Every Placenta Has a Story – An Interview with Dr. Lena Serghides

For Dr. Lena Serghides, some of the most important lessons about pregnancy research did not come from a laboratory; they came from listening.

They came from women living with HIV who challenged her to look beyond the virus itself and ask what lifelong treatment meant for mothers and babies, and from a midwife who taught her that every placenta carries the story of the woman behind it. Along the way, she realized that some of the biggest gaps in medicine weren’t questions answered incorrectly; they were questions that had never been asked.

In our conversation, Dr. Serghides reflects on her unconventional path from business school to becoming one of Canada’s leading researchers in HIV and pregnancy, why she believes the placenta is “the coolest organ of them all,” and how listening to community members shaped her approach to science.

Can you tell me about your journey into research, from your initial interest in immunology and infectious diseases to your current role today?

From an early age, Dr. Serghides was fascinated by science, a curiosity she credits to her chemist grandfather. However, she initially enrolled in business studies, following in her parents’ footsteps. “I showed up to class and people were wearing suits. I thought, ‘Oh my God… is this what I want to do?’” she explained. “At some point you’re going to have to break up with your parents. You have to say, ‘I’m going to make my own decision.’” She switched into biology, later completing her PhD with Dr. Kevin Kain, where malaria research quickly sparked her interest in host-pathogen interactions.

Dr. Serghides’ transition into HIV research in pregnancy was influenced by both scientific curiosity and personal experience. “Motherhood is lived experience too,” she reflects. Rather than assuming what pregnant women living with HIV needed, Dr. Serghides listened. “Our virus is controlled. Why don’t you look at what the drugs are doing?” This inspired her to establish the Angiogenesis and Adverse Pregnancy Outcomes in Women with HIV (AAPH) cohort in Toronto, which helps her lab investigate how HIV and antiretroviral therapies influence pregnancy and fetal development. These conversations reinforced a philosophy that continues to guide her research today: the most meaningful scientific questions often come from listening to the people most affected by the answers.

Was there a defining moment or experience that led you to pursue women’s health research, and how did it shape your path?

Rather than a single defining moment, Dr. Serghides describes her journey into women’s health as a gradual realization. Throughout her work in HIV, she found herself repeatedly drawn to the same problem: women, particularly pregnant women, were often overlooked in research. “The research kind of took me there because those were the questions that needed answering, and they weren’t being addressed as well as they should have been.”

Those gaps became even more tangible through conversations with community members. One story that has stayed with her is that of W.M., a longtime community advocate living with HIV. After giving birth to one child without antiretroviral therapy in Africa and another while receiving treatment in Canada, W.M. reflected on the striking difference between the two pregnancies. “While holding her son born in Canada, [W.M.] said, ‘My baby was so small. He looked so different… The only difference was the drug.’ Those kinds of things really motivate you.”

Much of your work has centered on understanding how HIV & antiretrovirals affect the placenta. What do you find most fascinating about the placenta, and why should immunologists be paying attention to it?

“The placenta is the coolest organ of them all! It’s the only organ formed by two individuals. What immunologist wouldn’t want to study something that’s both fetal and maternal at the same time?” she said enthusiastically.

Early in her career, she worked closely with a midwife who viewed every placenta as part of a much larger story. She taught her that “…there’s a woman attached. She has experiences, and those experiences influence the pregnancy outcomes that she’s going to have.” That mentorship fundamentally changed how Dr. Serghides approached research. Rather than viewing placentas as isolated samples, she began to see each one as inseparable from the lived experiences of the woman who carried it. Trauma, stress, and access to care all become part of the biological story.

“You get a bigger understanding of what being a woman is and what women’s health entails. It’s not just the medicalized aspects. It’s having someone listen to you, understand you, and spend time realizing that the struggles you come from, and experiences you’ve had are going to influence you.”

You work with both mouse models and human placental samples, each with their own strengths and limitations. How do you decide which model is best suited to answer a particular question?

“I always start with the clinical. Then we develop a model, but the model is only helpful if it corresponds to what you see clinically,” she explains. “The clinical samples guide the development and validation of the model. Then everything you learn from the model can go back to the clinical side to help explain what you’re seeing.” This approach is particularly important in pregnancy research, where many developmental stages cannot be studied directly in humans. “You can’t get a placenta midterm. You can’t get a fetal brain. That’s where the models become so valuable.”

Despite major advances in HIV treatment and maternal health, many questions remain unanswered. What discoveries are you most excited about in the years ahead?

While an HIV cure remains the field’s ultimate goal, Dr. Serghides is excited by new therapeutic approaches that could improve care for pregnant women. “I’m also really excited about broadly neutralizing antibodies and other non-drug-based treatments. They have particular promise in pregnancy because they could reduce some of the toxicities associated with antiretroviral drugs,” she notes. “New treatments mean more work for us – which is awesome.”

What’s a moment in your career that made you step back and say, “This is why I do what I do?”

“I get that feeling every time I present to a community-based audience,” she says after a moment of reflection. “I worry that I’m going to scare them with the work that we present, but they’re almost always excited and they come and ask questions… That’s when you realize that what you’re studying is actually important to them.”

Brief Bio

Dr. Lena Serghides is a senior scientist at Toronto General Hospital Research Institute, an Associate Professor in the Department of Immunology at the University of Toronto, and is a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Maternal-Child Health and HIV.