Dean's Newsletter

SHRF Achievement Award

Congratulations to Dr. Susan Whiting on receiving a Saskatchewan Health Research Foundation Achievement Award last night at the Santé Awards. This award is presented to an individual in health research whose exemplary career achievements have inspired us with their drive, leadership and ingenuity. Read more.

Fentanyl testing

Mayfair Drugs in Saskatoon is now distributing fentanyl testing strips, which is a result of the 2019 pharmacy business case competition. Watch the video.

CSHP PPC USask Alumni Event

Join us for complimentary refreshments, and a chance to catch up with your classmates, colleagues and friends after the Canadian Society of Hospital Pharmacists Awards Ceremony on Saturday, February 1 in Toronto.

On Friday, November 29, Saskatchewan Pharmacy & Nutrition Student Society held their annual Winter Formal where they raised $1560 for the Canadian Mental Health Association - Saskatoon Branch.

In keeping with the holiday tradition in the college, the fourth-year pharmacy students went caroling at the faculty's homes on Tuesday, December 3.

Congratulations to Dr. Katelyn Halpape on her new role as president of the Canadian Society of Hospital Pharmacists Saskatchewan Branch. She also presented on New Antiepileptic Drugs at the Canadian Society of Hospital Pharmacists (BC Branch) Annual General Meeting on November 23.

Dr. Kate Dadachova served as reviewer on CIHR Pharmacology and Toxicology Project Grant Panel in November 2019 and will be continuing to serve on this Panel through 2020. She was invited to take part in Consensus Workshop in September in Ottawa to discuss the draft of CIHR Strategic Plan. She also participated in the follow-up CIHR Health Summit in Ottawa in December where the Strategic Plan was further refined.

Dr. Anas El-Aneed was invited to present Structure-Function Based Drug Design at the Institute of Biomedical Chemistry in Moscow. 

Dr. Kishor Wasan has been appointed to the Board of Directors of the Canadian Pharmaceutical Sciences Foundation for a two-year term (December 2019 to December 2021). 

Drs. Ildiko Badea and Kishor Wasan are editors of a book recently published on Drug Delivery Technology Development in Canada. Read.

Dr. Phyllis Paterson will be the faculty advisor for the relaunched Canadian Nutrition Society University Student Representative program. For the 2019-2020 academic year, nutrition PhD student Se’era Anstruther will be the college’s student representative. This program is designed to maximize student engagement in educational, professional development, and networking opportunities within nutrition and related fields. 

In the media

Dr. Lesley Moisey was interviewed for the podcast “Clinical Nutrition Notes” where she spoke about post-ICU nutrition. Listen.

Trainee Success

Program Update

Congratulations to the following graduate students who successfully defended their theses over the past term: Dr. Mahasti Khakpour (Nutrition PhD, supervisor: Dr. Hassan Vatanparast), Dr. Wei Jin (Pharmacy PhD, supervisor: Dr. Anas El-Aneed), Kang Jiang (Pharmacy MSc, supervisor: Dr. Anas El-Aneed), Shabukta Malik (Nutrition MSc, supervisors: Drs. Carol Henry and Chowdhury Jalal), Chandra Bose Prabaharan (Pharmacy MSc, Supervisor: Dr. Meena Sakharkar), and Raj Rai (Pharmacy MSc, supervisors: Drs. Ildiko Badea and Humphrey Fonge).

This fall we welcomed two postdoctoral fellows to the College: Dr. Getenesh Teshome, who is working with Dr. Carol Henry, and Dr. Noorjahan Aibani, who is working with Dr. Ellen Wasan. We will also have four new graduate students join our programs this January: David Asante (MSc with Drs. Jane Alcorn and Darrell Mousseau), Kiranmayee Budharaju (MSc with Dr. Meena Sakharkar), Itoro George (MSc with Dr. Phyllis Paterson), and David Tran (PhD with Dr. Dave Blackburn). 

Scholarships and Awards

Congratulations to Mojtaba Shafiee, who has been awarded a 2020 Dean’s Scholarship by the College of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies to undertake PhD studies.  Mojtaba is studying under the supervision of Dr. Hassan Vatanparast. 

Trainee Presentations and Awards

Sukanya Pati, MSc student with Drs. J. Dimmock and R. Sharma, was awarded Second Place - Graduate Student Research Presentation at the 2019 Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine Research Day (November 26, 2019) for her presentation Evaluation of a potent cytotoxic designed to inhibit methionine aminopeptidase 2 with a view to treating colon cancer. 

Wei Jin, PhD student with Dr. Anas El-Aneed, received a CSMS Travel Award to present his abstract Mass spectrometric investigation on the biological fate of gemini surfactants used as gene delivery vectors at the 32^nd Annual Tandem Mass Spectrometry Workshop held in Lake Louise, AB, from December 4-7, 2019.

Asmita Poudel, PhD student with Drs. Ildiko Badea and Anas El-Aneed, presented her poster Liquid Chromatography Tandem Mass Spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) Method for the Simultaneous Quantification of Phytosterols and Tocopherols Entrapped in Lipid based Nano-formulations at the 32^nd Annual Tandem Mass Spectrometry Workshop held in Lake Louise, AB, from December 4-7, 2019.

Research Funding

Derek Jorgenson and Katelyn Halpape with co-investigators Eric Landry, Charity Evans, Alex Crawley, and Kerry Alcorn were awarded $1.77M from Health Canada under the Substance Use and Addictions Program for the project titled An Interprofessional Model for Chronic Pain Opioid Management.  

