Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC Named a Center of Excellence by Food Allergy Research & Education

Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC has been named a center of excellence by Food Allergy Research & Education, which has established the FARE Clinical Network, an initiative that aims to accelerate the development of drugs for patients with food allergies as well as improve the quality of care for this serious illness. Children’s Hospital is one of 22 centers named as inaugural members.

FARE Clinical Network members will serve as sites for clinical trials for the development of new therapeutics and will develop best practices for the care of patients with food allergies. The Network will serve as a powerful driver of collaboration to advance the field of food allergy, with member centers contributing to the development of a national food allergy patient registry and biorepositories.

“We were honored to be invited to apply for membership with the FARE Clinical Network and to receive designation as a FARE Clinical Network Center of Excellence,” said Todd D Green, M.D., Division of Pulmonary Medicine, Allergy and Immunology, Children’s Hospital. “This will be a great opportunity for food-allergic patients and their families in our region and will allow us to collaborate with other top food allergy centers on maximizing the quality of care these patients receive, as well as to participate in more multicenter research studies.”

Participation in the FARE Clinical Network will ensure that Children’s remains on the forefront of efforts to improve the quality of life for food-allergic individuals as they work toward development of potential new treatments.

“We need to push for the development of drugs and other therapies to prevent life-threatening food allergy reactions, while ensuring that children and adults with food allergy receive the best care possible,” said James R. Baker, Jr., M.D., C.E.O. and chief medical officer of FARE. “To that end, FARE will direct the Clinical Network centers of excellence across the country to a common goal of ensuring that patients with food allergies have access to state-of-the-art diagnosis, treatments and research. We will continue to expand the number of centers to provide access to more patients. This effort is fundamental to our mission — to improve the quality of life and the health of individuals with food allergies while providing them hope through the promise of new treatments.”

In addition to Children’s, the inaugural members of the FARE Clinical Network are:

• Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago
• Arkansas Children’s Hospital Research Institute
• Boston Children’s Hospital
• Children’s Hospital Colorado
• Children’s Mercy Kansas City
• Children’s National Health System
• Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center
• Jaffe Food Allergy Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai
• Joe DiMaggio Children’s Hospital – a facility of Memorial Healthcare System
• MassGeneral Hospital for Children
• National Jewish Health (Denver)
• Rady Children’s Hospital/University of California, San Diego
• Riley Hospital for Children at IU Health
• Sean N. Parker Center for Allergy Research at Stanford University
• Texas Children’s Hospital Food Allergy Program, Baylor College of Medicine
• The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia
• The Northwest Asthma and Allergy Center (Seattle)
• The University of Chicago Medicine
• UNC Food Allergy Initiative at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
• University of Arizona College of Medicine – Tucson
• UT Southwestern Medical Center and Children’s Medical Center Dallas

The centers of excellence selected as part of the FARE Clinical Network provide high-quality clinical and subspecialty food allergy expertise and services and are focused on applying new evidence-based knowledge to this important field. Additionally, these centers meet high standards for clinical care, teaching and clinical research.

Andrea Kunicky, 412-692-6254, andrea.kunicky@chp.edu
Marc Lukasiak, 412-692-7919, marc.lukasiak@chp.edu