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For more than a decade, Marlene Rabinovitch has been working to unlock the secrets of a rare condition called pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH). A severe disease marked by high blood pressure in the lungs, PAH can damage the heart and become fatal if left untreated. Using a variety of lab approaches—including genetic analyses, stem cell studies, and mouse models of human disease—Rabinovitch’s lab explores the cellular and molecular underpinnings that lead to the development of this condition, with the goal of preventing or even reversing it. Of particular interest to Rabinovitch: finding therapies that will benefit children as well as adults. Rabinovitch, who is the Dwight and Vera Dunlevie Professor of Pediatrics Cardiology at Stanford University School of Medicine, said that PAH can complicate successful repair of congenital heart disease in children and children do not always respond to therapies used in adults to improve survival and quality of life. Although there currently is no cure for PAH, her research team has identified several promising drug candidates for treating the condition that are undergoing clinical trials. Rabinovitch, who has received multiple grants from NHLBI to study PAH, says that current investigations are leading to different avenues of treatment to reverse the progressive damage to lung blood vessels. And wearing her many hats—she is also the Director of the Basic Science and Engineering Initiative at the Betty Irene Moore Children’s Heart Center at the Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford—she says she hopes to help make that happen.
Learn more about Marlene Rabinovitch, M.D.
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