Category: Grants and Awards
Grandy Receives NCAP Excellence in Innovation Award
October 15, 2018Rebecca Grandy, Pharm.D., is the recipient of the 2018 Excellence in Innovation Award from the North Carolina Association of Pharmacists for her work providing hepatitis C care in rural communities. Grandy is an assistant professor of clinical education at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy’s Asheville satellite campus and practices at the Mountain Area Health Education Center’s Family Health Center. The award recognizes Grandy’s efforts to increase access to hepatitis C treatment in primary care centers. The incidence of hepatitis C virus is on the rise due to the country’s opioid epidemic and rising rates of injection drug use, Grandy … Read more
Hingtgen Awarded UNC Hettleman Prize for Young Faculty
October 12, 2018Shawn Hingtgen, Ph.D., was awarded the Philip and Ruth Hettleman Prize for Artistic and Scholarly Achievement by Young Faculty by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Hingtgen is an associate professor at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy in the Division of Pharmacoengineering and Molecular Pharmaceutics. His research harnesses the potential of stem cells to develop new and better methods for treating terminal cancer. Working closely with an interdisciplinary team of researchers and clinicians, Hingtgen showed how skin cells could be flipped into stem cells that hunt down and deliver cancer-killing drugs to glioblastoma, the deadliest malignant brain … Read more
Ferreri Awarded $3M CDC Grant for Study on Opioid Use
October 10, 2018The Centers for Disease Control awarded a $3 million grant to Stefanie Ferreri, Pharm.D., for a study on screening older adults who use prescription opioids and are at risk for falls. Ferreri is the executive vice chair of the Division of Practice Advancement and Clinical Education at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy and a clinical professor. Her study will engage patients within the UNC Health Care System who are 65 years of age or older and taking either an opioid or benzodiazepine, with the objective of implementing a de-prescribing medication protocol to protect older adults at risk of falls. … Read more
Gonzalez Receives $2M NIH Grant for Project on Childhood Obesity
October 9, 2018Daniel Gonzalez, Pharm.D., Ph.D., an assistant professor at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy in the Division of Pharmacotherapy and Experimental Therapeutics, received a $2 million NIH Research Project Grant for research focused on drug dosing in children with obesity. Gonzalez’s proposal aims to find a systematic approach to the development and evaluation of physiologically-based pharmacokinetic models to help treat children with obesity. These models are mathematical constructs that incorporate physiologic and body composition changes during childhood. “The majority of drugs prescribed to children with obesity lack recommendations for appropriate dosing for size,” Gonzalez said. “Physiologically-based pharmacokinetic models can be used … Read more
UNC’s Phi Delta Chi Raises Over $14,000 for St. Jude, Most in Country
September 26, 2018The UNC chapter of the co-ed pharmacy fraternity Phi Delta Chi raised more money for philanthropy than any other chapter in the country. The Alpha Gamma chapter from the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy raised $14,048.12 for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital during the 2017-18 academic year. The chapter was honored by the national Phi Delta Chi organization at its annual Leader-Development Seminar, held in Virginia Beach from Aug. 1-4. Seven students from the School attended the seminar, including 2017-18 Philanthropy Chairs Lauren Branson and Amanda Mintz. The chapter was able to raise the money through letter-writing, Venmo campaigns and … Read more
Crona Awarded ACCP Research Institute Futures Grant
September 24, 2018Daniel Crona, Pharm.D., Ph.D., an assistant professor at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy in the Division of Pharmacotherapy and Experimental Therapeutics, was awarded the American College of Clinical Pharmacy Research Institute Futures Grant Junior Investigator Award. Crona received the award and a $30,000 grant from the ACCP Research Institute for his proposal, “A Prospective Multi-Dose Study of Apixaban in Nephrotic Syndrome Patients.” “Currently, there is no established standard of care prophylactic for venous thromboembolic events in nephrotic syndrome patients,” Crona said. “However, direct oral anticoagulants, apixaban in particular, are appealing options for thromboprophylaxis. There is an unmet need to … Read more
UNC AAPS Chapter Receives National Award
September 21, 2018The American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists awarded the 2018 AAPS Student Chapter award to students at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy. The award, which comes with a $1,000 prize, recognizes student AAPS chapters that have provided exceptional service and outreach over the course of the year. The UNC student chapter has nearly 200 members in both the Pharm.D. and Ph.D. programs, said chapter president Daisy Zhu, Pharm.D. “AAPS hopes to bridge the gap between Pharm.D. and Ph.D. students at the School,” Zhu said. “We encourage contact and communication between students, because talking and learning about others’ research and being … Read more
UNC to Apply Machine Learning, AI to Improve Battlefield Medicine
September 10, 2018The University of North Carolina will use machine learning and artificial intelligence to help ensure that military health care providers are better prepared to handle the evolving conditions and traumatic injuries seen on the battlefield. The Department of Defense has awarded a grant of $1.6 million to the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy to fund the two-year project. The military has asked the research team for an analytical tool that can evaluate real-world patient data to predict the skills, training and patient care guidelines that military health care workers will need in different scenarios. The project is being led by … Read more
Sokolsky Awarded St. Baldrick’s Hero Grant to Target Brain Tumors
July 30, 2018Marina Sokolsky-Papkov, Ph.D., a research assistant professor at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy, is the recipient of a Hero Fund grant from the St. Baldrick’s Foundation to support her research into more effective methods of treating medullosblastoma, the most common malignant brain tumor seen in children. The St. Baldrick’s Foundation, the largest private funder of childhood cancer research grants, awarded 76 new grants totaling $19.1 million in its summer grant cycle to support research in pediatric cancer. Medulloblastoma is the most common malignant brain tumor of children. New approaches to treatment are needed, because current treatment can cause brain injury … Read more
Sanders Wins AHEC Innovation Grant for Opioid Stewardship Training Program
July 25, 2018The North Carolina Area Health Education Centers awarded an Innovation Grant to Kimberly Sanders, Pharm.D., a clinical assistant professor at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy, to develop a training program for acute-care opioid prescribing. The $43,398 grant will allow Sanders and her team of collaborators from across the UNC health sciences programs to create and disseminate an interdisciplinary educational toolkit for health-care providers. Patients receiving opioids for pain control after surbery are particularly vulnerable to dependence due to excessive prescribing of opioids, gaps in follow-up and inadequate disposal of excess supply of pills, Sanders said. Tens of millions of … Read more