David Boulware is a professor of medicine and a practicing infectious disease physician at the

University of Minnesota Medical School The University of Minnesota Medical School is a medical school at the University of Minnesota. It is a combination of three campuses located in Minneapolis, Duluth, and St. Cloud, Minnesota. The medical school has more than 17,000 alumni as of 2 ...

. He is a member of the graduate faculty for the

University of Minnesota School of Public Health The University of Minnesota School of Public Health (SPH) is located in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and it is fully accredited by the Council on Education for Public Health. The school enrolls more than 1,000 undergraduate and graduate students fro ...

Epidemiology PhD program and for the Microbiology, Immunology, and Cancer Biology (MICaB) graduate program. Boulware was the first Lois & Richard King Distinguished Assistant Professorship at the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota Twin Cities (historically known as University of Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint ...

. Boulware is an active medical researcher engaged in clinical trials in infectious diseases. His expertise is particularly in the realm of

HIV The human immunodeficiency viruses (HIV) are two species of '' Lentivirus'' (a subgroup of retrovirus) that infect humans. Over time, they cause acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), a condition in which progressive failure of the im ...

-related meningitis, including

Cryptococcosis Cryptococcosis is a potentially fatal fungal infection of mainly the lungs, presenting as a pneumonia, and in the brain, where it appears as a meningitis. Coughing, difficulty breathing, chest pain and fever are seen when the lungs are infect ...

and

Tuberculous meningitis Tuberculous meningitis, also known as TB meningitis or tubercular meningitis, is a specific type of bacterial meningitis caused by the ''Mycobacterium tuberculosis'' infection of the meninges—the system of membranes which envelop the central ner ...

Education

Boulware graduated from

Wabash College Wabash College is a private liberal arts men's college located in Crawfordsville, Indiana. Founded in 1832, by a group of Dartmouth College graduates and Midwestern leaders, the institution was originally named "The Wabash Teachers Seminary an ...

in 1996 with a Bachelor of Arts in

Chemistry Chemistry is the scientific study of the properties and behavior of matter. It is a physical science within the natural sciences that studies the chemical elements that make up matter and chemical compound, compounds made of atoms, molecules a ...

. He later attended the

Indiana University School of Medicine The Indiana University School of Medicine (IUSM) is a major, multi-campus medical school located throughout the US state, U.S. state of Indiana and is both the Medical school, undergraduate and Graduate medical education, graduate medical school o ...

, graduating in 2000. He completed various residencies and fellowships from 2000-2007, receiving a certificate in tropical medicine from the

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is the National public health institutes, national public health agency of the United States. It is a Federal agencies of the United States, United States federal agency under the United S ...

(CDC) in 2006. He completed his master's in public health in 2007.

Career

Boulware joined the faculty of the University of Minnesota in 2007, becoming an Assistant Professor of Medicine in the Division of Infectious Disease and International Medicine at the University of Minnesota’s Department of Medicine. Around the same time, he began working within the university’s Center for Infectious Diseases and Microbiology Translational Research (CIDMTR) to study

HIV/AIDS The HIV, human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) is a retrovirus that attacks the immune system. Without treatment, it can lead to a spectrum of conditions including acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). It is a Preventive healthcare, pr ...

and cryptococcal meningitis with the

Infectious Diseases Institute The Infectious Diseases Institute (IDI), established within Makerere University, is a Ugandan not-for-profit organization which aims to strengthen health systems in Africa, with a strong emphasis on infectious diseases; through research and capac ...

Uganda Uganda, officially the Republic of Uganda, is a landlocked country in East Africa. It is bordered to the east by Kenya, to the north by South Sudan, to the west by the Democratic Republic of the Congo, to the south-west by Rwanda, and to the ...

. He was named to the Lois and Richard King Distinguished Assistant Professorship at the school in 2011.

COVID-19

Boulware's primary research has been focused on improving the diagnosis, prevention, and treatment of cryptococcal meningitis. However, he is best known for outpatient COVID-19 clinical trials, pioneering remote de-centralized, internet-based clinical trials during the COVID-19 pandemic. Boulware's team rapidly launched a series of three U.S. nationwide randomized clinical trials testing

hydroxychloroquine Hydroxychloroquine, sold under the brand name Plaquenil among others, is a medication used to prevent and treat malaria in areas where malaria remains sensitive to chloroquine. Other uses include treatment of rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, an ...

for post-exposure prophylaxis, early treatment, and pre-exposure prophylaxis for prevention of COVID-19 on March 17, 2020. These were among the first U.S. trials to be launched. The pre-exposure prophylaxis trial was reported June 3, 2020 showing that taking hydroxychloroquine was not effective at preventing

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. In January 2020, the disease spread worldwide, resulting in the COVID-19 pandemic. The symptoms of COVID‑19 can vary but often include fever ...

