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Dr Heather Medbury

Senior Research Fellow
Surgery, Westmead Clinical School

C24 - Westmead Hospital
The University of Sydney
NSW 2006 Australia

T: +61 2 9845 7677
F: +61 2 9893 7440
E:

Research interests

Our research is focused on understanding wound healing in particular the vascular wounds such as atherosclerosis and intimal hyperplasia.

In atherosclerosis our aim is to 'stabilise' the disease to reduce the incidence of heart attack and stroke. Our approach is to redefine the role of monocytes in plaque stabily. For while monocytes have traditionally been known to play a detrimental role in atherosclerosis(and indeed there is a wealth of literature in this area), we are the first group to provide evidence that it may play an opposing beneficial role (by transforming into a muscular type cell) that stabilizes the disease.

Understanding monocyte transformation will help us to identify targets for therapeutic manipulation that could stabilize the disease. This will potentially result in a reduction in events such as heart attack and stroke that will not only decrease the morbidity and mortality associated with the disease but also limit the associated, health, social and economic burdens it poses.

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Keywords

Cardiovascular diseases; Inflammation; Cell biology; Atherosclerosis; Immunology

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Publications

2009 | 2008 | 2007

2009

   
  • Zoellner, H., Siddiqui, S., Kelly, E., Medbury, H. (2009), The anti-apoptotic activity of albumin for endothelium is inhibited by advanced glycation end products restricting intramolecular movement. Cellular & molecular biology letters. 14(4), 575-86. [Abstract]

2008

   
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  • Medbury, H., Tarran, S., Guiffre, A., Williams, M., Lam, T., Vicaretti, M., Fletcher, J. (2008), Monocytes contribute to the atherosclerotic cap by transformation into fibrocytes. International Angiology. 27(2), 114-123. [Abstract]
  • Holland, A., Tarran, S., Medbury, H., Guiffre, A. (2008), Are Fibrocytes Present in Pediatric Burn Wounds?. Journal of burn care & research : official publication of the American Burn Association. 29(4), 619-26. [Abstract]

2007

   
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  • Russo, R., Medbury, H., Guiffre, A., Englert, H., Manolios, N. (2007), Lack of increased expression of cell surface markers for circulating fibrocyte progenitors in limited scleroderma. Clinical rheumatology. 26, 1136-41. [Abstract]
  • Medbury, H. (2007), Fibrocytes in atherogenesis. In: Fibrocytes: New Insights into Tissue Repair and Systemic Fibroses. (pp.0).Singapore: World Scientific Publishing Co Pty Ltd.