The Division of Pulmonary and Sleep Medicine provides services to patients with pulmonary or sleep disorders at Memorial Hermann Hospital, Lyndon B. Johnson General Hospital, and Select Specialty Hospital. Out-patient clinics include the UT Professional Building pulmonary clinic and the Lyndon B. Johnson General Hospital pulmonary and sleep medicine clinics. In addition, the faculty staff the pulmonary function testing laboratory and the sleep study center, perform bronchoscopies and other pulmonary diagnostic and therapeutic interventions, and offer other procedures for outpatients and inpatients.

The faculty and fellows are closely involved in the education of medical students and residents. Our faculty lecture at regional, national and international meetings and symposiums, and our fellows have presented research projects and case reports at national annual conferences, including American College of Chest Physicians and The American Thoracic Society. Many of our faculty also participate in clinical research and quality improvement projects. 

The current research efforts of the division include ongoing funded and non-funded research in interstitial lung diseases, sleep disorders, pulmonary hypertension, ARDS, sepsis, ICU outcomes, patient safety, healthcare services research, and ventilator weaning strategies.

Pulmonary & Sleep Medicine Director

Richard J. Castriotta, M.D.

Richard J. Castriotta, M.D. , FCCP is a Professor of Internal Medicine, Pulmonary Division Director and Chair-elect of the Interfaculty Council at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston. He is Associate Faculty in the John P. McGovern Center for Health, Humanities and the Human Spirit and in the Department of Pediatrics. He is the Chief of Pulmonary Medicine, Chairman of the Institutional Ethics Committee and Medical Director of the Sleep Disorders Center at Memorial Hermann Hospital in the Texas Medical Center and Co- Medical Director of the Harris County Hospital District Sleep Disorders Center at Lyndon. B. Johnson Hospital in Houston. He is Program Director for the University of Texas Sleep Medicine Fellowship and serves on the Coordinating Committee for the University of Texas Neurophysiology Fellowship. He has served as President of the Southern Sleep Society, Chairman of the Connecticut Thoracic Society Section on Sleep Medicine, Chair of the American College of Chest Physicians (ACCP) Sleep NetWork and Vice Chair of the Southern Medical Association Chest Disease Section. He is currently a member of the ACCP Sleep Institute Steering Committee and the SEEK Editorial Board. He is a Fellow of the American College of Chest Physicians and of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine. His most recent research interests have involved sleep disorders in traumatic brain injury, REM sleep behavior disorder in Parkinson’s disease, sleep-related hypoventilation in children, complex sleep apnea, methods of monitoring airflow during sleep, the diagnosis of sarcoidosis and medical ethics involving end-of-life decisions. His clinical interests include sleep disorders, interstitial lung disease, pulmonary hypertension, asthma and tuberculosis.