Lauffenburger is beginning her fourth year of graduate studies at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy with Assistant Professor Gang Fang, PhD, as her adviser. Her research focuses on pharmacoepidemiology and health-services research, specifically on the use, adherence, and health outcomes of medications for cardiovascular diseases using large administrative health-care databases. She completed her PharmD at the University of Pittsburgh in 2010.
The PEO Scholar Award was established in 1991 and provides a $15,000 merit-based award for women of the United States and Canada who are pursuing a doctoral-level degree. In addition to the PEO award, Lauffenburger is supported through a T32 fellowship funded by the National Institute of Nursing Research and is a five-year Royster Fellow of the UNC Graduate School.
]]>Rishi Desai, a graduate student in the Division of Pharmaceutical Outcomes and Policy, examined these data, finding that 11 percent of reported medication errors involved an individual's transition into nursing home care. In further analysis of the data, it was observed that these errors occurring during patient transitions had a higher likelihood of resulting in patient harm compared to errors occurring later.
Desai received a Graduate Education Advancement Board Impact Award from the Graduate School at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in recognition of his work. Each year the Graduate School recognizes graduate students whose research is of exceptional benefit to North Carolina. This year forty-one Impact Awards were given out.
Working in collaboration with UNC-Chapel Hill’s Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research, Desai was able to identify patient and treatment factors that increased risk of a medication error. His research findings give nursing home administrators key information toward preventing future errors—and toward enhancing the quality and safety controls surrounding medication use among nursing home residents.
"His work has been widely cited and is being used to help identify ways to reduce medication errors," said Richard Hansen, PhD, who serves on Desai’s dissertation committee.
Desai received a BS in pharmacy from Sardar Patel University in India and an MS in pharmacy administration from the University of Houston. After receiving his PhD from the School in May 2013, Desai is pursuing a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University in Boston.
]]>Can genetic differences predict beta-blocker effectiveness in patients with heart failure? Jasmine Talameh, PharmD, a graduate student in the Division of Pharmacotherapy and Experimental Therapeutics, identified a genotype that could potentially be used to select patients with heart failure who would benefit from beta-blocker treatment. She also found that beta-blockers may not be as effective in African-American heart failure patients who carry a particular variation from that genotype.
Talameh received a Graduate Education Advancement Board Impact Award from the Graduate School at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in recognition of her work. Each year the Graduate School recognizes graduate students whose research is of exceptional benefit to North Carolina. This year forty-one Impact Awards were given out.
Her findings were based on a candidate gene study of 722 heart-failure patients with nine years of vital status follow-up. She studied eleven genetic variants in all.
Follow-up research is necessary, but these early findings suggest that testing for certain genetic variants could potentially identify patients with heart failure who would benefit from beta-blocker treatment.
“The genetic mutation that Dr. Talameh found could potentially identify heart failure patients that require additional or alternative medications to help them live longer and reduce hospitalizations,” said adviser Herb Patterson, PharmD.
Talameh entered the PhD program at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy in 2008 after receiving her doctor of pharmacy from the University of Pittsburgh. She is a first author on five publications during her time at the School. She has received several research grants from the National Institutes of Health and the American Foundation for Pharmaceutical Education, and her research in the field of heart disease and heart failure has been recognized by the American College of Cardiology.
]]>James Byrne, a graduate student in the Division of Molecular Pharmaceutics, designed and fabricated an electric field-assisted delivery device that would administer gemcitabine directly into the tumors. His preliminary evaluations of the device's effectiveness in a mouse model with patient-derived pancreatic tumors indicate a greater reduction in tumor volume using the device compared to gemcitabine delivered intravenously.
Byrne received a Graduate Education Advancement Board Impact Award from the Graduate School at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in recognition of his work. Each year the Graduate School recognizes graduate students whose research is of exceptional benefit to North Carolina. This year forty-one Impact Awards were given out.
