Fazle Rabbi Chowdhury
Research Fellow
- Institute for Neuroscience and Cardiovascular Research
- The Queens Medical Research Institute
Contact details
- Email: Rabbi.Chowdhury@ed.ac.uk
Address
- Street
-
47 Little France Crescent
Edinburgh BioQuarter - City
- Edinburgh
- Post code
- EH16 4TJ
Background
Dr Fazle Rabbi Chowdhury graduated from Khulna Medical College, Khulna, Bangladesh, in 2004. He later obtained his Master's in Tropical and infectious disease from Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, UK, FCPS in Internal Medicine from Bangladesh College of Physicians and Surgeons (BCPS) and DPhil from the University of Oxford. He received multiple awards during his scientific and academic career, such as the ISC Young Investigator Award, Young Physician Leader Award, BMU Best Researcher Award, National Best Teacher (University category) award and others. He was also awarded the best PhD student from the Nuffield Department of Medicine, University of Oxford, in 2018 for his thesis on Melioidosis and sepsis. His area of research interest is pesticide poisoning, snakebite, clinical trials, tropical immunology, sepsis, and Arboviral infections.
Qualifications
DPhil, MSc, FRCP, FCPS
Responsibilities & affiliations
Associate Professor, Dept. of Internal Medicine, Bangladesh Medical University
Deputy Director, NIHR RIGHT4: Preventing Deaths from Acute Poisoning in LMIC
Visiting Research Affiliate, Mahidol Oxford Research Unit (MORU), Thailand
Open to PhD supervision enquiries?
Yes
Research summary
My work’s major aim is to reduce mortality and morbidity due to pesticide poisoning (responsible for more than 150,000 deaths) and snakebite (causes more than 80,000 deaths), a major problem in LMICs. To achieve this, I conduct phase II and phase III RCTs in various tertiary-level hospitals in Bangladesh, repurposing existing drugs. This is to understand better the pharmacology and effectiveness of different antidotes and additives, and improve treatments. I try to explore different clinical and laboratory scores to predict the outcome of poisoning and sepsis. My work also leads to studying diagnostic and prognostic serological and immune markers of poisonings (pesticide and methanol) and sepsis (Dengue, TB, etc.). I collaborate with pharmacology and immunology laboratories to detect specific pesticides, to understand the mechanisms of complications and identify potential prognostic markers. I am also engaged with social scientists and anthropologists to better understand the care pathways and community perspectives of snakebite, pesticide and other poisonings in Bangladesh
Current project grants
1. Deputy Director. NIHR RIGHT4 grant (£ 4.9 million) titled ‘preventing deaths from acute poisoning in low-and middle-income countries’ (April 2023 to March 2028)
2. Principal Investigator. Poisoning and envenomation in Bangladesh. Toxicology Society of Bangladesh ( £ 100k), March 2025 to February 2027)
Past project grants
1. MRC/Wellcome Trust global health challenge grant (£ 3.34 million) as a Co-PI to conduct a clinical trial titled, ‘’Effectiveness of calcium channel blockade for organophosphorus and carbamate pesticide poisoning - an open, pragmatic, 3-arm RCT repurposing two widely available licensed medicines’’ (July 2019 to January 2025)
2. CDC, USA zoonotic disease research allocation ($75K) as a Principal investigator for “Awareness and capacity development amongst clinicians and microbiologists to improve diagnosis of melioidosis in Bangladesh” (April 2021 to September 2021)