Early Intervention to Minimize Progression of COVID-19

Peter Chen obtained a BS in Electrical Engineering from the University of Texas, his MD from Baylor College of Medicine, and then trained in Internal Medicine at UT Southwestern. Subsequently, he did his fellowship in Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at the University of Washington, where he also started basic research training in lung biology. Working with his mentor, Bill Parks, he unraveled mechanisms by which the lung epithelium interacts with the matrix to facilitate lung injury and repair. He started his academic career as an Assistant Professor at the University of Washington, where he continued to establish himself as a physician-scientist focused on understanding mechanisms of acute lung injury with an overarching theme in studying lung mucosal immunity.

Dr. Chen rose to the rank of Associate Professor at the University of Washington before being recruited by Paul Noble to Cedars-Sinai in 2013, to become the Director of the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine. He currently is a Professor of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences and has been active in mentoring trainees within the Women’s Guild Lung Institute, which has led to multiple fellowship, and career development awards, and also a T32 institutional training grant. He also established the Physician-Scientist Training Program within the Internal Medicine Residency, which is focused on developing the next generation of physician-scientists.

During his time at Cedars-Sinai, he has transformed the Division by expanding the clinical care programs and mirroring it with a world-class research program. Accordingly, the Division has had a quick rise in the US News and World Report rankings to #3 in 2020. Since 2013, the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care has grown from 8 MDs to currently 16 MDs and 8 PhDs. In this time, the Division has developed state-of-the-art clinical programs for the care of all respiratory diseases such as for interstitial lung disease, COPD, asthma, and pulmonary vascular disease. Most recently, a post-COVID clinic was started to serve the growing number of patients seeking care for long-term consequences after infection. Furthermore, the Women’s Guild Lung Institute has developed into a premier pulmonary research institute housing internationally recognized researchers that conduct basic, translational, and clinical research in interstitial lung disease, pulmonary vascular disease, acute lung injury, COVID-19, cystic fibrosis, and regeneration.

Dr. Chen has been highly accomplished as a physician-scientist that has been continually NIH-funded since fellowship. He was published in some of the top clinical and basic science journals including the New England Journal of Medicine, JAMA, American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, JCI Insight, Cell Reports, among many others. He was awarded the Jo Rae Wright Award for Outstanding Science by the American Thoracic Society (ATS) in 2013, which is a highly competitive award presented to a rising star within this international respiratory society of 16,000+ members. He has served on study sections for the NIH, VA merit, and American Heart Association, is on the editorial board of the American Journal of Respiratory Cellular and Molecular Biology and has held several leadership positions in the ATS.

During the COVID pandemic, Dr. Chen has taken a prominent role in both the clinical and research aspects of this disease. He is a frontline clinician and has been caring for COVID patients in the ICU since the beginning of the pandemic. As the Director of the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care, he has coordinated the ICU response during the pandemic and worked closely with the Cedars-Sinai leadership to expand the ICU capacity to meet the needs of the growing COVID-19 census. Finally, he was on the forefront of the research in understanding the pathogenesis of the disease and also developing novel therapies for COVID-19 patients. He has been invited by numerous international societies to talk about his work in COVID-19, sits on the California COVID-19 Academic Advisory Board, and has been featured in several media stories locally and nationally such as in the New York Times.

Dr. Huhn is an infectious disease specialist and is currently the Senior Director for HIV Services at Cook County Health and The Ruth M. Rothstein CORE Center, an associate professor of medicine at Rush University Medical Center, where he serves as the associate director for the joint Rush University/Cook County Health Infectious Diseases Fellowship Program. He lectures regularly at the University of Illinois, Chicago, School of Public Health, where he holds an adjunct assistant professor position. Since November 2020, Dr. Huhn has been the Covid-19 vaccination coordinator for Cook County Health. He received his medical degree from Tulane University, where he earned a concomitant Master of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, trained at Duke University in Internal Medicine, and completed his infectious diseases fellowship at Rush University Medical Center in 2005.

From 2002 to 2004, Dr. Huhn was based at the Illinois Department of Public Health as the Epidemic Intelligence Service Officer with the CDC. His research activities include HIV and viral hepatitis, Covid-19, outbreak investigations, infectious disease surveillance, and risk analysis, and he has published over 65 articles in peer-reviewed literature. He was the Principal Investigator in recently completed, NIH-funded, R01 grant examining pre-exposure prophylaxis adherence for HIV prevention and has been the Principal Investigator for several pharmaceutical-sponsored clinical trials in HIV, hepatitis C, and Covid-19.

In addition Dr. Huhn has developed several investigator-initiated studies examining novel therapeutic, diagnostic, and patient retention interventions in HIV, viral immunopathogenesis, and hepatitis C-associated liver fibrosis. Dr. Huhn also mentors and supervises postgraduate trainees in HIV, viral hepatitis-related longitudinal and retrospective database, and survey studies. Dr. Huhn published a book, serving as the editor for a new series in HIV through Oxford University Press in 2020, is the therapeutic advisor for the Simply Speaking HIV Management CME series since 2015, has been a content faculty expert on several other CME programs, and is a frequent teacher and lecturer across the country.

Margot Savoy, MD, MPH, FAAFP, FABC, CPE, CMQ, FAAPL is Associate Professor for the Department of Family & Community Medicine at the Lewis Katz School of Medicine at Temple University and Temple University Hospital, and Chief Quality Officer for the Temple Faculty Practice Plan. She is an attending physician at Temple University Hospital (Philadelphia, PA) and Christiana Care Health System (Wilmington, DE). Dr. Savoy graduated from the University of Maryland School of Medicine in 2002, completed Family Medicine Residency Program at the Crozer-Keystone Family Medicine Residency Program (Springfield, PA) in 2005, and graduated from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill Gillings School of Global Public Health in 2008 with a Master’s degree in Public Health in Public Health Leadership with a focus on Public Health Practice. She is certified by the American Board of Family Medicine, the Certifying Commission in Medical Management, and is a Fellow of the Advisory Board Company.