Overall, local drug delivery using the device could have dramatic implications for the treatment of pancreatic cancer and other difficult-to-treat solid tumors. Drug delivery using the device may also reduce the side effects that accompany intravenous administration of chemotherapies and improve the quality of life for pancreatic cancer patients.
“I have absolutely no doubt that James will be an extraordinary and exemplary physician-scientist who will provide significant contributions to science and translational medicine in his career,” said adviser Joseph DeSimone, PhD, Chancellor's Eminent Professor of Chemistry and director of the Frank Hawkins Kenan Institute of Private Enterprise.
Byrne earned a bachelor’s degree in biomedical engineering from the University of Texas at Austin. He entered the School’s PhD program in fall 2008 and is pursuing a combined MD/PhD.
]]>Discovery of a predictive biomarker could enable clinicians to identify patients at high risk of neuropathy prior to initiation of treatment.
Working with a cohort of patients derived from the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center's Carolina Breast Cancer Study database, graduate student Dan Hertz, PharmD, PhD, analyzed genetic and demographic data to establish that paclitaxel-treated patients who carry a certain genotype were more susceptible to neuropathy.
Hertz received a Graduate Education Advancement Board Impact Award from the Graduate School at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in recognition of his work. Each year the Graduate School recognizes graduate students whose research is of exceptional benefit to North Carolina. This year forty-one Impact Awards were given out. Hertz is a graduate student in the Division of Pharmacotherapy and Experimental Therapeutics.
Successful prospective testing for the genotype could give clinicians a predictive tool to identify which of the hundreds of patients treated with paclitaxel in North Carolina each year are at increased neuropathy risk, enabling individualization of treatment to maximize effectiveness while minimizing toxicity.
“The continued development of this approach could one day lead to pre-paclitaxel treatment genotyping that guides treatment decision in order to optimize efficacy while limiting toxicity for the hundreds of cancer patients in North Carolina,” said adviser Howard McLeod, PharmD, Fred Eshelman Distinguished Professor and director of the UNC Institute for Pharmacogenomics and Individualized Therapy.
Hertz received his doctor of pharmacy from the Ernest Mario School of Pharmacy at Rutgers University in 2008. He was awarded a predoctoral fellowship from the AFPE in 2010 that was renewed in 2011. He also received the Young Philanthropist Award from the Cancer Institute of New Jersey in 2011. Hertz has been first author on five published scientific articles with two more in press.
Hertz is currently a research assistant professor at the University of Michigan College of Pharmacy.
]]>Kashuba studies the role of antiretroviral therapy in preventing the transmission of HIV along with the optimal dosing and drug combinations for treating HIV infection. She works to better understand the interactions between drugs and between drugs and signaling molecules, as well as the roles that gender and ethnicity play in the way drugs are processed by the body. She plays a significant role in the $32-million UNC-led Collaboratory of AIDS Researchers for Eradication, a comprehensive effort to eliminate HIV infection.
The McNeills have given $333,000 that will create a $500,000 endowed professorship at the School once it is combined with $167,000 in state matching funds. This is the third professorship John “Sandy” McNeill Jr. has endowed at the pharmacy school.
“Mr. McNeill has made an impact on health care at every level,” says Bob Blouin, PharmD, dean of the School and Vaughn and Nancy Bryson Distinguished Professor. “We are grateful not just for his financial support but also for his expertise and the countless hours he has devoted to the advancement of the School and the profession.”
A 1972 graduate of the School, McNeill has distinguished himself as a pharmacist, businessman, and entrepreneur during a career that has included time both in patient care and in the pharmaceutical industry, including a role as founding director of one of the largest clinical research organizations in the world, Pharmaceutical Product Development Inc.
McNeill has served three terms as a member of the board of directors of the Pharmacy Foundation of NC, Inc., including one term as chair. He has also been a member of the Wilmington advisory board for United Carolina Bank and the executive board of the Cape Fear Council of the Boy Scouts of America.
