Dr Lyda Osorio, Colombia
Mentoring organization: GlaxoSmithKline
In her first year of medical school Dr Lyda Osorio was already clear on her path. She would devote her career to one mission: reducing the toll of neglected tropical diseases like malaria and dengue in her country, Colombia, and across Latin America.
Now, as a respected researcher and teacher of a new generation of scientists at Del Valle University in Cali, she says there is one quality that has driven her from the start: insatiable curiosity. Osorio admits she has been asking questions incessantly since she was old enough to speak. Fortunately, she was born to parents who appreciated this quality. “We are five brothers and sisters, and we did not have much in the way of means. Yet my parents inspired me to stay curious and pursue my own dreams,” she says.
At first, she imagined a career devoted to interacting with individual patients and improving their lives. But during her first year of medical school she discovered that her greatest passions lay elsewhere. “I was literally seduced by research, and this goes beyond my personal curiosity. I discovered that committing myself to research was a road not just to answering my own questions but questions that matter to other people.”
An early start in malaria in urban areas
A graduate of the Caldas University Faculty of Medicine 1995, Osorio completed the social service required of newly graduated Colombian physicians at the International Centre for Medical Research and Training (CIDEIM) in Cali. She knew she would need more education to be the kind of researcher she aspired to be, so she applied for and received a grant from the government of Colombia to pursue a doctorate in epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
Her subject was the effect of population mobility on transmission of malaria in urban areas. Although there has been remarkable progress on malaria, it remains one of the most serious public health problems in Colombia. After completing her doctorate in 2003, she returned to CIDEIM as coordinator of malaria research. In 2007, she moved up to a faculty position as Assistant Professor of Epidemiology at Del Valle University in Cali.
A clinical trial for a new malaria treatment
Although she had worked successfully for several years as a researcher at Del Valle University and been appointed director of postgraduate programmes in the School of Public Health, Osorio felt it was time to expand her horizons. “I needed to see how the best research and development was performed in an international context. I recognized that the best way to achieve this was to work for a while in a pharmaceutical company,” she says.
“I believe that in low-and-middle-income countries at some point we should be able to do research and development for our own products with our own ideas and our own platforms to solve our own problems.” Lyda Osorio
In 2013 she applied for the one-year WHO/TDR fellowship and received a placement with GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) as a postdoctoral fellow in the company’s West London office. Her supervisors and colleagues at Del Valle University were highly supportive and arranged to take over her responsibilities temporarily in her absence.
At GSK she joined the team conducting trials on tafenoquine, an 8-aminoquinoline medicine that is being investigated as a potential treatment for malaria. The objective of the clinical programme is to establish whether a single dose of tafenoquine could be an effective treatment against Plasmodium vivax, which causes the most common form of malaria in Latin America, South East Asia and the horn of Africa.
In tandem, Osorio worked on the analysis of data from one of the trials that assessed a diagnostic test for deficiency of the enzyme glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase (G6PD). People affected by this deficiency may experience rupturing of their red blood cells when taking medicines from the 8-aminoquinoline class so need to be identified before treatment.
“The project was important for me personally and career wise, and I feel privileged to have had this year at GSK. I am really grateful to TDR, not just for their financial support but for helping me structure the experience at GSK,” Osorio says.
Taking internationally gained knowledge home
For Justin Green of GSK’s Diseases of the Developing World programme, who served as Osorio’s supervisor during her fellowship, one of the main benefits of the Career Development Fellowship is that it builds a new cadre of scientific leaders. “Lyda learned a great deal about clinical trials, but even more importantly, she developed her own style as a leader. When she left, I was confident she would use that skill to run clinical trials at her home institution and produce high-quality data,” he says.
Dr Fabian Mendez Paz, Director of the School of Public health at Del Valle University in Cali, agrees that Osorio’s personal development was every bit as important as her growth as a researcher. “When she left she was already a natural leader, but during the fellowship she gained new confidence in how to make doors open, overcome obstacles and reach her goals,” he says.
Osorio went back to her position at Del Valle in 2014 and a year later was promoted to coordinator of the doctoral programme in health sciences. “On my return, I wanted to share my experience with everyone at the university and demystify what research and development means. I gave talks and encouraged my own students about opportunities they could have in their own careers,” she says.
Osorio’s experience as a TDR fellow only deepened her commitment to addressing neglected diseases. “I am mainly interested in addressing the problem of why there has been so little research on diseases of poverty, and in that way I completely share TDR’s vision,” she says. “I believe that in low-and-middle-income countries at some point we should be able to do research and development for our own products with our own ideas and our own platforms to solve our own problems.” Osorio, along with a group of other former Career Development Fellows, is building a platform for the development of local ideas for innovation in public health.