George G. Rhoads , MD, MPH
Chairman, TLC National Steering Committee — Director, Environmental Health Division, EOHSI, UMDNJ
- Site
- Newark
- Affiliation
- EOHSI — UMDNJ / Robert Wood Johnson Medical School
- TLC era
- 1990s
- Tags
- Steering Committee ChairCLEARS TrialLead AbatementNewark PI
Director of the Environmental Health Division at the Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences Institute (EOHSI), UMDNJ — Robert Wood Johnson Medical School. Principal Investigator of the New Jersey clinical site and Chairman of the TLC National Steering Committee.
Rhoads led the parallel CLEARS trial (Community Lead Education and Reduction Study), a randomized study of biweekly household cleaning conducted at the same New Jersey site. CLEARS showed that intensive dust-control intervention reduced blood lead levels by 17% (12.4 → 10.3 µg/dL); children in homes cleaned 20+ times saw a 34% reduction. CLEARS demonstrated what intensive environmental intervention could achieve — the kind of intervention TLC did not provide.
Chair, TLC Steering Committee. Oversaw the four clinical sites and adjudicated cross-site protocol decisions.
Co-Principal Investigator at the Newark clinical site (UMDNJ + Newark VA).
Co-authored a 1996 letter to Pediatrics with Rogan describing the TLC trial design, noting that enrollment began at 20 µg/dL (not 25 as stated by the AAP Committee on Drugs) and raising a dosing concern: young TLC children needed up to twice as much succimer when dosed by body surface area rather than weight.
- 1996 TLC design letter to Pediatrics with Rogan
- 1999 CLEARS dust-control trial published — 17–34% BLL reduction
- 2001 TLC primary outcome paper