This year’s Ava Helen and Linus Pauling Memorial Lecture for World Peace series Distinguished Lecturer is Steven T. Wax, the Federal Public Defender for Oregon, who is being honored for his efforts to protect human rights and our Constitutional guarantees, in particular through his defense of Brandon Mayfield and seven of the detainees at Guantanamo Bay.

Wax had been a public defender for 29 years before he represented Mayfield. He was previously involved in the high profile “Son of Sam” case in New York.

Mayfield was the Portland attorney of Muslim faith who was precipitously and erroneously arrested and imprisoned because of FBI confusion of his fingerprint with one found at the site of the Madrid railway station bombings in 2004.

Wax has recounted the many hurdles and obstacles he and his colleagues encountered in their attempt to defend these alleged “terrorists” in a book entitled “Kafka Comes to America: Fighting for Justice in the War on Terror.”

He will speak at 7:30 p.m., April 21, in the La Sells Stewart Center’s Austin Auditorium.

The OSU lectureship honors Linus Pauling, an OSU graduate and two-time Nobel Prize laureate, and his wife, Ava Helen Pauling, a noted peace activist. It is sponsored by the College of Liberal Arts.

Ecampus wins awards

Oregon State University Extended Campus (Ecampus) returned from the 2009 University Continuing Education Association (UCEA) national conference with five Marketing and Publications Awards.

The OSU Extended Campus marketing team was the recipient of three UCEA gold awards for the OSU Summer Session 2008 Web site, a YouTube commercial for Ecampus online chemistry courses and labs and for the marketing campaign for the Ecampus online chemistry courses and labs. Silver awards were given to the OSU Summer Session 2008 e-newsletter and a media release on the Spanish-language Phytophthora training course for nursery growers.

Last summer, OSU Extended Campus and Summer Session received the highest honor for marketing at the Western Association of Summer Session Administrators (WASSA) annual meeting, which included awards for the Summer Session Web site, printed materials, advertisements and e-newsletter.

UCEA members include public and private accredited colleges and universities and nonprofit organizations with a significant commitment to continuing higher education and online learning. WASSA’s summer session administration members meet annually to exchange information about summer session programs and administrative practices in order to improve institutional growth and development.

For more information about OSU’s online degrees, courses and programs, visit ecampus.oregonstate.edu. Visit the award-winning OSU Summer Session Web site at summer.oregonstate.edu.

Prosperity That Fits Town Hall Meeting in May

The Economic Vitality Partnership and the Prosperity That Fits Steering Committee is inviting the public to the fourth annual Prosperity That Fits Town Hall Meeting at 6 p.m. May 7 at the CH2M HILL Alumni Center Ballroom, OSU Campus. The keynote speaker is Robert Young, a University of Oregon professor and renowned expert on Sustainable Cities. To register go to www.prosperitythatfits.us or contact Lynn Roylance, EVP Coordinator, at roylance@cbchambercoalition.com.

Ito named President of Pacific Lipid Association

Matthew K. Ito, PharmD, FCCP, CLS has been elected to serve as president of the Pacific Lipid Association (PLA). A chapter of the National Lipid Association, the PLA is a medical education society for healthcare professionals who work in the area of lipid management and preventive cardiology. Dr. Ito is professor and chair of Pharmacy Practice at Oregon State University (OSU) and Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU). Dr. Ito was appointed professor and chair of Pharmacy Practice at OSU/OHSU in 2005. He is responsible for the daily operations of the Portland based campus located at OHSU. Dr. Ito’s research interests are the pharmacotherapuetics , pharmacokinetics, and pharmacodynamics of lipid-modifying agents and clinical outcome research. Dr. Ito has received numerous research grants, has published over 70 research papers, review articles, book chapters and abstracts in both the pharmacy and medical literature and has given over 200 presentations to professional audiences at the local, state, and national levels. As a founding member of the Pacific Lipid Association, Dr. Ito has played an active role in the growth of the organization. It is anticipated that PLA will grow further and accomplish key projects under his leadership.

Ecojustice conference comes to OSU in April

“To Swim with the Salmon: Spirituality and Ecojustice in the Pacific Northwest” is a one-day conference that takes place April 25 in the LaSells Stewart Center from 9-4.

Its purpose is to bring academic and faith communities together in dialog about the ways in which spiritual values intersect with concerns for earth care in our region. John Hart, Boston University School of Theology professor of Christian ethics, and Native American storyteller, poet and artist Elizabeth Woody will give major talks. Breakout sessions on a variety of practical topics, an artists gallery, and lunch are included as part of the conference. Cost is $30 for adults, $15 students. The conference web site and online registration can be found at http://oregonstate.edu/conferences/swimwithsalmon2009/.

