PLANNING GRANT FOR A MULTIPURPOSE CLINICAL RES CENTER

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This planning grant requests the resources to assist in preparing for a multipurpose clinical research center in rheumatic diseases. The overall goal of this proposal is to promote high quality clinical research in systemic lupus erythematosus, rheumatoid arthritis, inflammatory myositis and Wegener's granulomatosus. The specific plans to accomplish this goal are to identify, consolidate and augment the necessary resources to interconnect our basic science and clinical research areas, to establish a specialized biostatistic and research design core for rheumatic disease research and to create a competitive, unified multipurpose clinical research center application. The strengths of the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation for a planning grant of this nature are multiple. At the forefront is the leadership of Dr. Morris Reichlin as the Program Direct. Dr. Reichlin is recognized as a leader in the study of rheumatic disease autoantibodies and has been committed to rheumatic disease clinical research for decades. Dr. Reichlin leads an Arthritis and Immunology program which is dedicated to and engaged in high-caliber clinical research, especially in the genetics of human SLE, the development and pathogenesis of human lupus and myositis autoantibodies, the role of autoantibodies in pediatric rheumatic disease. The Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation also has world class biomedical/basic science programs in Immunogenetics, Immunobiology and Cardiovascular Biology. Strong institutional support is provided both from the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation and the Oklahoma University Health Sciences Center. Unique opportunities abound in Oklahoma. Our research base is over two-thirds rural in nature, is located in the central region of the United States, and has a high proportion of minority individuals, especially American Indians. This proposal will provide the resources to accomplish the following specific aims: 1) to strengthen the biostastical/research design capabilities and integrate these epidemiologic/biostastical methods into our current human research projects 2) to develop a clinical database to augment our serologic repository, 3) to strengthen and formalize interactions with basic science programs and 4) to better interrelate projects to comprise a clinical research center.