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Pediatric Clinical Pharmacology
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Pediatric Pharmacogenetics
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Pediatric Precision Therapeutics
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research overview
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In his former role as Director of the Division of Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutic Innovation at Children’s Mercy Dr. Leeder led a program consisting of multidisciplinary teams of researchers with expertise in analytical chemistry, drug biotransformation, gene regulation, pharmacogenomics, and pharmacokinetics to investigate variability in medication response in children. An important component of the program was to provide an environment in which trainees and early career faculty members from diverse backgrounds could develop as independent investigators in their areas of research interest. These research interests generally are closely aligned with their clinical expertise with the goal of implementing precision therapeutics in their clinical subspecialties to benefit the patients they serve.
Currently, Dr Leeder is Executive Director (Interim) of the Children’s Mercy Research Institute and leads the Precision Therapeutics Area of Emphasis. The Precision Therapeutics initiative extends the Division of Clinical Pharmacology's emphasis on developing individuals to a more institutional level by providing support to pediatric subspecialties interested in adding precision therapeutics to their portfolio of research programs. In this way the program serves as a model of integrated research that will extend throughout the CMRI.
Over the years, Dr. Leeder's research interests in pediatric pharmacogenetics and the ontogeny of drug biotransformation pathways during growth and development have coalesced into the GOLDILOKs initiative: Genomic- and Ontogeny-Linked Dose Individualization and cLinical Optimization for Kids. Originally funded as one of four Specialized Centers for Research in Pediatric Developmental Pharmacology supported by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute for Child Health and Human Development, "GOLDILOKs" now represents a conceptual approach to better understanding factors contributing to variability in drug disposition and response and using that information to make the use of medications safer and more effective in children of all ages.
Dr. Leeder is also co-PI, with Dr. Mario Castro (KUMC), of the Frontiers Clinical and Translational Science Institute at the University of Kansas.
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