Dr. Branche is an Associate Professor of Medicine at the University of Rochester. Dr. Branche received her Bachelor of Arts degree in Biology at the University of Pennsylvania and Doctorate in Medicine at American University of the Caribbean. She completed residency in Internal Medicine at NYU Langone Hospital-Brooklyn in Brooklyn, NY and infectious disease fellowship at the University of Rochester. She currently has a clinical inpatient practice comprised of both general infectious diseases and HIV medicine patients and is also a New York State designated HIV/AIDS provider. During her years at the University of Rochester her focus in research involved the use of viral molecular and immunological diagnostic assays to explore the pathogenesis and host response to acute viral respiratory illnesses in adults.
She is currently Co-Principle Investigator for the UR Vaccine Treatment and Evaluation Unit (UR VTEU) one of ten NIH funded network sites in the US. Her current research activities explore clinical disease, pathogenesis, development of therapeutics and vaccine biology related to infection with viral and bacterial respiratory pathogens. Studies include assessment of asymptomatic carriage of Streptococcus pneumoniae and the impact of pneumococcal vaccination, surveillance of epidemic influenza infections and immunologic mechanisms of protection following natural infection versus vaccination, the development of pandemic influenza vaccines, population-based studies of RSV infection and the development of vaccine and anti-viral agents for RSV. She is actively involved in the NIH and University of Rochester research response to COVID19 and is helping conduct, natural history, therapeutic and vaccine studies. She is a member of the Infectious Disease Society of America, the NIH IDCRC Emerging Infections Expert Working Group and the Adult RSV Vaccine ACIP working group. Dr. Branche has published several peer-reviewed articles, reviews and book chapters related to respiratory viral pathogens in adults.
