HJAR May/Jun 2023

HEALTHCARE JOURNAL OF ARKANSAS I  MAY / JUN 2023 43 For weekly eNews updates and to read the journal online, visit HealthcareJournalAR.com Manar Ibrahim, MD Samina Nadvi, MD Mercy Fort Smith Pediatricians Join AutismScreening Program Three pediatricians at Mercy Fort Smith recently joined the CoBALT Project, an Arkansas-based program that screens children for developmen- tal disorders such as autism. Anne Eckes, MD, Manar Ibrahim, MD, and Sam- ina Nadvi, MD, have completed training with the Community-Based Autism Liaison and Treatment Project (CoBALT), joining 17 other providers at eight locations across the state where families can get care for their child quickly and closer to home. The pediatricians at Mercy Clinic Pediat- rics – Tower West in Fort Smith are the only three who are providing services through the CoBALT Project in the River Valley. CoBalt is a joint venture between the Univer- sity of Arkansas Medical Sciences Department of Pediatrics and the Arkansas Department of Human Services Division of Developmental Dis- abilities – Children with Special Care Needs. The CoBALT project is designed for children between 12 and 42 months, and a referral is needed from the child’s primary care physician to access services. “Drs. Eckes, Ibrahim, and Nadvi have worked very hard to help bring the CoBALT Project to the River Valley,” said Sebrina Shelton, operations supervisor of pediatrics at Mercy Fort Smith. “The training they have received will be so beneficial for children who need screening for potential developmental delays. This project helps address a huge need in our state.” CoBALT teams are educated about autism and developmental delays and given tools to screen and identify young children with a possible Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). The project assists providers by offering best practices for screening for developmental and autism con- cerns, providing information on treatment prac- tices and sharing links to help create relationships between CoBALT teams and local representatives for early intervention services. According to CoBALT, after a formal diagno- sis, pediatricians will be the “front line” in the medical management of patients who may have been diagnosed with a developmental disor- der or ASD. They will serve as the medical home for families to guide evidence-based treatment options and to help find community resources for the child. “This project will be so beneficial for our patients because it addresses the needs of the entire family, not just the patient,” Shelton said. “Once the referral from the primary care physician is made, we can develop a plan of action so par- ents will understand what to expect during their child’s evaluation.” UAMS Researcher Awarded $1.8M to Study Potential Treatments for Neurological Diseases The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has awarded a $1.8 million grant to Fang Zheng, PhD, an associate professor of pharmacology and tox- icology at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS), to continue research that could lead to new treatments for epilepsy and other neurological diseases. The NIH’s National Institute of Neurological Dis- orders and Stroke awarded Zheng’s lab $385,995 on March 1, which is to be followed by annual awards of $372,745 for each of the following four years, for a total of $1,876,975 over five years. “Dr. Zheng’s research is unique because it focuses on abnormalities of the cerebral circu- lation as a major contributing factor to epilepsy rather than focusing on neurons as the cause of the disease,” said Nancy Rusch, PhD, distin- guished professor and chair of the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology. “His research raises the possibility that treatments directed at restoring normal function to small cerebral blood vessels may reduce the number and severity of epileptic seizures.” Zheng said initial research has focused on the underlying mechanisms of neurovascular cou- pling dysfunction, which happens when the con- nection between blood flow and neurons in the brain stops working normally. “Neurovascular coupling, a mechanism that matches local neuronal activity to blood flow, is critical to maintain local microenvironment and normal brain function,” Zheng said. “However, normal neurovascular coupling is disrupted in sei- zure, traumatic brain injury and other neurolog- ical disorders. Despite continued high neuronal metabolism, small cerebral arteries and arterioles begin to inappropriately constrict to limit cerebral blood flow to the challenged neurons.” He said this process, known as the inverse hemodynamic response (IHR), is thought to con- tribute to brain damage and functional impair- ment in people with neurological diseases, including Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer’s disease. n Anne Eckes, MD