Kashuba earned a bachelor’s degree in pharmacy from the University of Toronto and completed a general practice residency at Women's College Hospital. She practiced as a critical care pharmacist at Mount Sinai Hospital, in Toronto before attending the State University of New York at Buffalo to earn her doctor of pharmacy. She completed postdoctoral pharmacology training at the Clinical Pharmacology Research Center at Bassett Healthcare in Cooperstown, New York.
In 1997 Kashuba joined the UNC-Chapel Hill faculty. She is director of the UNC Center for AIDS Research Clinical Pharmacology and Analytical Chemistry Core and director of the Pharmacology Core for the UNC-Delaney CARE HIV eradication initiative. She is a diplomat of the American Board of Clinical Pharmacology. Kashuba is the author of more than 140 peer-reviewed publications and has received more than $18 million in research funding.
]]>The professorship is a gift of Nancy McFarlane, mayor of Raleigh, and Ron McFarlane. The couple operates MedPro Rx Inc., an accredited specialty infusion pharmacy that provides medications and services to clients with chronic illness. Nancy McFarlane founded the company in 2002 and serves as the company’s president and CEO. Her husband is chief operating officer.
“We are very grateful to the McFarlanes for their support of the School and the profession,” say Bob Blouin, PharmD, dean and the Vaughn and Nancy Bryson Distinguished Professor. “We are especially appreciative of their recognition of how important it is to attract and retain top-notch faculty at Carolina.”
Rhoney came to the School at the start of 2012 from Wayne State University, where she spent sixteen years working with the neurocritical care team at Detroit Receiving Hospital. Her research has focused mainly on traumatic brain injury and acute stroke, and she has expertise in the pharmacokinetics of pharmacologic agents in cerebrospinal fluid and the therapeutic optimization of neurocritical care.
The McFarlanes graduated from Virginia Commonwealth University in 1980 and began their careers in hospital pharmacy. Nancy McFarlane has been a member of the Raleigh City Council since 2007 and was elected mayor in 2012. She is also in her second term as a member of the board of directors of the Pharmacy Foundation of North Carolina, Inc. Ron McFarlane has held positions as sales director, consultant, and executive at several companies in the health-care industry. He has served on the national board of directors for the Myasthenia Gravis Foundation and is a former board member of the local Wake County AIDS Service Agency.
When combined with state matching funds, the McFarlanes's gift will bring the endowment for this professorship to $500,000. Income generated by the endowment, estimated to be $25,000 annually once fully funded, will be used to provide salary and scholarship support to an outstanding scholar and researcher.
Rhoney received her BS in pharmacy and doctor of pharmacy from the University of Kentucky and completed a general clinical pharmacy residency and critical care specialty residency at UK. She was a clinical research/drug development fellow and clinical instructor at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy from 1993 to 1995. She joined the Wayne State University faculty in 1995, first as an adjunct professor while also serving as a clinical assistant professor at the University of Michigan College of Pharmacy, and then as an assistant professor of pharmacy practice in 1997. She was promoted to associate professor in 2003.
Rhoney is the author of more than sixty papers and fifteen book chapters and is a fellow of the American College of Clinical Pharmacy and of the American College of Critical Care Medicine.
]]>Lloyd received the 2013 Samuel B. Burrus Family Award for Community Service, which is presented to alumni and students who exhibit outstanding and unselfish civic, community, or church volunteer service outside the scope of regular pharmacy practice. The award is funded by the Pharmacy Foundation of North Carolina and is given by the Burrus family in memory of Samuel B. Burrus, a 1915 graduate of the Southern College of Pharmacy in Atlanta.
One award is presented annually to a student in the School, and one is presented to an alumna or alumnus. Recipients receive a $750 cash award, and they designate an additional $750 to the charity of their choice.
