Ellen Wald, MD, with Co-Investigators, Gregory DeMuri, MD, and James Gern, MD, were recently awarded $309,167 from the National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIH/NIAID). Their project, “Nasal cytokine responses in children with viral upper respiratory infection,” will capitalize on a large collection of respiratory specimens previously obtained from children with upper respiratory illnesses. This study is based on the premise that analysis of selected nasal cytokines at 3 days will accurately predict those children at high-risk for developing sinusitis and at 10 days will predict the likelihood of spontaneous resolution vs. the necessity for antibiotic therapy. There is great potential to identify children with clinically defined sinusitis for whom antibiotics can be safely withheld thereby avoiding cost, adverse effects and the emergence of antibiotic resistance.