The 7th International Annual Conference of the South Asian Chapter of American College of Clinical Pharmacology (SAC-ACCP) was recently held in Mumbai. The conference and pre-conference workshops were co-hosted by the National Institute for Research in Reproductive Health (NIRRH) and Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), GS Medical College, KEM Hospital, ESI-PGIMSR MGM Hospital and Maharashtra University of Health Sciences, Nashik MUHS. The theme of the conference was translational research.
The conference was inaugurated by Dr Anil Kakodkar, DAE Homi Bhabha Chair Professor and former Chairman of Atomic energy commission and Dr VM Katoch Secretary, Department of Health Research, and Director General, Indian Council of Medical Research.
This year two pre-conference workshops were organised. Dr Stella Blackburn and Priya Bahri of ENCePP / EMA; Dr Rakhi Dhawan of NIMR and Dr Robin Ferner, Professor, Clincial Pharmacology, Birmingham, UK took part in the pharmacoepidemiology workshop. Workshop on Modeling and Simulation to support drug development decisions was organised by Dr Pravin Jadhav from Merck, USA and his team.
Dr Renu Swarup from the Department of Biotechnology, Dr Samadhanam, Former Director Department of Science and Technology, and Dr Sarala Balachandran from CSIR spoke about the Government initiatives in India. Dr Mike Conlon from University of Florida spoke about NIH USA initiative and the clinical and translational science institute at University of Florida. Dr JN Varma, researcher entrepreneur spoke about his experience in marketing the liposomal amphotericin drug developed by Dr BK Bacchawat, Dr NA Kshirsagar and others at Department of Biochemistry, Delhi University and GS Medical college KEM hospital Mumbai with department of biotechnology funding. Dr. Utkarsh Palnitkar discussed the view points of investors and the financial implication of translational research.
Dr Prasad Kulkarni elaborated on issues in taking product like vaccines to large population for public health, national and international experts like Dr Rinti Banerjee (IIT Mumbai), Dr Shanti Nair (Amruta institute, Thiruvananthapuram), Dr Padma Devarajan (ICT Mumbai), Dr Gerd Arnold (Germany), Dr Mohan Raizada (US), Dr Vinayak Shenoy (US), Dr Marcus Homepash (US) spoke about issues in product development and drug delivery system and testing for nutraceuticals, leukaemia.
Dr RD Lele released a book titled ‘Emerging Trends in Phytopharmaceuticals’, edited by Dr Priyanka Ingle Jadhav, Dr Manoj Jadhav and Dr NA Kshirsagar.
A pre-conference workshop on pharmacoepidemiology was conducted by Dr NA Kshirsagar. She elaborated on need for systematic review and data from India to take policy and regulatory decisions nationally and for drug therapeutics committees and individual patients locally. Methodology used electronic medical record and computers for hospital information, National registries were discussed by Dr Rakhi Dhawan, Dr Abhimanyu Panda, Dr Narayani and Dr Harshad Devarbhavi.
Regulatory requirement were discussed by Dr Priya Bahri from EMA and Dr YK Gupta for India. Dr Robin Ferner and Dr Priya Bahri discussed on how to take decisions with inadequate data.
Dr Chandrahas Sahajwalla from US FDA who initiated the SAC-ACCP and Dr Lokesh Jain were present at the valedictory function where students were given best poster and best oral paper awards for clinical research, and preclinical studies and drug delivery systems. Dr Mrudula Phadke, former Vice Chancellor guided the students with her spirited inspiring talk.
EP News Bureau– Mumbai
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