Ilene Zuckerman Named a New Fulbright Scholar

Distinguished professor will use Fulbright grant to expand Thailand collaboration on drug use and safety for the elderly.

By Steve Berberich
September 4, 2008

The prestigious J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board has awarded Ilene Zuckerman, PharmD, PhD, professor and chair of the Department of Pharmaceutical Health Services Research at the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy, a fellowship grant to expand her research of elderly health care in Thailand.

Proper drug use and care for the elderly is becoming a more visible global problem, says Zuckerman.

“Typically, as emerging nations develop, there are an increasing number of older adults and, in turn, more cases of chronic diseases,” she says. “That leads to national health questions about the elderly’s quality of care, what drugs they are taking, and when.”

Health researchers in developing nations often have not studied their aging populations extensively, unlike current U.S. studies of elderly healthcare by the School of Pharmacy’s Peter Lamy Center on Drug Therapy and Aging.

Zuckerman’s Fulbright grant ties into a 14-year partnership between Thai and U.S. pharmacy schools, called the U.S. Consortium for the Development of Pharmacy Education in Thailand.

As one of 10 schools in the consortium, the School of Pharmacy has graduated 14 Thai faculty, and 22 faculty and students have completed short-term exchanges of three to four months. Three Thai students are currently enrolled in PhD programs at the School, and 16 faculty and 12 students from the School have been hosted by Thai universities in various capacities.

Zuckerman has traveled to Thailand twice in recent years, mostly to lecture and meet with policy and university leaders.

Under the Fulbright grant, she will work in Thailand from December 2008 to March 2009. “This trip is for building a research agenda in drugs and aging in Thailand. We will examine appropriateness of care, drug safety issues, and quality of medication use, by applying what we do with national survey data here, with their data over there, so we can better understand what is going on with their drug utilization,” says Zuckerman.

Edward Moreton, PhD, a professor of pharmaceutical sciences at the School and consortium coordinator, who in July signed a renewal agreement for the School’s partnership, said Zuckerman’s grant shows “how we have taken the next step.” He added, “This is a natural progression in that we have started to see areas of research move forward.”

Zuckerman says the project may also serve as a prototype for training and research in other developing nations. ”With the recent implementation of universal health coverage in Thailand, which includes prescription drug coverage, there is a growing need for descriptive epidemiological drug studies,” she said. As yet, there are no published estimates on the prevalence or patterns of medication use in Thailand.

Zuckerman said that research on other populations outside of the United States fosters a more global perspective and the opportunity to determine how cultural, economic, political, and social differences affect drug utilization in the elderly.

The time is right and Thailand is right for such overseas research, she says. The percentage of that country’s aging population is higher than that in low- or middle-income countries in Asia and the Thai population is aging faster than many of those countries.

Zuckerman’s studies in Thailand are aimed at developing adequate databases to perform drug use studies in that country.

Zuckerman is also director of Medication Appropriateness Studies at the Lamy Center and is founder and executive director of Pharmaceutical Research Computing, a School of Pharmacy center that provides computing and analytic support to faculty.

Her research focuses on improving drug therapy in vulnerable populations. She is principal investigator on a career development grant funded by the National Institute on Aging to examine risk factors for transitions to nursing home among community-dwelling elderly.

The Fulbright Program operates in more than 155 countries worldwide. It was established in 1946 and is sponsored by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs of the U.S. Department of State. The program is designed to increase mutual understanding between the people of the U.S. and other countries.