Click here or the image above to watch Ranking Member Capito’s first round of questions, and here for her second round of questions.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, U.S. Senator Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), Ranking Member of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies (Labor-HHS), participated in a hearing to review the president’s Fiscal Year (FY) 2025 Budget Request for the National Institutes of Health (NIH). During the hearing, Ranking Member Capito questioned NIH leaders about biomedical initiatives happening in West Virginia, as well as health issues that impact rural communities.

The following leaders from NIH participated in today’s hearing: Dr. Monica Bertagnolli, NIH Director; Dr. Nora Volkow, National Institute on Drug Abuse Director; Dr. Richard Hodes, National Institute on Aging Director; Dr. Gary Gibbons, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute Director; and Dr. Jeanne Marrazzo, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director.

HIGHLIGHTS:

HIGHLIGHTING THE WORK OF WEST VIRGINIA UNIVERSITY:

Senator Capito: “I know that you've seen and are well aware of some of the research that's going on with NIH at West Virginia University with Dr. [Ali] Rezai on his use of ultrasound to potentially slow addiction and Alzheimer’s… What do you think of that work? What kind of promise does that work have with ultrasound to decrease some kind of cravings? I know there's no one-solution-fits-all here. That's the difficult part of what you deal with every single day. So what do you see in terms of on the horizon for treatment?”

Dr. Volkow: “This is a perfect example that you see where science has transformed the way that we can tackle problems like in this case, addiction. And this is possible because of our understanding of how the brain works, and what are the circuits affected in addiction on the one side, and through brain technologies developed by BRAIN to be able to manipulate them in a non-intensive way, very selectively, and that's exactly what Dr. Rezai is doing.”

Senator Capito: “Yeah, it's quite remarkable to watch and I've watched it myself.”

ON THE FUTURE OF ALZHEIMER’S DISEASE TREATMENT:

Senator Capito: “I know you've had a long history of studying Alzheimer's, so what do you think about this as a potential breakthrough in combination with what we're seeing with some of the pharmaceuticals and others available – I don't know that they're full treatments – but at least improvements in how to handle Alzheimer's?”

Dr. Hodes: “The progress of this past year in Alzheimer's treatment has been quite remarkable with the first FDA approval of a drug Lecanemab for treatment of mild cognitive hemorrhage, early stage. What we learned from the series of both successful and unsuccessful trials is that the effect is very strongly related to the degree of decrease in amyloid that can be accomplished. And what we're showing in these studies in West Virginia was that the use of targeted ultrasound, in combination with an antibody to amyloid, increased the effect in decreasing amyloid in the brain.”

IMPROVING RURAL RESPIRATORY CARE:

Senator Capito: “I wanted to ask a question about an NIH study through your institute that found higher mortality rates for patients on respiratory support in rural intermediate care units. This goes to the heart of what I talked about earlier, obviously, I have a large rural population. What advice would you give or what do you think has come out of this study in terms of helping rural intermediate care facilities be able to change the results of the study?”

Dr. Gibbons: “You bring up an important aspect of your earlier comment, in which we recognize that rural America and our systems need to focus in on where the burden and suffering is the greatest and clearly, when it comes to intensive care units, there's actually a lower proportion per capita in rural communities. And we know that it is a challenge. We're hoping that and we're testing strategies, many of which involve telehealth, in which we can ensure that the care is at the level where we can improve those rates of recovery in the context of rural communities.”

ON IMPROVING NIH’S EFFICIENCY:

Senator Capito: “My last comment would be to you, Dr. Bertagnolli. 27 institutes, that's a lot to manage, not just physically manage, but there's so much interplay between what's going on. As we look at a time of dollars, shrinking or not, we’ve got to be more efficient. Any efficiencies that can be found across the 27 institutes, I think you're going to reap the results of that.”

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