Titilayo Ilori, MD, MSc

My various experiences and training have resulted in a strong desire to improve outcomes and survival of individuals with chronic kidney disease (CKD), particularly in disadvantaged populations. I am interested in the effect of diet and lifestyle in the development and progression of CKD and ApolipoproteinL1 Nephropathy. I started in research as a research assistant in the United Kingdom where I learned the fundamentals of population-based research in nutritional epidemiology in the department of Public Health at the University of Manchester.

I then formal training in basic science during my nephrology fellowship at Emory University. There, I worked on a translational project looking at the role of calcineurin inhibitors in the phosphorylation of the urea transporter. I decided to pursue a clinical research career after my fellowship training and completed the Master of Science in Clinical Research degree at Emory in 2015. I am a co-investigator in the H3Africa Kidney Disease Research Network and this has equipped me with on-ground training of staff in Africa, protocol development and execution, and data management and analysis with the Bioinformatics Core. I was also a co-investigator in the All of Us Research Program (AoURP), a part of the NIH-supported Precision Medicine Initiative. I gained hands-on experience in building clinical research infrastructure and high-volume recruitment and enrollment in a large clinical research enterprise. I was the Associate Director of Clinical Research and Global Health Initiatives and played an integral role in recruiting >30,000 research participants for the AoURP recorded in a recent article in the Journal of Clinical and Translational Science (PMID: 32004412).

I was awarded a K23 grant from the NIDDK in 2020 to study Diet, CKD and ApolipoproteinL1 Nephropathy (DK119542). I am looking at diet and CKD progression as well as gene x environment interactions in APOL1 nephropathy in sub-Saharan Africa. I have a commitment to mentoring and training in research. I have mentored three fellows one who is an Assistant Professor at Emory University and multiple masters’ level students.