Physician-scientist Keith McCrae, MD, has officially joined the Cleveland Clinic as a physician in the Department of Hematologic Oncology and Blood Disorders within the Taussig Cancer Institute and as a research scientist in Lerner Research Institute's Cell Biology. Not entirely new to Cleveland Clinic, Dr. McCrae has been an external collaborator from Case Western Reserve University on a Cleveland Clinic-based five-year $13.5M Specialized Center for Clinically Oriented Research (SCCOR) grant from the National Institutes of Health since 2006. This grant, headed by Roy Silverstein, MD, Chair, Cell Biology, funds multi-institutional research on the cellular and genetic causes of arterial thrombosis, or blood clots.
Originally from Maine, Dr. McCrae earned his undergraduate degree from Dartmouth College and his MD degree from Duke University. After his residency in Internal Medicine at Duke, Dr. McCrae completed his fellowship in Hematology/Oncology at the University of Pennsylvania. During this time, he did a postdoctoral research fellowship that initiated his interest in studying the biology behind antiphospholipid syndrome (APS), a clinical disorder characterized by blood clotting in both arteries and veins and recurrent fetal loss. Today, his laboratory continues research in that area, as well as in the function of a protein called kininogen, which has a known role in the pathway that controls blood clotting. Subsequent studies have shown that kininogen also plays a role in regulating angiogenesis, a process through which new blood vessels are formed. Altogether, Dr. McCrae's research focuses not only on factors involved in blood biology, but also on the cells that line blood vessels. His dual role as physician and as a researcher gives him a unique perspective on how biology of the blood and related systems influence human health and disease.