By: Amrita Singh, PharmD Candidate c/o 2015 – Last November, the American College of Cardiology and the American Heart Association released new lipid guidelines, which will transform the way we manage our patients with hyperlipidemia. Earlier, lipid management was based on the ATP-III guidelines, which emphasized the use of several lipid-lowering medications to reach target…

By: Aleena Cherian, Co-Copy Editor [Graphics-focused] – From December 8th to 12th 2013, over 20,000 student pharmacists, residents, fellows, pharmacy technicians, new practitioners, and seasoned professionals all gathered in Orlando, Florida for the 48th Midyear Clinical Meeting and Exhibition, hosted by the American Society of Health-Systems Pharmacists (ASHP). The schedules were packed with a number…

By: Fatema Elias, Staff Writer – With the New Year and everyone committing to their New Year resolutions, more and more patients are coming into the pharmacy asking for recommendations, particularly for weight loss dietary supplements. I hesitate to recommend an over-the-counter dietary supplement for weight loss. However, we as pharmacists and pharmacy students have…

By: Hayeon Na, Co-Copy Editor (Content-focused) – On Tuesday, February 4th, the New Jersey Pharmacist Association (NJPhA) and Dr. Maria Leibfried hosted a seminar for international pharmacy students at St. John’s University. The seminar was held to provide information to international students, especially for those who are here as F-1 students, about their options when…

By: Jenny Park, PharmD Candidate c/o 2015 – Methadone maintenance therapy is prescribed for opioid dependency. Many HIV patients who were former injection drug abusers rely on methadone maintenance. Although there is limited data, research suggests lamivudine, ritonavir, and zidovudine to be the most common concomitant drugs in methadone associated torsades and prolonged QT interval.1…

By: Davidta Brown, Senior Staff Editor – In 21st century medicine, pharmaceuticals have come to include compounds derived through novel and complex methods. Some of the most recent innovations have been in the form of biologics, therapeutic compounds produced through biological processes.1 Biologics are derived from living cell lines which may be bacterial, yeast, animal,…

By: Davidta Brown, Senior Staff Editor – In August 2013, the results of a yearlong safety study were published in the Journal of American Medical Association (JAMA) Psychiatry.1 The study, which followed the health status of about 43,000 youths aged 6 to 24, confirmed and built upon a previously noted trend in adults: that the…

By: James Schurr, PharmD Candidate c/o 2014 and Jennifer Miao, PharmD Candidate c/o 2014 With very special thanks to Jessica Melore and Jennifer McDermott, PharmD, BCPS of NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital – Jessica Melore was 16 years old, a senior in high school, and co-captain of the tennis team when her life took a drastic turn. While…

By: Sabrina Ahmed, PharmD Candidate c/o 2017 – One recent stride towards combating worldwide infectious disease has been in the improved surveillance of Japanese encephalitis in Asia, predominantly in South and South-East Asia. This potentially deadly virus is transmitted to humans via mosquito bites. The Japanese encephalitis (JE) virus is the leading cause of encephalitis…