News and Events
2006 News Archive
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Rhode
Island casts overwhelming yes vote for new College of
Pharmacy Building
November 9, 2006
Thirty-eight of Rhode Island’s 39 cities and towns
approved the higher education bond issue that will
provide $65 million for a new College of Pharmacy
building at the University of Rhode Island.
Election-day approval of the $72.8 million Question 4
bond referendum will also provide $7.8 million to Rhode
Island College.
“As Tuesday night’s election numbers came in, it was
apparent that the people of Rhode Island recognized the
quality of the programs offered by the University and
voted to support them through the continuing
rehabilitation of the campus at Kingston,” URI President
Robert L. Carothers said in a message to the University.
“We are grateful for their overwhelming support.
“It’s a great day for URI and the state of Rhode Island,
and I congratulate everyone for work very well done,”
Carothers said.
A total of 229,658 Rhode Islanders, or 62 percent of the
vote, cast affirmative ballots.
Click here to read the full article
Question 4 endorsed by key business and community organizations
November 1, 2006
Question 4 — a bond referendum that will provide $65
million for a state-of-the-art teaching and research
facility for the College of Pharmacy at the University
of Rhode Island and $7.79 million for building
renovations and site improvements at Rhode Island
College—has earned endorsements from key Rhode Island
business and community leaders.
Question 4 is endorsed by:
* Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce
* Northern Rhode Island Chamber of Commerce
* Hospital Association of Rhode Island
* Rhode Island Economic Development Corporation
* Rhode Island Economic Policy Council
* Rhode Island Pharmacists Association
* Rhode Island State Nurses Association
* Rhode Island Community Pharmacy Association
* Rhode Island Federation of Teachers and Health
Professionals
* South Kingston Town Council
* American Federation of State, County and Municipal
Employees - Council 94
* American Association of University Professors - URI
Chapter
* Local 3302 - American Federation of Teachers/AFL-CIO.
* Rhode Island College Student Community Government,
Inc.
* University of Rhode Island Student Senate
Supporters of Question 4 agree the bond referendum will
expand and improve higher education opportunities,
support economic and job growth, and improve health and
social service programs throughout the state—including
those for seniors and residents with disabilities.
Click here to read the full article
URI
pharmacy student is grandfather, full-time EMT
October 31, 2006
“You’re my boy Blue, you’re my boy.” This quote, from
the movie Old School, refers to an 89-year-old
fraternity member, but is also used by the members of
the University of Rhode Island pharmacy fraternity Kappa
Psi to refer to one of their own. They are talking about
Ronald Hammond, the 54-year-old, second-year pharmacy
major and fellow pharmacy fraternity member.
Why did Hammond decide to return to school at this age,
and tackle one of the University’s most difficult
majors? “I had lots of free time on my hands,” Hammond
said, and he wanted to put it to good use. “Going back
to school would help me gain knowledge and make me able
to treat my patients better.” Hammond has also been a
full-time emergency medical technician with the
Woonsocket Fire Department for the past 9 years. “Many
patients we pick up on the rescue are on a myriad of
medications. I want to know that any treatment or
medication I give doesn't have an adverse affect on
them.”
Click here to read the full article
URI College of Pharmacy, Dept. of Corrections team up to save nearly $5 million in drug costs at state prisons
October 26, 2006
The University of Rhode Island’s College of Pharmacy
plays a pivotal role in reducing the state Department of
Corrections pharmacy costs, saving nearly $5 million
during the last four years.
The College’s Health Care Utilization Management Center
works with the department’s medical staff to manage the
medications for the prison system whose daily population
averages 3,700, while its intake center processes 17,000
individuals per year. The department’s projected
medication budget from 2003 through 2006 totaled $13.7
million, but its actual costs, thanks to efforts of the
medical team led by URI’s management, were $8.8 million
for the same period.
URI’s pharmacy college was awarded a three-year,
$454,000 contract to oversee the department’s pharmacy
program in 2002 following a competitive bidding process.
In the spring of 2006, corrections awarded URI a
four-year, $875,000 contract to continue its oversight.
URI experts also oversee the state’s contract with
Contract Pharmacy Services of Hatboro, Pa., which
provides the actual medications.