Vivian Nguyen holds one of her newest patients in a remote hospital in the African country of Niger. Her OSU internship is part of the College of Pharmacy's effort to help future pharmacists recognize their ethical obligations in the medical field.

“So much need” for rural health care and those in underserved populations is changing the way Oregon State is training its College of Pharmacy students.

“A big world out there needs our help,” said Ann Zweber, an instructor of pharmacy education who is working in OSU’s outreach programs in Oregon and throughout the world. “The challenge is great.”

Zweber wrote a recent report challenging pharmacy colleges across the nation to become more aggressive in training and involving their students in the “front line” of medicine, reaching out to underserved populations, those with little insurance, special needs, low income or minority groups.

“For many people, pharmacies provide the first — and sometimes the only — health care they get, when they can’t afford to see a doctor, travel long distances or pay for medications. We want our students to understand these issues, realize their ethical obligations and get involved,” Zweber said.

She was a member of a recent national task force on “caring for the underserved,” which published its findings in the American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education.

“Pharmacy graduates must not only have the knowledge, attitudes and skills to provide quality pharmaceutical care,” task force members wrote in their report. “They must care enough to proactively seek opportunities to render that care to the disenfranchised and forgotten people within our society.”

Even in urban areas, Zweber said, pharmacists are now frequently involved in immunization programs, health screenings, medication therapy management, dispensing products and advice, and helping patients learn about and sometimes wade through the maze of bureaucracy to access some health assistance programs.

In rural or remote areas, the demands can go far beyond that. Cultural factors, language, literacy and disabilities can all become roadblocks to care.

Such initiatives have been an increasing part of OSU’s pharmacy instruction programs in recent years. Every student is required to do at least one six-week rotation in an underserved setting or community.

Some students work with Mid-Valley Housing Plus, helping mental health patients with their medication management. Many participate in a workshop that teaches “Spanish for pharmacists.”

“We don’t want our students going through college in a bubble, unaware of what’s going on in the outside world,” Zweber said. “We see them developing a sense of obligation to serve people, do volunteer work, give back to the community. It’s not easy; it takes a lot of time and effort to balance a community project with a final exam. But it’s worth it.”

~ by David Stauth and Ed Curtin

With a head scarf as colorful as the surroundings, Vivian Nguyen inoculates an infant held by its mother. Nguyen, a Portland resident, urges Oregonians to support health care efforts in impoverished countries.

GALMI, West Africa – Vivian Nguyen was expecting “culture shock” when she went to a remote hospital in Niger as part of a college outreach program – most people were poor, had no running water, electricity or bathrooms, and they lived in mud huts. She knew that going in.

But by the time she was helping to deal with fatal burn cases, struggle against an AIDS epidemic, and hold a diseased leg steady while a surgeon sawed it off, the Portland, Ore., resident said she also was experiencing a little “medical shock.” At Galmi Hospital, being overwhelmed with desperate patients was a daily event.

“The hospital was what you would have found in the United States 100 years ago, except they have penicillin,” said Nguyen, a student in the College of Pharmacy at Oregon State University. “Surgeons operate with headlamps in case the electricity goes out. People there die every day of things that you could never imagine seeing today in the U.S., like cholera, malaria, typhoid and tetanus.”

The experience was part of what OSU, and increasing numbers of pharmacy programs all over the country, are trying to help more students understand – the immediate and sometimes desperate needs of underserved populations, and the role that pharmacists on the front lines can play to help address that.

In Oregon, that might include working in a rural outreach program, learning to provide vaccinations, or helping break through language or cultural barriers. In other parts of the world, the experience can be more extreme.

“One man was paralyzed from the neck down when a brick wall fell on him, and there was nothing we could do,” Nguyen said. “Sometimes there were no surgeons, and children with advanced typhoid disease had to be sent home to die because there was no one within 300 miles able to perform an intestinal operation.”

Other volunteer medical experts, besides Nguyen, also experienced “medical shock.” She would make rounds with doctors and offer drug prescription and dosing recommendations, not necessarily based on what the doctor wanted or was optimal for the patient, but based on what was available and might be able to help.

She went to local villages, teaching malnourished people how to treat lice, scabies and worms. She vaccinated babies to prevent polio. She worked at the HIV clinic.

“It is often easy to focus solely on the healthcare issues here at home and forget how millions of people live around the world,” Nguyen said. “I hope more people will donate to organizations working in these areas, or go themselves to help make a difference.”

~ by David Stauth