Women’s Research & Training Program

Women’s Research & Training Program

The Women’s Research and Training Program at the Texas Heart Institute Center for Women’s Heart & Vascular Health is a collaborative research and training initiative launched in 2017 that promotes a rigorous and highly cooperative research environment focused specifically on women’s heart and vascular issues.

The program draws upon substantial basic, clinical and population research expertise at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston and Baylor College of Medicine, while leveraging the strength of THI’s Women’s Center. The team includes Dr. James T. Willerson and Dr. Stephanie Coulter (Texas Heart Institute), Eric Boerwinkle, PhD (Dean UT School of Public Health), Biykem Bozkurt, MD, PhD and Christie Ballantyne, MD (Baylor College of Medicine), and Dianna Milewicz, MD, PhD (UT Health Science Center).

The overarching goal of the research is to learn more about non-coronary, non-atherosclerotic, non-inflammatory cardiovascular disease in women, with a particular emphasis on heart failure with preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF) and other diseases primarily affecting women such as fibromuscular dysplasia (FMD). The program will also provide training for physician-scientists who will continue to make discoveries to improve women’s cardiovascular health.

Through the development of gender-specific diagnostic, risk-assessment and preventive strategies for heart and vascular disease, we will improve survival and quality of life for women.