The Ohio Northern University Raabe College of Pharmacy, along with Kroger Pharmacy, has received a Community Pharmacy Foundation grant that will focus on a community-based pharmacogenetic study looking at a person’s genetics relative to drug therapy.

Dr. David Bright, assistant professor of pharmacy practice, will serve as the principal investigator on the clinical study. Dr. David Kisor, professor of pharmacokinetics and chair of the Department of Pharmaceutical and Biomedical Sciences, and Dr. Jeffery Talbot, associate professor of pharmacology, are co-investigators. Kisor will be involved in the clinical and laboratory aspects of the study, and Talbot will focus on laboratory work.

The study will include testing patient genetic information relative to a specific metabolizing enzyme that is responsible for converting the drug clopidogrel to its active form. The drug is commonly used in patients who have undergone a procedure called percutaneous coronary intervention (having a small tube put in arteries of the heart to keep blood flow adequate).

The study will try to identify, through genetic testing, those individuals for whom the
drug is likely not working. These individuals can then be placed on an alternative medicine. The study will look at the application of genetic testing in the community pharmacy setting.

Work will commence in September, and 50 patients are expected to participate in the study. The clinical study will be performed in collaboration with Kroger Pharmacies at a number of sites, but primarily in Marion, Ohio. The lab work and study analysis will be conducted at ONU.

Kroger, the nation’s largest traditional grocery retailer, employs more than 338,000 associates who serve customers in 2,458 supermarkets and multi-department stores in 31 states under two dozen local banner names including Kroger, City Market, Dillons, Jay C, Food 4 Less, Fred Meyer, Fry’s, King Soopers, QFC, Ralphs and Smith’s. The company also operates 786 convenience stores, 361 fine jewelry stores, 1,014 supermarket fuel centers and 40 food processing plants in the U.S.