit in terms of glucose control and long-term complications of diabetes based on an individual's unique genetic and metabolic profile.
Why important for you, personally, to become involved in diabetes research? What role will this award play?As an endocrinologist, I provide care for patients with diabetes. I am deeply moved by the lives and stories of my patients. A large part of my clinical practice is walking with my patients through the many challenges of living with diabetes, navigating the complexity of the disease, and confronting the obstacles in our social and healthcare systems. This experience has motivated me to play an active role in advancing science with the ultimate goal of improving the clinic care and outcomes of the next patient that I see in my clinic. This award will support my research in understanding the role of genetics in diabetes physiology, drug actions and effects, and developing precision medicine approaches to diabetes care.
In what direction do you see the future of diabetes research going?We have a wealth of clinical information available to us in healthcare for research. In the not too distant future, we will likely have genetic information as well. We are poised to integrate and make sense of big data to address biological research questions as well as clinical questions in diabetes. The use of real-world clinical data for research will likely accelerate translational science and implementation science to bridge the gap between "bench" and "bedside."