Lloyd, a 1965 graduate of the school, owns and operates Lloyd’s Pharmacy. Her father, Alan Lloyd, founded the pharmacy after graduating from the school in 1940. She has served on the Hillsborough town board since 1991 and is the town’s representative to the Orange Rural Fire Department, which her father helped launch. She also served on the committee to refurbish the town’s 250-year-old clock and contributed generously toward the restoration.
Lloyd’s greatest legacy in the community may be the preservation of 66 acres of mountainside and riverfront land along the Eno River, which she and her father donated to the Eno River Association. The land is designated an ecological area of national significance and protected forever as part of the Occaneechi Mountain State Natural Area.
“The citizens of Hillsborough know they can visit her store on King Street to not only fill their prescriptions but to also share their concerns or ask questions about town matters,” said Bob Blouin, PharmD, dean of the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy. “She takes the time to listen to everyone who comes through her door, and she exemplifies the qualities honored by the Burrus Award.”
Samuel Burrus, a native of Mooresboro in Cleveland County, worked in, owned, or co-owned drugstores in Asheville, Canton, Sylva, Bryson City and Fontana Lake. His children and grandchildren created the award in memory of his generous and caring nature and in honor of the impact he made on the communities in which he practiced.
Two of Burrus’s three children and three of his ten grandchildren earned pharmacy degrees at UNC-Chapel Hill. His oldest daughter, Blanche Burrus Clark, is a 1941 pharmacy graduate and lives in Chapel Hill.
]]>Shelton Earp, MD
Shelton "Shelley" Earp is the director of the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center and director of UNC Cancer Care. This award is given to an individual whose accomplishments and contributions have enhanced the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy as well as the profession of pharmacy at the local, state, national, or international level. In particular, the recipient has provided distinguished service to the School and is therefore considered an exceptional supporter of the School’s service and outreach initiatives.
Boka Hadzija Student Excellence Award
David Robert Steeb
Buxton Williams Hunter Award
Michelle Janan Sarwar
F.O. Bowman Award
Andrea Yuen Logan
George H. Cocolas Pharmacy Student Body Award
Maya Chen Wai
Jacobs Award in Medicinal Chemistry
Chun Ying “Kinny” Lin
Molecular Pharmaceutics Award
Leah Bethany Edenfield
John T. and Rebecca B. Henley Award in Pharmaceutical Outcomes and
Policy
Alina Robyn Sayner
Pharmacotherapy and Experimental Therapeutics Award
Jamielynn C. Sebaaly
John C. Hood Sr. Award in Practice Advancement and Clinical Education
Lucas Shane Wind
Ralph Rogers Sr. Award
John Taylor Schimmelfing
TEVA Outstanding Student Award
Rachel Dorothea Smith
T. R. Burgiss Family Award
Christina Helms Sherrill
PY1 Instructor of the Year
Russell Mumper, PhD, John McNeill Distinguished Professor and Vice Dean, Division of Molecular Pharmaceutics
PY2 Instructor of the Year
Robert Dupuis, PharmD, Clinical Associate Professor, Division of Pharmacotherapy and Experimental Therapeutics
PY3 Instructor of the Year
Heidi Anksorus, PharmD, Clinical Assistant Professor, Division of Practice Advancement and Clinical Education
Overall Instructor of the Year
Adam Persky, PhD, Clinical Associate Professor, Division of Pharmacotherapy and Experimental Therapeutics
Experiential Faculty Instructor of the Year
Debra Kemp, PharmD, Duke Region
Claude Paoloni Preceptor of the Year Award
Edward Sredzienski, MS, UNC Hospitals
Jonathan Craig Hale, 2013 PharmD Candidate
Evelyn Lloyd, BSPhar ’65
This award is presented to members of the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy family who exhibit outstanding and unselfish civic, community, or church volunteer service provided outside the scope of regular pharmacy practice. One award is presented to a student currently enrolled in the School. The second is awarded to an alumnus of the School or to a husband-and-wife team, at least one of whom is an alumnus. This award is funded by the Pharmacy Foundation of North Carolina and is given by the Burrus family in memory of Samuel B. Burrus, who graduated in 1915 from the Southern College of Pharmacy in Atlanta.
