Susan L. Furth

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Susan L. Furth, MD, PhD

Executive Vice President and Chief Scientific Officer

Dr. Furth's research focuses on defining risk factors for kidney disease progression in children; characterizing the effect of kidney function decline on neurodevelopment, cognitive abilities and behavior; identifying the prevalence and evolution of cardiovascular disease risk factors, and examining the effects of declining glomerular filtration rate on children’s growth.

Pediatric Center of Excellence in Nephrology

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Bio

Dr. Furth is the principal investigator of the East Coast Coordinating Center for the Chronic Kidney Disease in Children study (CKiD), a role she has held since 2003. In that role she leads a multidisciplinary team in protocol design, and the coordination of recruitment and retention of study participants. She also oversees the quality of data collection at the sites, data analyses reviews, and manuscript writing for the study.

Dr. Furth has held multiple leadership roles on other projects as well. She serves as the PI representing CKiD in the NIH-supported BioCon consortium studying biomarkers of chronic kidney disease progression across multiple adult and pediatric CKD cohort studies. She is the PI for the NIDDK-funded Pediatric Center of Excellence in Nephrology. This study promotes and develops clinical trial research with a focus on pediatric nephrology. The study’s goals include strengthening research, accelerating implementation of clinical trials, and serving as a resource to all clinicians, researchers and investigators working in pediatric nephrology. Dr. Furth oversees the operations of the center, leads meetings of the scientific advisory core, and oversees the use of each of the biomedical cores the pilot and feasibility program, the enrichment core, and the progress of the research projects.

Additionally, she has been the PI of several patient outcomes research projects focusing on the effectiveness of treatment for children with CKD and end-stage renal disease and has studied behavioral determinants and quality of life outcomes.

Among Dr. Furth’s notable career accomplishments are the:

Documentation of the rates of kidney disease progression, development of comorbid conditions, and underlying genetic factors contributing to CKD in children
Development of accurate and precise estimating formulas to assess kidney function in chronic kidney disease