Dr. Naftali Kaminski, director of the Dorothy P. and Richard P. Simmons Center for Interstitial Lung Disease and the Lung, Blood and Vascular Center for Genomic Medicine, and Professor of Medicine, Pathology, Human Genetics and Computational Biology at the University of Pittsburg, will receive the Marvin I. Schwarz Research Award, which recognizes a researcher's commitment to improving the quality of life of those living with IPF through compassionate patient care, education, and support, while leading research efforts to find a cure.  

Kaminski is an internationally recognized IPF expert. As a researcher he pioneered the application of genomic technologies in the study of interstitial lung disease. Among his major discoveries is the finding that a novel group of small molecules called microRNAs are important in IPF ??“ a finding that is likely to lead to new drugs, as well as the identification of proteins in the lung and in the blood that can aid in diagnosing the disease earlier and more accurately.  

As the director of the Simmons Center for Interstitial Lung Disease, Kaminski and his team worked with hundreds of patients suffering from PF, and focused on all aspects of disease, from better diagnosis, easier access to care and research, and improved quality of life.

"Finding answers to PF has been a huge challenge, however the research we have been doing of late has led to important breakthroughs in the understanding of lung fibrosis.  For the sake of our patients, I think that we should now focus on bringing the fruits of these breakthroughs to the clinical arena and to the bedside.  If we focus on doing that ??“ we will have effective therapies that will improve the outcome and quality of life of patients with pulmonary fibrosis much sooner than everybody is expecting," said Kaminski.

SOURCE Coalition for Pulmonary Fibrosis