Click here to read the full article
Pharmacy research, outreach programs could grow at URI if voters approve Question 4
October 26, 2006
Some of its faculty are making critical discoveries
about drug interactions while others are helping another
state agency save millions in pharmacy costs. The
University of Rhode Island College of Pharmacy is
benefiting our state, country and indeed the world.
But the College no longer has the space or technology it
needs to grow in its crowded, outdated home—Fogarty
Hall.
That’s why on Nov. 7 alumni and friends of URI are being
asked to vote yes on Question 4, which would provide $65
million for a new home for the College and $7.8 million
for Rhode Island College.
In one corner of Fogarty Hall, Professor Bingfang Yan conducts gene-based research on why some medicines work
in one person and not in another. His worked is backed
by $3.7 million in federal funding to examine critical
drug interactions, how drugs are metabolized and the
effectiveness of herbal remedies.
Despite being recognized by the National Institutes of
Health as a leading biomedical researcher, he operates
in severely outdated and cramped lab and office space.
Click here to read the full article
Pharmacy
professor discovers drug interaction that inhibits
Tamiflu
October 25, 2006
International and federal
health officials are counting on the anti-viral drug
Tamiflu to be a critical weapon in the event of an
influenza pandemic. But a recently completed study at
the University of Rhode Island’s College of Pharmacy
indicates that the drug can be rendered ineffective in
patients also taking the anti-clotting drug Plavix.
Click here to read the full article
Pharmacy professor uses animated movie to teach about
diuretics
October 11, 2006
Roberta S. King was
frustrated three years ago when she tried to explain to
her University of Rhode Island pharmacy students how
diuretic drugs work at a cellular level in the body.
“You can talk about how the drugs work and you can use
still diagrams, but those methods are not very effective
for explaining a lengthy, moving process,” said the
assistant professor of pharmacy and Narragansett
resident. “None of the textbooks explain this in a way
that makes the sequence of movement understandable.”
Click here to read the full article
URI
College of Pharmacy dedicates Brooks Eckerd classroom
July 20, 2006
The University of Rhode
Island’s College of Pharmacy has dedicated a classroom
with the latest animation technology to Brooks Eckerd
Pharmacy. The pharmacy chain has supported several
College projects, its total support exceeding $100,000.
During springtime ceremonies with company officials, the
College renamed the facility in Fogarty Hall the Brooks
Eckerd 3D Visualization Auditorium.
“This room, which is now one of the most technologically
advanced classrooms in New England, is a reflection of
the great changes going on here at the College,” said
Pharmacy Dean Donald E. Letendre. “We dedicate this
facility with sincere thanks for all Brooks Eckerd does
for the College.”
Click here to read the full article
URI's
College of Pharmacy honors outstanding alumni
May 31, 2006
The University of Rhode
Island's College of Pharmacy has honored two alumni who
mentor students during their clinical rotations and
another alumnus for his national leadership in the
profession.
Click here to read the full article
URI
pharmacy student wins national Goldwater scholarship for
work in HIV prevention research
May 19, 2006
University of Rhode
Island pharmacy student Michael Hanley was recently
named a 2006 Barry M. Goldwater scholarship winner for
his work in HIV transmission prevention research. The
annual awards are given to undergraduate sophomores and
juniors who are interested in pursuing science and math
related careers. The scholarship is applied to the cost
of tuition, fees, books, and room and board up to $7,500
per year.
The Warren native was one of three Rhode Islanders
awarded the scholarship. This year, the Goldwater
committee awarded 323 scholarships out of almost 1,100
nominations. Hanley, who is a fifth-year pharmacy
student, had never heard of the scholarship program
until he saw a notice for applications in the student
newspaper, The Good 5? Cigar last January. Taking a
chance on the application, he found out in early April
that he was a recipient. Hanley received a phone call
from his friend from high school who had checked an
online list of winners. He did not see his own name, but
saw Hanley’s.
Click here to read the full article
URI
honors late pharmacy alumnus who saved a life
May 8, 2006
The University of Rhode
Island’s College of Pharmacy has named its physical
assessment workshop in memory of an alumnus who saved
the life a woman in the midst of a stroke.