Eckel, an alumnus of the School, had been an adjunct assistant professor since 1999. He also serves as the associate director of pharmacy at UNC Hospitals and oversees the hospital’s pharmacy residency programs.
“In his dual role at the School and the hospital, Stephen has made numerous important contributions in education, practice, and research,” says Bob Blouin, PharmD, dean of the School. “He has proved himself as an innovator and played a vital role in strengthening the collaboration between the School and the hospital, which has benefitted both students and patients.”
Eckel has served as a preceptor, lecturer, and course coordinator for the School since 1997 and oversees the MS in pharmaceutical sciences program with a specialization in health-system pharmacy administration.
In 2009, he led the development of the Partnership in Patient Care, which combines the resources of the School and UNC Hospitals to increase the pharmacy services available to patients at the hospital, the amount of experiential education that pharmacy students receive at UNC, and the amount of point-of-care research being conducted.
Eckel was instrumental in developing the concept of Pharmacy Grand Rounds and partnering with the American Society of Health-System Pharmacy to launch this ongoing subscription-based continuing-education product in early 2013.
On the research front, Eckel investigates ways of improving the medication-use process to free up pharmacists to practice, and he has given talks around the world on that subject. He is also a leading expert on chemotherapy contamination in places that prepare and administer anticancer drugs, such as hospitals, pharmacies, clinics, and labs. In 2012, he and fellow School faculty member William Zamboni, PharmD, PhD, cofounded ChemoGLO LLC, a spinoff company that provides products and services to clean up surface contamination of anticancer agents and other hazardous drugs.
Eckel is a fellow of the American Society of Health-System Pharmacy and the American Pharmacists Association. In 2012, he received the Distinguished Achievement Award in Hospital and Institutional Practice from the American Pharmacists Association Academy of Pharmacy Practice and Management. In 2011, his pharmacy department at UNC Hospitals received the ASHP Best Practices Award.
]]>The center states that, for more than four decades, Caiola has promoted public service through his work with UNC Hospitals and the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy. After establishing the clinical pharmacy program at UNC Hospitals, he worked with Orange Chatham Comprehensive Health Service to move UNC into the community to improve the health care needs of the underserved. During that time, he also involved pharmacy students as charter members of the Student Health Action Coalition , the oldest health affairs student-run clinic in the country.
Tim Ivins, who nominated Caiola for the honor said that Caiola’s role at the University “is one of fulfilled service to others, largely through extending the health care to every city and town across the state and beyond.
According to the CCPS website, the award recognizes staff or faculty members of the UNC-Chapel Hill community who throughout their career have, in a collaborative and sustained manner, made a difference in the larger community by:
The award is based on a sustained record of service over a period of years carried out through the individual’s role(s) at the University rather than as a private citizen.
The award honors the contributions and values of Ned Brooks, who has served the University since 1972, making significant contributions to the mission of service and engagement, including a leadership role in the development of the Carolina Center for Public Service.
]]>In addition to the chapter awards, third-year student Justin Arnall won one of four Student Leadership Awards given annually to students in their third year of school across the country. This is the third time a member of CAPS has received this award. Previous UNC award winners are Elizabeth Alford in 2011 and Virginia Suiter in 1986.
Third-year student Stephanie Craycroft also represented the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy in the National Patient Counseling Competition. Craycroft won the UNC Patient Counseling Competition earlier in the spring semester and went on to compete at the national level at the annual meeting.
This meeting also signaled the conclusion of PY4 David Steeb’s term as president of APhA-ASP. Steeb’s presidential theme of Make Your Mark was shared with student pharmacists across the country. CAPS members served in a number of other leadership roles at APhA2013:
Clinical Associate Professor Macary Marciniak, PharmD, and Associate Professor Dennis Williams, PharmD, are the faculty advisers for CAPS.