Robert Laprairie was awarded $40,000 from Health Canada for Cannabinoid Agonist Testing for Novel Synthetic Cannabinoids.

Ed Krol and Robert Laprairie were awarded $15,000 from the College of Medicine for Development of Photoaffinity Labeling Methodology for Identification of Protein Binding Sites for Drug Discovery.

Recent Publications

• *Allen, K. J. H., *Jiao, R., Malo, M. E., *Frank, C., Fisher, D. R., Rickles, D., & Dadachova, E. (2019). Comparative radioimmunotherapy of experimental melanoma with novel humanized antibody to melanin labeled with 213bismuth and 177lutetium. Pharmaceutics, 11(7).
• *Al-Sakran, L., Marrie, R. A., Blackburn, D., Knox, K., & Evans, C. (2019). Association between disease-modifying therapies for multiple sclerosis and healthcare utilisation on a population level: a retrospective cohort study. BMJ Open, 9(11), e033599.
• *Goulding, F. L., Evans, C., Knox, K. B., Lim, H. J., Levin, M. C., & Donkers, S. J. (2019). Individualised behaviour change strategies for physical activity in multiple sclerosis (IPAC-MS): protocol for a randomised controlled trial. Trials, 20(1), 664.
• Kamrul, R., Bunka, D., Crawley, A., Schuster, B., & LeBras, M. (2019). Navigating cannabinoid choices for chronic neuropathic pain in older adults Potholes and highlights. Canadian Family Physician, 65(11), 807–811.
• *Kazemi, M., McBreairty, L. E., Zello, G. A., Pierson, R. A., Gordon, J. J., Serrao, S. B., … Chizen, D. R. (2019). A pulse-based diet and the Therapeutic Lifestyle Changes diet in combination with health counseling and exercise improve health-related quality of life in women with polycystic ovary syndrome: secondary analysis of a randomized controlled trial. Journal of Psychosomatic Obstetrics & Gynecology, 1–10.
• *Khamis, M. M., Adamko, D. J., & El‐Aneed, A. (2019). Strategies and challenges in method development and validation for the absolute quantification of endogenous biomarker metabolites using liquid chromatography‐tandem mass spectrometry. Mass Spectrometry Reviews, mas.21607.
• Lamb, D. A., Bungard, T. J., Lowerison, J., Semchuk, W. M., Thomson, P., Brocklebank, C., & Bolt, J. (2019). Jurisdictional Guidance on DOAC Use—Will It Affect Practice? A Comparison of European, American, and Canadian Product Monographs. Annals of Pharmacotherapy.
• Laprairie, R. B., Vemuri, K., Stahl, E. L., Korde, A., Ho, J. H., Grim, T. W., … Bohn, L. M. (2019). Probing the CB1 Cannabinoid Receptor Binding Pocket with AM6538, a High-Affinity Irreversible Antagonist. Molecular Pharmacology, 96(5), 619–628.
• Mansell, K., Bhimji, H., Eurich, D., & Mansell, H. (2019). Potential cost-savings from the use of the biosimilars filgrastim, infliximab and insulin glargine in Canada: a retrospective analysis. BMC Health Services Research, 19(1), 827.
• Marcinow, M. L., Simpson, J. A. R., Whiting, S. J., & Buchholz, A. C. (2019). An Exploration of Milk Product Health Beliefs and Dietary Calcium Intake in Young Adults. Canadian Journal of Dietetic Practice and Research : A Publication of Dietitians of Canada = Revue Canadienne de La Pratique et de La Recherche En Dietetique : Une Publication Des Dietetistes Du Canada, 80(4), 179–185.
• Mehramiz, M., Khayyatzadeh, S. S., Esmaily, H., Ghasemi, F., Sadeghi-Ardekani, K., Tayefi, M., …, Vatanparast, H.,…, Avan, A. (2019). Associations of vitamin D binding protein variants with the vitamin D-induced increase in serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D. Clinical Nutrition ESPEN, 29, 59–64.
• *Nwabufo, C. K., El-Aneed, A., & Krol, E. S. (2019). Tandem mass spectrometric analysis of novel caffeine scaffold-based bifunctional compounds for Parkinson’s disease. Rapid Communications in Mass Spectrometry, 33(23), 1792–1803.
• *Rajamanickam, K., Yang, J., & Sakharkar, M. K. (2019). A Novel Antimicrobial–Phytochemical Conjugate With Antimicrobial Activity Against Streptococcus uberis, Enterococcus faecium, and Enterococcus faecalis. Frontiers in Pharmacology, 10.
• Swidrovich, J. (2019). Decolonizing and Indigenizing pharmacy education in Canada. Currents in Pharmacy Teaching and Learning.
• Vatanparast, H., Patil, R. P., Islam, N., *Shafiee, M., & Whiting, S. J. (2019). Vitamin D Intake from Supplemental Sources but Not from Food Sources Has Increased in the Canadian Population Over Time. The Journal of Nutrition.
• Wasan, E. K., Zhao, J., Poteet, J., *Mohammed, M. A., Syeda, J., Soulsbury, K., … Krol, E. S. (2019). Development of a UV-stabilized topical formulation of nifedipine for the treatment of Raynaud phenomenon and Chilblains. Pharmaceutics, 11(11).