Newborn Screening SPOTlight Podcast

Congenital Cytomegalovirus (CMV)

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Listen as Dr. Megan Pesch shares her journey to becoming a parent advocate and a researcher in Cytomegalovirus (also called CMV). Dr. Pesch is an Assistant Professor of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics at the University of Michigan where she is the Director of the Congenital CMV Developmental Follow-up Clinic. Dr. Pesch completed her medical school training, residency, and fellowship at the University of Michigan. She is board certified in Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics and serves as the President-elect of the National CMV Foundation.

Dr. Pesch’s youngest daughter has a profound bilateral sensorineural hearing loss from congenital CMV and this led to her involvement in national advocacy efforts to ensure that all newborns receive CMV screening.  Dr. Pesch’s clinical interests include the early diagnosis and treatment of congenital CMV using a multidisciplinary approach with a focus on family care and support, while her research focuses on healthcare provider practices around congenital CMV diagnosis and management and understanding the relationship between autism and CMV.  

The month of June is CMV awareness month. Please visit the National CMV foundation to learn more about advocacy efforts in CMV in your area and how you can support NBS for CMV.

 

Learn more about Dr. Megan Pesch and her advocacy effort on newborn screening for CMV:

https://ihpi.umich.edu/our-experts/pesch

https://www.nationalcmv.org

 

Podcast Interview Question with Dr. Megan Pesch.

  1. You are currently an Assistant Professor of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics and the Director of the Congenital CMV Developmental Follow-up Clinic at the University of Michigan. Can you tell our listeners more about CMV and how it impacts mothers, their babies and families? (perhaps, talk about the differences between prenatal CMV and neonatal congenital CMV)?
  • You are a clinician and a researcher, and lead efforts in the Pesch Lab at Michigan Medicine at the University of Michigan! One of your projects brings together a multidisciplinary group of health care providers to refer infants who fail their newborn hearing screen for congenital cytomegalovirus testing. Tell us more about this important project and explain how you got involved in newborn screening research?
  • Currently, there is no standard of care or routine screening for newborns for congenital cytomegalovirus at birth. What can parents do if they suspect their baby has CMV? (perhaps discuss the Alethia CMV Assay Test System)
  • What is hearing targeted early cytomegalovirus (HT-CMV) screening?
  • One of your current studies seeks to understand the possible connection between exposure to CMV during pregnancy and the later risk of autism. Can you tell us more about this effort? What are you hoping to learn? What is the biological pathway?
  • You are also the President-elect of the National CMV Foundation. What are some of the current activities or programs that people can get involved in your advocacy efforts? What are the recent advocacy efforts to support newborn screening for CMV? Is it currently being reviewed to be added to the RUSP?
  • Are you involved in training the next generation of pediatricians, and what do you tell them about newborn screening research?
  • You are busy as a clinician, researcher, advocate, and parent. Do you have any stories of inspiration that keep you going?
  • What does NBS research mean to you?

    • To learn how NBSTRN can help your research in newborn screening, visit www.nbstrn.org

     

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