Innovators at CRH

David Wilson, MD, FCCP Lung Institute Medical Director Innovation understands that seeing deeper into the lungs means diagnosing earlier.

David Wilson, MD, FCCP is one of the nation's leading experts utilizing technology that is helping to diagnose lung diseases at earlier stages. Using innovative Cellvizio technology with bronchoscopy, Dr. Wilson is able to view and reach areas of the lungs in a way that was never before possible.

"Until now, our ability to look for lung diseases with bronchoscopy has been limited to the main branches of the lungs due to the narrowing diameter of the outer branches and the size of existing bronchoscopes. This has prevented physicians from gaining a better understanding of peripheral lung cancers and other peripheral lung diseases," explained Dr. Wilson.

With Cellvizio, Dr. Wilson threads a tiny microscope through the bronchoscope and is able to access the far reaches of the lung, even the alveoli, the lung's tiny branches that replace carbon dioxide with oxygen in the blood. Just as important, Cellvizio allows physicians to view this tissue right away in the body at the cellular level, live and moving. And, the Lung Institute, directed by Dr. Wilson, has performed more procedures utilizing this technology than any other institution in the nation.

"Cellvizio now allows the opportunity to immediately see changes in the cells and potentially gain insights of what may be wrong and thus optimize patient treatment," Dr. Wilson said. "Further, we've traditionally used random or 'blind' biopsies, in which we cut out pieces of suspicious tissue and send them to a laboratory to determine if they are cancerous, and Cellvizio could let us less invasively and more quickly reach a diagnosis as it helps us perform more targeted and fewer biopsies," continued Dr. Wilson.

Lung disease is America's number three killer, responsible for one in six deaths. Dr. David Wilson and his team at the Lung Institute are finding lung diseases at earlier stages—without a surgical biopsy. With earlier diagnosis, specific therapy for lung cancer can be started sooner at a more treatable stage.

Learn more about the Lung Institute
Video: David Wilson, MD

Jennifer Dunscomb, RN, MSN, CCRN Clinical Nurse Specialist Innovation is leading to better care for congestive heart failure patients.

Jennifer Dunscomb is the inaugural recipient of the Douglas J. Leonard Innovation Fellowship. The Leonard Fellowship was created to honor past Columbus Regional Hospital CEO Douglas Leonard and his passion for innovation in the care of Columbus Regional patients.

Jennifer's work will span a two year period and will be focused on reducing readmission rates for congestive heart failure patients. Jennifer will be developing and testing self-care strategies to determine which technique is most helpful to patients' success.