Our Work

Past

In 2008 - 2009, we helped fund a research project headed by Michael Volk, MD, MSc, of the University of Michigan which measured the public health impact of current Hepatitis C treatments. The study shows that only 7% of the Americans who have hepatitis C have ever been treated for it and discusses the reasons why this figure is so low. It is being used by various groups to advocate for increased hepatitis C funding.

Update: The descriptive study on treatment rates of hepatitis C, titled "Alarming Trend: Antiviral Therapy to Treat Hepatitis C is Declining in the US" was published in the Dec. 2009 issue of Hepatology, the official journal of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases. A press release is available here and more detailed summaries are available at ScienceDaily, EurekAlert, PhysOrg, and the Life Sciences Blog.

Current

One of our goals for this year is to raise enough money to completely cover the salary of a research assistant who has been hired to continue on a study we seeded (for $5,000 in 2010), which is being conducted by Andrew Tai, MD at the University of MI. This study seeks to identify the gene involved in hepatitis C replication and then figure out a way to turn the gene off. This qualifies as a non-Interferon based treatment. We have donated $10,000 so far and intend to donate at least $25,000 more by Dec. 2011.

All viruses are parasites in that they require a host cell to reproduce. Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is no exception to this rule. Indeed, work done by myself and several other groups have shown that literally hundreds of human proteins appear to play important roles in viral entry, replication, and release from liver cells.

My goals are (1) to characterize, at a molecular level, how some of these human proteins help HCV replicate and (2) to continue to identify new proteins that participate in the HCV life cycle. Some of these human proteins may be good targets for drugs that block their ability to help HCV replicate and thus may result in new therapies for HCV infection. One advantage to this strategy is that it may be more difficult for HCV to develop resistance mutations to such drugs compared to drugs that directly target viral proteins.

Future

Future research topics may include optimizing treatment response in clinical practice (for example, research into methods to reduce side effects and to improve dose adherence), evaluation of new treatment strategies (for example, research on impact of weight reduction or treatment of associated metabolic conditions such as insulin resistance on rate of viral decline during antiviral therapy) or introduction of less invasive ways than biopsy to determine progression of the disease. We aim to increase our funding to a level which will allow us to begin supporting promising research at other facilities in addition to the University of Michigan. We have already discussed projects with Baylor and the University of Miami.