Category: Divisions
Wellness Visits Pay the Way for Pharmacists in Medical Practices
October 20, 2014By conducting 1,070 Medicare annual wellness visits a year, pharmacists in medical practices could cover for the cost of their salaries while using only 40 percent of their time. Wellness visits were created in 2011 as part of the Affordable Care Act. In 2013, only 11 percent of eligible patients nationally actually use their wellness visit benefit. The UNC faculty pharmacists conducting wellness visits in an Asheville clinic are on track to see 60 percent of eligible patients come in this year thanks to special efforts to boost participation. Physicians seeking a way to pay for the expertise of a … Read more
UNC Uses Liver-Function Model to Solve Mystery of Deadly Diabetes Drug
September 29, 2014Using a computer model developed by the Hamner Institutes for Health Sciences, researchers at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy believe they have solved the mystery of why a diabetes drug introduced in 1997 caused liver failure and death in sixty-three patients. Their discovery makes it likely that similar drug-related deaths can be prevented in the future. Sixty-Three Deaths In 1997, troglitazone was approved for use in the U.S. as one of the first drugs designed to treat type 2 diabetes. It was withdrawn from the market in 2000 after sixty-three people died from liver failure after taking it. No … Read more
Rodgers Appointed to Heart Failure Guideline Committee
September 23, 2014Jo Ellen Rodgers, PharmD, has been appointed to the Guideline Committee of the Heart Failure Society of America. Rodgers is only the second pharmacist to join the committee, which oversees the development of guidelines for the management of patients with heart failure, develops the HFSA’s position on new diagnostic and therapeutic approaches to heart failure, and updates existing HFSA heart-failure guidelines. The guidelines address the full range of evaluation, care and management of patients with heart failure, including acute heart failure, disease management, and heart failure in special populations. Rodgers serves as associate director of the Clinical Fellowship Programs at … Read more
Eshelman Gives $3 Million to School’s Drug-Discovery Center
September 3, 2014The UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy has received a $3 million gift from philanthropist and pharmaceutical-industry executive Fred Eshelman. Eshelman’s gift will support the work of the School’s Center for Integrative Chemical Biology and Drug Discovery. The center is dedicated to evaluating and developing potential drug targets discovered by UNC faculty. The UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy is one of the nation’s top pharmacy schools. It ranks second in total research funding and has the number-two doctor of pharmacy program in the nation, according to U.S. News & World Report. The CICBDD Researchers at UNC often discover interesting biological systems … Read more
Innocenti Receives R21 Grant to Personalize Angiogenesis Inhibitors to Individual Cancer Patients
August 20, 2014Federico Innocenti receives a $275,000 NCI grant to study the role a cancer patient’s genetic makeup plays in the effectiveness of angiogenesis inhibitors. Angiogenesis inhibitors stop or slow the spread of tumors by choking off the blood supply that feeds them. Angiogenesis inhibitors are a class of drugs commonly used in cancer therapy. However, there isn’t a way to identify patients who will benefit the most from treatment with these drugs. A new $275,000 grant could help Associate Professor Federico Innocenti, MD, PhD, and his team identify such patients based on their genetic profile. Angiogenesis is the formation of new … Read more
Bowers Awarded $750,000 Beckman Young Investigator Award
August 14, 2014Albert Bowers, PhD, is the recipient of a 2014 Beckman Young Investigator Award, a four-year, $750,000 award that recognizes the nation’s most innovative young scientists. Bowers is an assistant professor in the Division of Chemical Biology and Medicinal Chemistry. Bowers is one of only seven recipients nationwide selected across all disciplines of science for this prestigious award. He says his goal for this grant is to use the chemistry encoded in bacterial genomes to access to new therapeutics more quickly by genetically manipulating biosynthetic pathways within the bacteria themselves to make new pharmaceutically relevant compounds. The Arnold and Mable Beckman … Read more
Dusetzina Returns as Assistant Professor in DPOP
August 11, 2014Stacie Dusetzina, who earned her PhD at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy, returns as an assistant professor. Dusetzina studies how medications are used in large patient populations and how insurance policies and reimbursement decisions affect treatment use. Stacie B. Dusetzina, PhD, has been appointed as an assistant professor in the Division of Pharmaceutical Outcomes and Policy in the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy. She also has a faculty appointment at the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health in the Department of Health Policy and Management and is a member of the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, the Cecil G. … Read more
Remembering Feng Liu, PhD, 1955–2014
July 25, 2014Feng Liu, PhD, a research professor in the Division of Molecular Pharmaceutics, died Thursday, July 24, after being assaulted and robbed Wednesday, July 23, while walking in a neighborhood near campus. A memorial service will be held Saturday, August 2, at 4:00 p.m. in Memorial Hall on the UNC campus. The Triangle Chinese-American Friendship Association will hold a vigil for Liu on Wednesday, July 29, at 7:30 p.m. at the Fedex Global Education Center on the UNC campus. “Dr. Liu will be remembered as a dedicated colleague, educator and researcher who was passionate about Carolina,” UNC Chancellor Carol Folt says. “He truly … Read more
CBMC’s Konze Receives ACS Med Chem Predoctoral Fellowship
July 25, 2014Kyle Konze, a graduate student at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy, has received the American Chemical Society Medicinal Chemistry Predoctoral Fellowship. The $26,000 award will be given to Konze during the 2014–2015 academic year. The ACS has given this prestigious award annually since 1991. Konze is currently a third-year PhD candidate in the Division of Chemical Biology and Medicinal Chemistry. His graduate research is focused on the discovery and development of small molecule inhibitors of protein lysine methyltransferases. Jian Jin, PhD, is his faculty adviser. Most recently, the Jin Lab developed a chemical probe called UNC0965, which was featured … Read more
Kristy Ainslie and Team Join MOPH
July 21, 2014Kristy Ainslie, PhD, joins the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy as an associate professor after almost five years as an assistant professor at Ohio State. Ainslie’s research focuses on immune therapies, including bioterrorism vaccines, autoimmune treatments, and host cell-directed therapeutics. Members of her lab also moved to Chapel Hill, including Research Assistant Professor Eric Bachelder, PhD. Kristy Ainslie, PhD, has joined the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy as an associate professor in the Division of Molecular Pharmaceutics. Ainslie brings her interdisciplinary expertise to Chapel Hill after spending almost five years as an assistant professor at the Ohio State University’s Division … Read more