Laboratories and Research Facilities

To become pharmacists who can excel in clinical settings.

With the transition to a six-year pharmacy program, practical training lasting 11 weeks has become mandatory.
We are dedicated to nurturing pharmacists who can thrive in healthcare teams by providing guidance to practical training students and research interns, focusing on the skills required in medical settings.

Welcome

　The Laboratory of Pharmacy Practice and Science Ⅲ is dedicated to education and research in clinical practice with the aim of supporting higher quality drug therapy.
　Our laboratory is located in Kitasato University Kitasato Institute Hospital, and all of our faculty members concurrently work in the pharmacy department. This allows us to provide education and research guidance to students from the perspective of pharmacists working in the field. In particular, since the hospital's pharmacy department actively participates in ward pharmacy operations and team medicine in addition to pharmaceutical supply operations such as drug dispensing, we strive to conduct education and research in collaboration with pharmacists belonging to the pharmacy department.
　In our research, we often collaborate with hospital pharmacists and physicians, aiming to provide feedback to clinical practice. We hope that the results of our research will help improve the safety and effectiveness of drug treatment for patients, and at the same time, through the research process, our students will acquire the foundation of knowledge and behavior necessary for a pharmacist.

Professor Takeshi Hirayama

As a pharmacist who handles pharmaceuticals, I believe that working to solve problems related to pharmacotherapy, generating necessary data, and providing feedback to clinical practice from the specialized field of pharmacology will contribute to the safe and appropriate implementation of pharmacotherapy.

　In the Department of Pharmacotherapeutics IV, we conduct research to identify problems related to various drug therapies in the medical field from the pharmacist's point of view and study solutions to these problems. We are actively engaged in joint research not only with hospital pharmacists and physicians, but also with basic research laboratories, aiming to solve problems in the medical field from the viewpoints of both basic and medical pharmacology.

　The KMC Pharmacy Department is based at Kitasato University Medical Center (KMC) in Kitamoto City, Saitama Prefecture, where all faculty members also work as hospital pharmacists, and we provide student education and research guidance from a pharmacist's perspective while taking into account the latest medical conditions. In addition to dispensing prescriptions, pharmacists are stationed in all hospital wards and are actively involved in the drug treatment of patients together with doctors and nurses. We also participate in the diabetes care support team, nutrition management team (NST), infection control team (ICT), palliative care team (PCT), and disaster relief medical team (DMAT), and one of the features of our department is that we can closely observe the work of pharmacists.

　We hope that through their studies and research life at the university, students will acquire a strong sense of ethics as medical professionals, communication skills, problem-finding and problem-solving abilities, and a desire to continue learning throughout their lives.

Contribute to safe and secure medical care through the science of medical safety based on medical accidents and adverse events

As the public becomes increasingly concerned about medical safety, pharmacists are expected to contribute to safe and secure drug treatment.

Our department conducts research on the science of medical safety based on medical accidents, incidents, and adverse events related to drug treatment and pharmaceutical collaboration, leading to safety management in clinical practice.

Utilizing a University Hospital Environment to Promote Appropriate Drug Therapy and Medication Safety through the Proper Use of Drug Information

The Drug Information Laboratory started in April 2015 and is based within the Kitasato University Hospital with the aim of providing more practical drug information education and research in clinical settings. Taking advantage of the university hospital environment and in cooperation with pharmacists and physicians, we identify research themes that meet the needs of clinical practice. By investigating adverse drug reactions, drug interactions, and inappropriate use of drugs that occur in clinical settings and analyzing the mechanisms of such reactions, we are engaged in research aimed at promoting medical safety through the appropriate use of drug information, optimizing drug therapy, and reducing medical costs.

Why gaining drug information skills is important for pharmacists.

The internet penetration rate has been increasing year by year, and according to the Information and Communication White Paper of Japan 2020, it is reported to be over 80%. While the public can now easily obtain information about medications, the internet is overflowing with information, and some of the information may be incorrect. Pharmacists must use their professional skills to collect and evaluate drug information and provide the best patient care.

In clinical settings, communicating drug information appropriately is critical, and overall communication skills are essential. In addition, when receiving inquiries from healthcare professionals and patients, pharmacists must also have the skills to obtain information that allows them to determine which tasks should be prioritized, how much information is required, and how much time can be spent on research. In addition, with rising medical costs, pharmacists are expected to contribute to healthcare economics by preparing formularies.

Researching the best pharmacotherapy based on pharmacokinetics
- Fusion of science and humanism -

Pharmacokinetics is the study of how drugs are absorbed, distributed, metabolized, and eliminated in the body with time. In clinical practice, we consider to optimize drug therapy for each patient through therapeutic drug monitoring (TDM). We aim for practice, education and research that contributes to society in both science and humanism aspects.

Web site

The field of pharmacoepidemiology is a field of research that has developed in response to the needs of society and is connected to clinical pharmacology and epidemiology.

Pharmacoepidemiology (pharmacoepidemiology) is a field of study and research that has continued to develop in response to the demands of society and is also called the "bridge science" that connects clinical pharmacology and epidemiology. 
In this laboratory, we will face the issues and questions of pharmacotherapy in the medical field and research how to improve pharmacotherapy, focusing on pharmacoepidemiological research that utilizes medical information.

Welcome to the website of Laboratory of Pharmaceutical Health Care and Sciences in Community Pharmacy Practice, Division of Clinical Pharmacy, Research and Education Center for Clinical Pharmacy. Our laboratory performs research to further develop ambulatory care pharmacists’ skills and status, to optimize a pharmacotherapy in ambulatory pharmacy practice, to improve collaboration between community pharmacies and medical institutions, and to expand the role of community pharmacists in primary care.

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    Along with the significant progress in computer performance in recent years, computational algorithms and numerical methods that have been considered within theoretical frameworks are now becoming executable. In the field of statistics, the benefits of these developments in computer performance and computational algorithms have been applied to various fields such as healthcare and economics, resulting in new statistical methods. In particular, as medical treatment has become increasingly sophisticated and complex, such as personalized medicine utilizing gene expression information, large amounts of data have been accumulated, creating opportunities to utilize statistics supported by high-performance computers and fast computing algorithms. In the era of big data, the demand for statisticians and data scientists who can analyze medical data, including genetic information, and extract medical and pharmaceutical significance is increasing rapidly, highlighting the urgent need for talent development. In response to these social demands, the Laboratory of Biostatistics not only applies existing statistical methods but also actively proposes new methods in biostatistics, computational statistics, and Bayesian statistics, conducting research aimed at the application and utilization of gene expression data and medical data.

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　Drug development process and strategy have been changing drastically with the increasing development cost and the declining productivity in R&D as well as with the rapid advance in medical technology and the internationalization of drug development. In these situations, it is imperative to foster human resources who have a creative planning ability and play an active role in the front line of international new drug development.

　Our laboratory of Pharmaceutical Medicine has been conducting research on drug development strategy including clinical trial design and its evaluation, and post-marketing safety measures based on a broad range of natural science such as pharmaceutical sciences, medicine and biostatistics and also by applying knowledge and experience from the viewpoint of social science.

　Through these activities, we are aiming at training personnel to have knowledge and skill of analyzing issues to be tackled in the current drug development, and of proposing scientific and adaptable plans to address them.

Identifying highly safe therapeutic agents based on elucidating the mechanism involved in inflammation.