Dr. Toyohiro Hirai
Japan
Dr. Toyohiro Hirai (Japan)
Toyohiro Hirai is Professor and Chair, Department of Respiratory Medicine, Graduate School of Medicine Kyoto University, and is also deputy director of Kyoto University Hospital, Japan. He has been Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Japanese Respiratory Society since 2022. He is a respiratory physician, specializing especially in pulmonary physiology and structure-function relationships in his research.
Dr. Yoshikazu Inoue
Japan
Dr. Yoshikazu Inoue (Japan)
Dr. Yoshikazu Inoue, M.D., Ph.D.
Osaka Anti-Tuberculosis Association, Osaka Fukujuji Hospital, Osaka, Japan, advisor
National Hospital Organization Kinki-Chuo Chest Medical Center, Osaka, Japan, visiting researcher
Dr. Yoshikazu Inoue is a world-renowned pulmonologist and researcher, who is expert in Interstitial Lung diseases(ILD) and rare lung diseases such as pulmonary alveolar proteinosis(PAP), lymphangioleiomyomatosis(LAM)). From 1994 to 1997, he studied granulomatous lung diseases and pulmonary fibrosis at National Jewish Center for Immunology and Respiratory Medicine in Denver, Colorado. From 1997, he has worked in National Hospital Organization(NHO) Kinki-Chuo Chest Medical Center, Osaka, Japan. From 2011, he was an Invited Professor, Infection, Immunology and Oncology Cooperating Course, Graduate School of Medicine, Osaka University. From 2014, he was a group leader of the NHO Respiratory Network. From 2023, in addition to NHO Kinki-Chuo Chest Medical Center, he started to work in the Osaka Anti-Tuberculosis Association Osaka Fukujuji Hospital, as an advisor. He has conducted or collaborated many international/domestic official guidelines, global clinical trials, and international/domestic multicenter studies. He also has served patient societies of LAM, PAP and ILD.
Dr. Takashi Iwanaga
Japan
Dr. Takashi Iwanaga (Japan)
Dr. Takashi Iwanaga graduated from Kindai University and obtained Doctor of Medicine in 1990, and was received Ph. D. in 1996. He studied clinic and conducted research in the field of respiratory medicine and allergy at the Department of Respiratory Medicine and Allergology, Kindai University Faculty of Medicine (1990~2021). He studied abroad at the Department of Respiratory Cell and Molecular Biology, Southampton General Hospital, University of Southampton (Prof. Stephen T Holgate) (2000-2002). Currently, He is a professor at Kindai University Hospital and director of the Center for General Medical Education and Training. He served as a member of the committee for Japanese Guidelines for Asthma Prevention and Management (2015, 2018), Management of Refractory Asthma (2019, 2023) and the Allergen Immunotherapy (2022). Since 2021, he has served as Head of the Clinical Allergy and Immunology Assembly of the Asia-Pacific Respiratory Society.
Prof. Hiromi Matsubara
Japan
Prof. Hiromi Matsubara (Japan)
Hiromi Matsubara, MD, PhD, is currently the Deputy Director of National Hospital Organization Okayama Medical Center, Okayama, Japan. After finishing his fellowship at National Cardiovascular Center, Osaka, Japan in 1993. He became an Assistant Professor of Department of Physiology II at Okayama University Graduate School of Medicine and Dentistry. He became an Assistant Professor of Department of Cardiovascular Medicine in 1997 and the Associate Professor in 2000. He then became the Clinical Professor of Department of Cardiovascular Medicine and the Director of Department of Cardiology at Okayama Medical Center.
His investigative interests have focused on clinical and physiologic aspects of pulmonary hypertension. He started balloon pulmonary angioplasty (BPA) for chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension in 2004 and has experienced about 3000 procedures of BPA in more than 500 patients during 19 years. He has made Department of Cardiology at Okayama Medical Center as the largest BPA center in Japan.
Prof. Yasutaka Nakano
Japan
Prof. Yasutaka Nakano (Japan)
Professor Yasutaka Nakano is a physician-scientist. He graduated in medicine from Kyoto University, Japan, and received his medical license. After completing his residency and obtaining board certification in pulmonary medicine, he began his research career. His research focused on the structure-function relationship of lung diseases, and he mainly used computed tomography (CT) data and quantitatively evaluated various parameters of lung structures. He is one of the first to develop software for quantitative evaluation of lung structures. Using the original software, he studied the relationship between lung structural changes and functional changes, including pulmonary function tests, physical constitution, symptoms, prognosis, and so on. Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is his main research target disease, and he proposed the phenotyping of COPD, which has been widely accepted worldwide. He is now a professor of medicine at Shiga University of Medical Science, Japan, and he continues to conduct research vigorously.
Prof. Kazuhiro Yatera
Japan
Prof. Kazuhiro Yatera (Japan)
Respiratory physician and working as the professor of Department of Respiratory Medicine, University of Occupational and Environmental Health, Japan, located in the northeast of Kyushu island in Japan.
Specialized clinical fields are general respiratory medicine, occupational lung disease including pneumoconiosis and occupational asthma, obstructive lung disease (asthma and COPD), interstitial lung diseases and respiratory infections.
Research interests focus on the occupational and environmental pollution exposure on respiratory health and diseases, and also bacterial, mycobacterial and viral respiratory pathogens in acute and chronic lower respiratory tract infections such as bacterial/viral pneumonia, nontuberculous mycobacteriosis and bronchiectasis.
It is my great pleasure to work as the Chairperson of the Central Congress Committee and Head-elect of the Environmental & Occupational Health and epidemiology (EOHE) assembly in APSR.
A/Prof. Takeshi Yoshida
Japan
A/Prof. Takeshi Yoshida (Japan)
Dr. Yoshida is a graduate from Mie University School of Medicine (MD) in Japan. His graduate research training (PhD) was completed in Osaka where he demonstrated lung injury resulting from strong spontaneous effort during mechanical ventilation. He furthered this during a year’s work with Dr. Amato (University of São Paulo) where he described ‘Pendelluft’, a new mechanism of effort-dependent lung injury, and developed extensive knowledge of pleural pressure mechanics. He has completed an additional 3-year post-doctoral fellowship in Toronto (Drs. Kavanagh and Brochard) exploring translational research on pleural pressure and its manipulation. Dr. Yoshida has won multiple hospital, university and international awards, most recently the ‘Global Rising Star’ award from the Australian and New Zealand Intensive Care Society. He has taken up a faculty position in Osaka University Graduate School of Medicine (July 2018). Ultimately, Dr. Yoshida pursues translational research towards helping critically ill patients with acute lung disease