Our Faculty

Dr. Neil Schluger began his academic career at the height of the tuberculosis epidemic in New York City, and the hallmark of his career has been in translational research in that disease as well as in public health aspects of tuberculosis control. He received a Tuberculosis Academic Award in 1994 from the National Institutes of Health, and with this award designed tuberculosis specific curricula for undergraduate medical students, physicians in training, and practicing physicians. Through his research, he has also demonstrated the utility and limitations of molecular (PCR-based) diagnostics in tuberculosis, including demonstration of common blood-born phase of the disease, as evidenced by frequent finding of circulating mycobacterial DNA in patients with pulmonary tuberculosis. Dr. Schluger has also helped develop and evaluate innovative tuberculosis control approaches in difficult-to-reach populations in New York City. His research has helped explain the occurrence of so-called paradoxical reactions to tuberculosis therapy in AIDS patients. He has made important contributions to tuberculosis epidemiology in the United States, including a molecular epidemiologic analysis of tuberculosis transmission in New York City that has major implications for tuberculosis control programs in New York and other large U.S. cities. He has also demonstrated the utility of novel treatment approach to active tuberculosis by using once-weekly regimen in the continuation phase of treatment for active disease. Dr. Schluger contributed to this work both as a principal investigator and as the overall chair of the Tuberculosis Trials Consortium.

MD, University of Pennsylvania, 1985

BA, Harvard University, 1981

Mailman School Affiliations:

• Center for Infectious Disease Epidemiologic Research 

Additional Affiliations:

• Member, American Society of Clinical Investigation
• Chairman, American Lung Association of the City of New York, 2006-2008

• Mid-career Investigator Award in Patient-Oriented Research, National Institutes of Health

Selected Editorial Boards

• Encylopedia of Respiratory Medicine
• Respiratory Research

Tuberculosis Trials Consortium
The Tuberculosis Trials Consortium (TBTC) is an international research consortium funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) that conducts clinical trials aimed at developing new treatments for active tuberculosis and latent tuberculosis infection. Dr. Schluger is the principal investigator for the consortium's Columbia University site, which is run in conjunction with the New York City Department of Health Tuberculosis Control Program and enrolls patients through several of the Department of Health Chest Clinics.