. As described, "To say that the recruitment of this post-exposure prophylaxis trial was innovative hardly gives the methods enough credit." These trials were pioneering for being remote internet-based randomized decentralized clinical trials. The hydroxychloroquine early treatment trial was the first large phase III, outpatient randomized clinical trial testing an outpatient therapy for

. Subsequent, meta-analysis of 11 outpatient hydroxychloroquine randomized trials of 2037 participants showed zero benefit for reducing hospitalization While pre-exposure prophylaxis with

for prevention was promoted on May 18, 2020, the subsequent randomized trial did not show any benefit. Describing the experimental antiviral drug

remdesivir Remdesivir, sold under the brand name Veklury, Text was copied from this source which is copyright European Medicines Agency. Reproduction is authorized provided the source is acknowledged. is a Broad-spectrum antiviral drug, broad-spectrum ...

in June 2020, Boulware said that the medicine could provide "a reasonable value" if it reduced the length of stay in hospital for

patients. This true early in the pandemic waves when hospital beds were in limited supply. Boulware served as senior investigator on other trials testing early treatments for

including the TogetherTrial

ivermectin Ivermectin is an antiparasitic drug. After its discovery in 1975, its first uses were in veterinary medicine to prevent and treat heartworm and acariasis. Approved for human use in 1987, it is used to treat infestations including head lice ...

;, which demonstrated that

did not have a clinical benefit for early

's COVID-Out randomized trial testing

metformin Metformin, sold under the brand name Glucophage, among others, is the main first-line medication for the treatment of type2 diabetes, particularly in people who are overweight. It is also used in the treatment of polycystic ovary syndrome, ...

, and

fluvoxamine Fluvoxamine, sold under the brand name Luvox among others, is an antidepressant of the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) class. It is primarily used to treat major depressive disorder and, perhaps more-especially, obsessive–compu ...

. The Covid-Out trial reported a 42% reduction in COVID-related emergency room visits and hospitalizations through 14-days with the use of

. Metformin also had a 58% reduction in hospitalizations through 28-days and reduced

long COVID Long may refer to: Measurement * Long, characteristic of something of great duration * Long, characteristic of something of great length * Longitude (abbreviation: long.), a geographic coordinate * Longa (music), note value in early music mens ...

by 41% through 10-months. In December 2021 at the beginning of the Omicron wave, Boulware took the initiative to apply to the U.S.

FDA The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA or US FDA) is a federal agency of the Department of Health and Human Services. The FDA is responsible for protecting and promoting public health through the control and supervision of food ...

for an Emergency Use Authorization for

100 mg twice daily. This low cost generic medicine of fluvoxamine reduced covid-related hospitalizations by 25% as well as reducing ER visits and hospitalizations. FDA rejected the EUA request for this low cost generic medicine questioning whether reducing prolonged ER visits and hospitalizations represents a clinically meaningful benefit. Dr. Boulware has been a proponent of repurposed medicines which actually have benefit for COVID-19, including metformin, interferon-lambda, and higher-dose fluvoxamine. Boulware serves as the national co-chair of the trial steering committee for the NIH ACTIV-6 platform clinical trial testing repurposed medicines for COVID-19. ACTIV-6 trial has tested outpatient COVID-19 therapies including ivermectin, inhaled fluticasone, low-dose fluvoxamine 50mg twice daily, fluvoxamine 100mg twice daily, montelukast, and metformin.

Notable contributions and honors

World Health Organization The World Health Organization (WHO) is a list of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations which coordinates responses to international public health issues and emergencies. It is headquartered in Gen ...

2017 Guidelines for managing advanced HIV disease and rapid initiation of antiretroviral therapy *

2018 Guidelines for the diagnosis, prevention and management of cryptococcal disease in HIV-infected adults, adolescents and children * US Guidelines for the Prevention and Treatment of Opportunistic Infections in Adults and Adolescents with HIV—guideline committee member *

American Society for Clinical Investigation The American Society for Clinical Investigation (ASCI), established in 1908, is one of the oldest and most respected medical honor societies in the United States. Organization and purpose The ASCI is an honorary society to which more than 2,800 p ...

, honorary medicine society elected member 2020. *

Association of American Physicians The Association of American Physicians (AAP) is an honorary medical society founded in 1885 by the Canadian physician Sir William Osler and six other distinguished physicians of his era for "the advancement of scientific and practical medicine ...

, honorary medicine society elected member 2023.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Boulware, David 1974 births University of Minnesota faculty Living people COVID-19 researchers Wabash College alumni