Collaborative research

Antibiotic overuse: As a student at the University of Louisville, particularly while working within the Child and Adolescent Health Research Design and Support (CAHRDS) unit, I actively participated in pediatric research. One specific subfield I focused on was assessing antibiotic overuse among children in Kentucky.

• • Wattles, B., Vidwan, N., Ghosal, S., Feygin, Y., Creel, L., Myers, J., Woods, C. and Smith, M., 2021. Cefdinir use in the Kentucky Medicaid population: a priority for outpatient antimicrobial stewardship. Journal of the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Society, 10(2), pp.157-160. DOI: 10.1093/jpids/piz084

  • Smith, M., Vidwan, N., Wattles, B., Ghosal, S., Feygin, Y., Creel, L., Myers, J. and Woods, C., 2018, November. 281. Cefdinir Prescribing Increased in Low-Income Children in Kentucky From 2012 to 2016. In Open Forum Infectious Diseases (Vol. 5, No. suppl_1, pp. S116-S116). US: Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/ofid/ofy210.293

ADHD research: Another important area of pediatric research I focused on was ADHD. We examined the increase in ADHD diagnoses and stimulant medication use among Medicaid-enrolled preschoolers over time in Kentucky. Additionally, we investigated the relationship between language disorders and medication/healthcare use in low-income children with ADHD.

• • Davis, D.W., Feygin, Y., Creel, L., Williams, P.G., Lohr, W.D., Jones, V.F., Le, J., Pasquenza, N., Ghosal, S., Jawad, K. and Yan, X., 2019. Longitudinal trends in the diagnosis of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder and stimulant use in preschool children on Medicaid. The Journal of Pediatrics, 207, pp.185-191. DOI: 10.1016/j.jpeds.2018.10.062

  • Lohr, W.D., Feygin, Y.B., Le, J.F., Ghosal, S., Creel, L., Myers, J. and Davis, D.W., 2018, October. Impact of Language Disorder on Prescribing Patterns and Healthcare Utilization Among Low-Income Children With ADHD. In 65th Annual Meeting. AACAP.

Other work: Another work within the pediatric domain was examining pediatric patients with delta-storage pool disorder (δ-SPD), a platelet disorder affecting bleeding. It found a weak correlation between the severity of bleeding symptoms and the results of platelet electron microscopy (PEM). This suggests that PEM might not be a reliable predictor of bleeding severity in δ-SPD patients.

• • • Nessle, C.N., Ghosal, S., Mathews, C., Taylor, D., Myers, J., Raj, A. and Panigrahi, A., 2019. Weak correlation of bleeding scores to platelet electron microscopy: A retrospective chart review of pediatric patients with delta‐storage pool disorder. Pediatric Blood & Cancer, 66(3), p.e27505. DOI: 10.1002/pbc.27505

I have also worked on several projects related to cardiac surgery. One project focused on investigating the relationship between regional cerebral oxygen saturation levels and 30-day mortality rates in patients undergoing left ventricular assist device (LVAD) surgery. Another project examined the association between preoperative platelet count and 30-day mortality rates in patients undergoing cardiac surgery.

• Ghosal, S., Trivedi, J., Chen, J., Rogers, M.P., Cheng, A., Slaughter, M.S., Kong, M. and Huang, J., 2018. Regional cerebral oxygen saturation level predicts 30-day mortality rate after left ventricular assist device surgery. Journal of Cardiothoracic and Vascular Anesthesia, 32(3), pp.1185-1190. DOI: 10.1053/j.jvca.2017.08.029

• Ghosal, S., Trivedi, J., Barlowe, D., Zhao, L., Ji, X., Slaughter, M.S., Kong, M. and Huang, J., 2020, December. Preoperative functional platelet number is inversely associated with 30-day mortality after cardiac surgery: a retrospective cohort study. In Seminars in Cardiothoracic and Vascular Anesthesia (Vol. 24, No. 4, pp. 313-320). Sage CA: Los Angeles, CA: SAGE Publications. DOI: 10.1177/1089253220943023

Abnormal birthweight outcomes: Investigating how maternal BMI can impact the diagnosis of abnormal birthweight outcomes such as small- and large-for-gestational age (SGA and LGA respectively).

• Ghosal, S., Gleason, J., Grantz, K. L., Chen, Z. Impact of maternal BMI on the performance of EFW to predict abnormal birthweight categories. (Ongoing)

IVF research: Working on a project assessing the effectiveness of Preimplantation Genetic Testing for Aneuploidy (PGT-A) in improving the live birth rate and reducing stillbirth using SARTCORS registry data.

• McCulloh, D. H., Ghosal, S., Combs, J., Hill, M., Cohen, J. Success of Preimplantation Genetic Testing for Aneuploidy (PGT-A) in the United States 2014 - 2017: Analysis of the SARTCORS Registry. (Ongoing)

Seizure research: Working on several projects related to seizures. One investigated the continuous electroencephalographic (cEEG) monitoring among 18 years and older. It compared patients with altered mental status (AMS) to those with seizure-like events (SLE). We found that patients with SLE were younger, had longer monitoring periods, and were more likely to have epilepsy-related breakthrough seizures. In another work, we found the presence of active and remote seizure is associated with elevated mortality.

• Zawar, I., Ghosal, S., Hantus, S. and Punia, V., 2023. Indications for continuous electroencephalographic (cEEG) monitoring: what do they tell us? Epilepsy Research, 190, p.107088. DOI: 10.1016/j.eplepsyres.2023.107088

• Zawar, I., Quigg, M., Ghosal, S., Punia, V., Calle-Lopez, Y., Hashmi, S. A., Manning, C., Kapur, J. Poor seizure control in Dementia is associated with higher mortality and worse cognition and function. (Submitted)

Sarcoidosis: This study examines the impact of travel distance on disease severity in patients with pulmonary sarcoidosis. Analyzing 100 patients referred to the University of Virginia sarcoidosis clinic in 2019, we found that those living farther away had significantly lower lung function at the time of referral. Specifically, patients in the furthest distance tertile had a 9% lower predicted FVC. These findings suggest that travel distance affects outcomes in sarcoidosis and highlight the need for further research.

• Farah, N., Akingbade, J.O., Alsobrooks, J.P., Malhi, J., Schmidt, M.A., Noth, I., Ghosal, S., Barros, A. and Bonham, C., 2023. Longer Travel Distance to Subspecialty Clinic Associates With Lower Lung Function in Pulmonary Sarcoidosis. In D15. OUTCOMES IN SARCOIDOSIS (pp. A6225-A6225). American Thoracic Society.

Vaccine research: Conducted a project to evaluate a vaccine candidate against Entamoeba histolytica, the parasite causing amebiasis. The study in rhesus macaques showed that both intranasal and intramuscular immunizations induced a strong, durable immune response, indicating the vaccine's potential safety and efficacy for clinical trials.

• Abhyankar, M. M. et al. (2024) ‘Immunogenicity and safety of an Entamoeba histolytica adjuvanted protein vaccine candidate (LecA+GLA-3M-052 liposomes) in rhesus macaques’, Human Vaccines & Immunotherapeutics, 20(1). doi: 10.1080/21645515.2024.2374147.