printable versionNew pulmonary biology center opens at Packard Children’s
BY KRISTA CONGER
David Cornfield
David Cornfield, MD, knows exactly where he was when he first heard the news that the cystic fibrosis gene had been discovered.
"It was 1989, and I was in my car driving from Kansas City to Denver for a fellowship in pediatric pulmonology and critical care medicine," he recalled. "I spent the remainder of the trip thinking about what the discovery might mean to my career."
Like many physicians and scientists at the time, Cornfield, who is the first holder of the Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professorship in Pediatric Pulmonary Medicine, expected the cystic fibrosis finding to usher in a host of effective gene-based treatments or maybe even a cure for the deadly condition. If so, he'd have to adjust his research focus and his concept of cutting-edge clinical care. Although logical, his musings turned out to be way off track: Seventeen years later, there's still no cure for cystic fibrosis patients, though the future has brightened considerably.
Progress at this pace isn't nearly enough for Cornfield. He's pinning his hopes on Lucile Packard Children's Hospital's just-launched Center of Excellence for Pulmonary Biology, which includes pulmonary, allergy, asthma and critical care medicine. Cornfield will serve as the director of the new center, which brings together experts in disparate fields to cultivate novel approaches and new ideas for cystic fibrosis and other pulmonary disorders.
"There is a tremendous blurring of what we used to think of as very distinct disciplines," said Cornfield, who arrived at Packard Children's in November 2005 to serve as director of its Pulmonary Care and Cystic Fibrosis Center of Excellence and its chief of pediatric pulmonary medicine. "Scientists can now be both biologists and chemists, for example. I'm convinced that true research and clinical progress occurs where the margins of these disciplines intersect." Cornfield hosted an on-campus retreat June 8 for faculty and staff involved in the new center. They're setting the bar high.
"Good enough is not good enough when it comes to clinical care," said Cornfield. "It's very easy to be satisfied with 'the best that you can do.' But as physicians and researchers at an academic medical center, we have a responsibility to push the limits." To accomplish this, the center will focus its efforts on advancing research, clinical practice and education in pulmonary biology and critical care medicine.
"A baby's first breath is a miracle," said Cornfield, "when the lungs go from being almost vestigial in the fetus to fully functional, life-giving organs within a few seconds. We want to know what prepares them to undertake this great mission, understand why and how things sometimes go wrong."
Cornfield's appetite for rapid clinical advances was whetted during his fellowship at the University of Colorado School of Medicine and subsequent faculty positions at the University of Minnesota Medical School. Although he believes that medical progress is more likely to be incremental than monumental, he and his colleagues are not willing to sit around and wait for it to happen. "I want our reach to always just exceed our grasp," said Cornfield. "We should strive to be creatively uncomfortable."