During recent ceremonies at the College that launched
this spring’s assessment workshop, Pharmacy Dean Donald
E. Letendre announced that it would now be called the
Adam J. Mendelson, Pharm D. Physical Assessment
Workshop.
Mendelson, who died about six months after graduation
from URI in 2002, worked in the Tiogue Avenue Brooks
Pharmacy in Coventry when a woman came in complaining of
a severe headache.
“Adam asked the woman to sit down and because of his
training, he took her blood pressure and noticed that it
was very high,” Letendre said. “He asked her to remain
seated, took her blood pressure again, and then calmly
called 911.”
At the hospital, the woman was treated for a mild stroke
and recovered. “Adam’s assessment skills and quick
action saved the woman’s life,” Letendre said.
Click here to read the full article
URI pharmacy students to gain disaster response experience through mock clinic
May 3, 2006
As a member of the Rhode
Island Disaster Medical Assistance Team deployed to
Louisiana to assist in the Hurricane Katrina relief
effort, Jeffrey Bratberg knows what works and what
doesn’t.
Now the assistant professor of pharmacy at the
University of Rhode Island wants to see how students in
his advanced infectious and pulmonary diseases class
would perform in the simulated aftermath of a Category 5
hurricane that strikes Rhode Island.
On Friday, May 12, Bratberg’s students will participate
in a mock disaster clinic run by Bratberg and the Rhode
Island Disaster Medical Assistance Team for their final
exam. From 3 to 6 p.m., the last day of finals, members
of the Disaster Medical Assistance Team, several of whom
were in the Gulf of Mexico after Katrina, will erect a
tent outside Mackal Field House as a field clinic for
the exercise.
“The students are working in groups to develop lists of
drugs they would provide at a disaster site. Then, they
will be tested on whether they made logical choices and
how they respond to diseases for which they have no
medicines,” Bratberg said.
Click here to read the full article
URI
pharmacy students win top national honors for Medicare
Part D education efforts
April 27, 2006
The University of Rhode Island’s College of Pharmacy
captured first-place in a national competition that
ranked the reach and effectiveness of student-driven
Medicare Part D education efforts.
Twenty-two URI pharmacy students were honored during
ceremonies at the recent American Pharmacists
Association’s annual meeting in San Francisco. Jack
Hutson, executive director of the Rhode Island
Pharmacists Association, presented the students with a
plaque and a $10,000 check, which will go toward student
activities in the College of Pharmacy.
The University of Connecticut finished second in the
competition while the University of Illinois was third.
Jennifer Newell, of Lincoln, a fifth-year pharmacy
student and former president of the URI chapter of the
Academy of Student Pharmacists, the student division of
the American Pharmacists Association, accepted the award
at the podium on behalf of her fellow students.
(source URI News Bureau)
Click here to read the full article
URI,
ABC 6 launch ‘Ask the Pharmacist’ segment
January 23,
2006
The University of Rhode Island and Providence television
station ABC 6 have launched a new segment called “Ask
the Pharmacist” to provide viewers in Southeastern New
England with accurate and timely answers to their
medication questions.
Featuring registered pharmacist Dr. Kristina Ward,
clinical assistant professor at the URI College of
Pharmacy and director of its Drug Information Services,
the segments run each Tuesday and Thursday on the 6 a.m.
and noon newscasts. The format is designed so that Ward
can respond to pressing questions on such topics as
prescription drug interactions, Medicare Part D,
over-the-counter treatments, herbal remedies and even
issues raised by TV ads touting prescription medication
for everything from depression to arthritis. (source URI News
Bureau)
Click here to read the full article
Outreach program at College of Pharmacy helping thousands each month
January 23, 2006
When Rhode Islanders need help deciphering the
complexities of Medicare Part D, understanding drug imports from
Canada or evaluating the latest TV drug commercials, they look to
the Pharmacy Outreach Program of the University of Rhode Island
College of Pharmacy.
In its first two weeks, the URI program’s special Medicare Part D
website dedicated to the new federal prescription program had 1,100
hits, and since September the three-member outreach team has run or
participated in 32 Medicare Part D presentations that served 1,700
seniors citizens, health care professionals from Woonsocket to
Wakefield. The Outreach Program has trained 35 pharmacy students to
help with Medication Part D presentations. (source URI News Bureau)
Click here to read the full article
