Kyle Happel

Associate Professor of Medicine, Section of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, Dept. of Internal Medicine, Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center; New Orleans, LA.

I am a dual board certified pulmonary and critical care physician. For years my basic science research interest was pulmonary host defenses and how alcohol abuse affected them.  More recently, I have performed clinical research studies of airways diseases, particularly asthma and COPD. We have studied novel therapies for airways disease in protocols sponsored by the NIH and industry partners alike. I am most interested in therapies that might alter the disease trajectory of airways pathology – to include novel biologic therapies. Because smoking is the causal (or aggravating) factor in so many lung diseases, I am also a passionate advocate for smoking cessation and have been a public advocate for smoking cessation at the practice and policy level. Clinically, I am the director of my University Hospital’s Chest Clinic, a large outpatient teaching clinic that sees a myriad of pulmonary disorders and involves synchronous clinical teaching at the medical student, resident, and pulmonary fellow level. I also have an active inpatient practice in the intensive care unit and pulmonary consult services. It is a pleasure to teach trainees routine procedures such as bronchoscopy, central line placements, and intubations in such a diverse patient population afforded by our hospital’s location.