Dr Elena Schneider-Futschik receives Cure4CF grant for Trikafta pregnancy research

Dr Elena Schneider-Futschik has been awarded the 2023 Holckner Family Cystic Fibrosis Impact Grant by Cure4CF to further her research investigating Trikafta treatment during pregnancy. The Cure4CF Foundation is part of a global community working to develop a cure for everyone with Cystic Fibrosis (CF). Dr Elena Schneider-Futschik is one of two research group recipients to share the grant.

Dr Elena Scheider-Futschik and her team, including Professor Peter Middleton and Professor Jennifer Taylor-Cousar from the Department of Biochemistry and Pharmacology, are exploring the safety and effectiveness of Trikafta in pregnancy on mothers and their babies.

Since the approval of Trikafta, a major breakthrough in the treatment of cystic fibrosis-- sufferers are able to live longer, healthier lives.

Pregnancy in women with cystic fibrosis has dramatically increased since the treatment became readily available via the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme in Australia. But this has come with its complications – it is unknown if these treatments are safe for use during pregnancy, yet stopping these medications places the woman and pregnancy at high risk.

This grant award will fund a program to:

  • Develop a sensitive and reproducible analytical method to measuring the components of Trikafta
  • Determine the amount and impact of the medicine that reaches mothers and babies during pregnancy.

The team will explore this in the babies of mothers who have CF, and in CF babies whose mothers do not have CF. This will help the team understand how Trikafta impacts mothers when they are pregnant and explore if taking the treatment will reduce, halt or improve CF complications in newborns.

Learn more about Cure4Cystic Fibrosis