Dr. Michelle Hernandez leads asthma research in rural areas
As director of the N.C. Child Health Research Network, she’s making access to care and research studies easier for all.
Dr. Michelle Hernandez is a pediatric allergist and immunologist at the UNC School of Medicine and director of the N.C. Child Health Research Network. She is working to make access to asthma care and research studies easier for everyone, especially those living in rural areas.
“This work is in honor of my dad, who passed away due to complications from an asthma attack in 2022,” she says. “I believe his type of asthma was influenced by a protein that I’m now studying. That’s why I’m in it.”
Hernandez believes advanced treatments, such as injectable medications, play a crucial role in significantly improving the quality of life for patients with difficult-to-treat asthma. In her lab, she is testing therapeutic interventions aimed at reducing inflammation caused by environmental allergens and air pollution.
“There are gaps in the different types of asthma that people experience for which we don’t have effective medications,” she says. “I want to provide access to clinical trials so we can explore more options for these individuals.”
Impact Report
UNC Children’s lung disease program is consistently recognized as one of the country’s best by U.S. News & World Report on its “America’s Best Children’s Hospitals” list.
Asthma is a chronic respiratory condition that impacts nearly 25 million Americans, including about 5 million children, according to the CDC. The N.C. Department of Health and Human Services reports that about 8% of adults and 10% of children in North Carolina are affected by this condition.
Identifying triggers
Asthma is a chronic lung disease that can lead to episodes of wheezing, chest tightness, breathlessness and coughing. Asthma attacks are the leading cause of missed school or work for children and young adults, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Hernandez’s research explores therapeutic strategies to combat inflammation caused by environmental exposures. For Hernandez, this issue is personal; her father developed asthma after being exposed to lead-based paint without protection while painting buses during his military service in the Korean War.
In her lab, she is studying a protein known as Interleukin-1, which helps the immune system fight off infections and injuries. But, in asthma patients, this protein can worsen inflammation by sending signals that cause the airways to become swollen and narrowed, making it difficult to breathe. Currently, Hernandez is conducting a study that investigates repurposing medications that block Interleukin-1 to treat asthma.
Rural research
Hernandez noticed that she was getting a lot of referrals from pediatric pulmonologists in southeastern North Carolina. When she and her colleagues looked at the data, they became aware of a troubling trend — kids with asthma in this region were being hospitalized at higher rates than the statewide average.
“I knew that if we wanted to get community members who are most impacted by asthma to be involved in research studies, then we needed to build a clinical research unit down there,” she says.
This desire to bring research opportunities to patients motivated her to apply for a $500,000 research grant to reduce health disparities for children with asthma and establish a research infrastructure on the coast.
Hernandez received the funding and launched a joint project led by Novant Health and the UNC School of Medicine focused on treatments for patients with pediatric asthma. For this project, she and her colleagues are visiting primary care clinics in southeastern N.C. to recruit and onboard study participants.
The goal is to enable asthma patients to participate in research projects at their primary care clinics, eliminating the need to travel to research sites outside their local communities.
“The primary care physician is someone the patient already knows and trusts. And at the end of the day, it’s all about trust. We have to gain it, and then we have to make sure that we don’t dishonor it.”
