Translational Research Symposium Speaker Spotlight - Prof Helen Dewey

Professor Helen Dewey

Monash University's 3rd annual Translational Research Symposium is being hosted by its three metropolitan clinical schools on 31 July 2017. The symposium will host a diverse group of medical researchers presenting their work into translational research. RSVP here.

Professor Helen Dewey is the Director of Neurosciences at Eastern Health Clinical School.

Video of the week: Translational research at Monash University

What is translational research? Monash University's three heads of its metropolitan based clinical schools talk about translational medical research, how it works, why Monash is equipped to deliver it so well and the support offered to graduate students starting out on this career path. Prof Eric Morand is Head of School of Clinical Sciences at Monash Health, Prof Stephen Jane is Head of Central Clinical School and Prof Ian Davis is Head of Eastern Health Clinical School. See more:

• Translational Research education: www.med.monash.edu.au/cecs/education/translational/
• Central Clinical School: www.med.monash.edu.au/cecs/ 
• Eastern Health Clinical School: www.med.monash.edu.au/ehcs/ 
• School of Clinical Sciences at Monash Health: www.med.monash.edu.au/scs/

Reducing cardiac fibrosis

By Dr Jodie Abramovitch

Cardiac fibrosis (scarring) causes the heart to become stiff which affects the ability of the heart to function normally. Cardiac fibrosis can lead to heart failure and is associated with a range of health problems including hypertension, diabetes and obesity.

Dr Anthony Dear

A new class of therapeutics used to treat diabetes, known as glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor (GLP-1R) agonists, help regulate glucose levels in the body. There is evidence that some GLP-1R agonists are able to improve vascular disease in mouse models.

Monash researchers from the Eastern Health Clinical School and the Department of Pharmacology, overseen by Dr Anthony Dear (also associated with the Australian Centre for Blood Diseases) have investigated the effect of a GLP-1R agonist on cardiac fibrosis in a number of different pathological settings.  The recently published work showed that mice with hypertension, obesity, or age induced cardiac fibrosis had reduced evidence of cardiac fibrosis following treatment with a GLP-1R agonist, regardless of diabetic status. Furthermore, reduced levels of inflammatory markers were found within the hearts of treated animals. This reduction in inflammation may be the mechanism behind the observed reduction in cardiac fibrosis.

These results show that GLP-1R agonists may have success in treating cardiac fibrosis, regardless of pathological cause (i.e. hypertension, obesity or age), in humans.

Reference: Gaspari T, Brdar M, Lee HW, Spizzo I, Hu Y, Widdop RE, Simpson RW, Dear AE. Molecular and cellular mechanisms of glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonist-mediated attenuation of cardiac fibrosis. Diab Vasc Dis Res. 2016 Jan: 13;56-68.
doi: 10.1177/1479164115605000.

Professor Ian Davis: Cancer: I used to understand it. Find out more on 30 Sep 2015

Professor Ian Davis is a medical oncologist and is Professor of Medicine and Head of the Eastern Health Clinical School, Monash University and Eastern Health, in Melbourne, Australia. He will be speaking at the forthcoming 30 Sept Translational Research symposium hosted by Central Clinical School. See detail below.