Susan Koletar, MD 

Patients with AIDS can receive the latest research-based therapies available anywhere at the OSU AIDS Clinical Trials Unit (ACTU), one of 34 sites nationwide that conduct federally sponsored studies for treating HIV infection, AIDS and related illnesses.

The OSU ACTU, sponsored by the National Institutes of Health, features an interdisciplinary team of physicians, nurses, pharmacists and social workers working to find the next generation of agents for fighting even the most resistant strains of the HIV virus and exploring ways to reduce the damaging side effects of current medications.

Susan Koletar, MD, professor of Clinical Internal Medicine at OSU, has been principal investigator for the ACTU since 2002. Her current research involves a number of ACTU protocols, such as a longitudinal study of metabolic, cardiovascular and neurologic complications in HIV-infected patients who have had significant increases in CD4 counts in response to potent antiretroviral therapy.

Antiretroviral agents have prolonged thousands of lives, but Koletar and colleagues such as Michael Para, MD, co-principal investigator for the ACTU, say researchers keep seeking improved treatments and new classes of drugs in hopes of some day tailoring treatments to individuals based on their genetics.

While many patients benefit from current treatment options, there has been no decline in the number of patients becoming infected with HIV in the past decade. Approximately 40,000 new infections are reported each year in the United States, Koletar says, noting that the rates of new infections in women and minorities are higher than in Caucasian men, with women representing a third of new cases of HIV infection. Those statistics, Koletar says, are why she and her colleagues are trying to bring more women and minorities into clinical trials. If clinical trials are performed only on men of one race, no one will know how the test results would apply to others with the illness. 

Another consideration is that, thanks to advances in the use of life-prolonging drugs, more HIV patients are facing such “old-age” ailments as hypertension, high cholesterol and heart disease. “The average age of participants in our HIV clinical trials is about 40-41. That’s 10 years older than what we previously saw,” Koletar says, noting that as many as 10-15 percent of those living with HIV are over 60.

Dr. Koletar’s co-investigators include: William Maher, MD; Julie Mangino, MD; Michael Para, MD; Nancy Reynolds, RN, PhD; Julianne Serovich, PhD; and David Wininger, MD.