]]>The study, published on the website of the journal Clinical Rheumatology, surveyed 228 patients who were on vasculitis medication and found that overall they reported a high level of adherence to their regimens. However, patients who were younger and had more symptoms of depression reported worse adherence on a follow-up survey three months after the initial questionnaire.
“Past studies have also shown a strong association between depression and nonadherence, so we believe that health-care providers should evaluate vasculitis patients for depressive symptoms and discuss adherence-related issues with those who show clinical signs of depression,” says Carpenter, a faculty member in the School’s Division of Pharmaceutical Outcomes and Policy.
“As for younger patients, one possible reason for their higher rate of nonadherence might be that they have less experience managing vasculitis medication regimens or that they have busier lifestyles that interfere with those regimens.”
The study also found a lower level of adherence among patients who experienced side effects. While that correlation was not statistically significant when other factors were taken into account, the researchers say this finding and past studies suggest that providers should help vasculitis patients manage drug-related side effects because it may ultimately improve adherence.
The study was funded in part by the National Institutes of Health. The coauthors on the paper are Susan Hogan, PhD, a research associate professor at the UNC Kidney Center, and Robert F. DeVellis, PhD, a professor at the Thurston Arthritis Research Center.
]]>The discovery is discussed in the cover story of the March 2013 issue of Nature Chemical Biology. Lindsey James, PhD, a research assistant professor at the School, is the first author for the article. Stephen Frye, a Fred Eshelman Distinguished Professor at the School and director of the School’s Center for Integrative Chemical Biology and Drug Discovery, is one of the corresponding authors.
The probe, named UNC1215, targets the L3MBTL3 methyl-lysine reader domain. Domains are structural and functional units within proteins, and they are usually responsible for a particular function or interaction. L3MBTL3 mediates interactions between proteins, which have historically been difficult to target with small, drug-like molecules.
“Many people believe that protein-protein interactions are difficult to target,” James says. “Often they have a large surface area, so it is hard for small molecules to go in and intervene.”
UNC1215, the researchers say, is the first known chemical probe for a methyl-lysine-reader domain. Protein methylation dynamics, James says, have been shown to play an important role in a number of biological processes. In addition, aberrant methylation levels are one mechanism by which those processes can contribute to disease.
“High-quality, potent, and selective chemical probes of methyl-lysine reader domains will serve as excellent tools in improving our understanding of their targets,” James says. “Before UNC1215, there were no known chemical probes for the more than 200 domains in the human genome that recognize methyl lysine. In that regard, it is a first-in-class compound. The goal is to use the chemical probe to understand the biology of the proteins that it targets.”
Almost 40 percent of the genes that drive cancer can be mapped to dysfunction within signaling pathways. In the last five years, chemical probe development has allowed researchers to make fundamental observations of the role of these pathways in cancer development and has pointed to potential targets for new therapies. Each of the complex interactions within the signaling pathways represents a potential point where a therapy can be applied, and the probes allow researchers to observe the overall effect of their perturbation on the disease state.
Frye’s lab will provide UNC1215 to researchers free of charge on request, and the probe is already available through commercial vendors as well.
This research was supported by NIH grants (RC1GM090732 and R01GM100919) and the University Cancer Research Fund.
— Story courtesy of the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center
]]>One new fellow will be accepted each year for the two-year fellowship, which begins July 1. The fellows will spend their first year at the School and their second year in the health economics outcomes research department at GSK.
“Pharmaceutical and health outcomes research is becoming more important as the United States undertakes health reform,” says Betsy Sleath, PhD, the George H. Cocolas Distinguished Professor and chair of DPOP. “This terrific partnership with GSK will strengthen the School’s relationship with the GSK health outcomes group as we work together to provide future pharmaceutical outcomes researchers with the skills and training they need to stand out in the workforce.”