Pharmacology

His current research aims to delineate the role of exosomes-associated cargo bioactive molecules as a trojan horse in altering oncologic pathways in tumor and stromal cells to promote cancer progression and metastasis using tissue culture, preclinical model, and human specimens. The findings from his research are of great asset to have successfully competed for NIH support. The ultimate goal of his ongoing research is to utilize different therapeutic strategies for reducing drug resistance and improving the survival of patients with malignant diseases such as prostate cancer and melanoma. One of these strategies is to elucidate the underlying molecular mechanisms of aggressive phenotypes of tumors and discover specific and efficient therapeutic targets. In the same context, there is a critical need for the discovery of novel and reliable biomarkers that can stratify cancer patients according to their pathological stages, response to certain therapeutics, tumor relapse and other clinical outcomes.

My research interests are 3D-printing and diabetic ulcerations.  The goal of this research is to develop genetically targeted, patient-specific medications.  This will allow our medication therapies to have an enhanced therapeutic effect with fewer toxicities.

Also, I have an interest in COVID-19 vaccinations with two parts. First, I would like to see pharmacy technicians be able to give vaccinations and collect data regarding this effort.  This is something that is already happening in some of our states and it will most likely be allowed in our state (Alabama) by the beginning of the year.  Second, I would like to see if we could tabulate the adverse effects seen with the vaccine.

After graduating from pharmacy school in 2009, Dr. Jamison worked in retail pharmacy for 2 years before pursuing her residency. She completed her PGY-1 Pharmacy Practice Residency from 2011-2012 at the Salem VA Medical Center then moved on to become a Clinical Pharmacy Specialist in Primary Care from 2012-2015 where she focused on outpatient management of hypertension, diabetes, hyperlipidemia and HIV/AIDS. In 2015, she changed positions to become the Infectious Disease Clinical Pharmacy Specialist and to help the facility grow the antimicrobial stewardship program. Dr. Jamison also managed patients in the outpatient HIV and Hepatitis C Clinics, assisted with implementation of an Outpatient Parenteral Antimicrobial Therapy (OPAT) monitoring program, and served as a preceptor for both pharmacy students and residents. She served as the facility's PGY-1 Pharmacy Practice Residency Program Director from July 2014 through October 2015 and was a preceptor for pharmacy students from VCU and Shenandoah University Schools of Pharmacy. Through being a preceptor, Dr. Jamison realized how much she enjoyed educating students and residents in these roles, so she changed career paths to pursue academia at VCOM.

Education

Education

My research interest is to design and/or test strategies to facilitate health-habit adoption and maintenance in the domains of diet, exercise/physical activity, stress management/resiliency, sleep, and medication adherence. My ultimate aspiration is to create a series of effective virtual (e.g., Zoom, email-based) programs that serve as the go-to resource for rural/underserved primary care physicians in the Southeast for referring patients who want to make lifestyle changes. The aim is to help close the intention–implementation gap by creating programs that help participants find success early in their behavior change journey, leading to more and lasting change.

Capabilities: Behavior Design, Certified Tiny Habits® Coach, health and wellness coaching, Qualtrics power user, research design, scientific writing, basic statistical analysis (SPSS), student research mentorship.

Dr. Foushee received her Doctor of Pharmacy from the University of South Carolina. Following graduation, she completed two years of postgraduate residency training, initially in pharmacy practice and subsequently in critical care pharmacy. Upon completion of her training, she joined the Presbyterian College School of Pharmacy where she served on faculty in the Department of Pharmacy Practice for 9 academic years before joining the VCOM-Carolinas Faculty. She is board certified in Pharmacotherapy and in Critical Care Pharmacy.

Education

Dr. Foushee’s research interests are related to two primary areas: 1) the scholarship of teaching and learning and 2) patient outcomes related to pharmacotherapy. She is passionate about interprofessional education (IPE) and the delivery of healthcare in a team-based fashion. Incorporating IPE into undergraduate medical education and assessing outcomes are areas of strong interest. Her particular clinical expertise is related to appropriate medication management in critically ill adult patients. She is also an advocate for ensuring access to medications for underserved populations. She has experience with survey research, chart reviews and retrospective cohort studies, and has provided clinical supervision of bench-to-bedside collaborative research regarding medication compatibility. She brings a collaborative spirit to projects, and feels strongly that interprofessional representation within research improves quality, just as it does to patient care.

After receiving a Pharmacy degree Blaise Costa pursued a theoretical biophysics research to study the structure, function and pharmacology of NMDA receptors that play a crucial role in learning and memory. For this work, he earned a PhD Degree in Psychopharmacology from The National Institute of Mental Health And Neurosciences, Bangalore India. To work out the theoretical findings, he undertook a molecular neuroscience training at the University of London. He won the Royal Society International award to fund this training. Subsequently, as a postdoc at Max Planck Institute for Brain Research, he further studied NMDA receptor function using electrophysiology techniques. To translate this knowledge into identification of novel therapeutic agents for brain disorders, he moved to the University of Nebraska Medical Center to work on a NIH funded project, for which he served as key personnel. During this work, his team discovered a novel family of negative and positive allosteric NMDA receptor modulators. These compounds are novel in their chemical structure, mechanism of action and binding sites. Currently, Costa lab is interested in identifying and developing NMDA receptor based therapeutic strategy for neurodegenerative disorders with a special focus on Alzheimer’s disease.

Visit my lab website for more information

Education

Mental disorders affect everyone in four human beings. Abnormalities in glutamate mediated communication between brain cells cause most of the neuropsychiatric disorders. We are working to identify, design and screen novel compounds with the goal of developing new treatment strategies for refractory brain disorders.