Maddox to address Walgreen pharmacists

     Dr. Ronald Maddox, dean of the Campbell University School of Pharmacy, will present an update on breast cancer disease as part of a continuing education program for Walgreen pharmacists at a district meeting in Raleigh, N.C., July 11-12.

     Maddox, who has researched the pharmacist’s role in the care of oncology patients, has made numerous presentations on breast cancer, and his research has appeared in professional journals such as “US Pharmacist” and the “Journal of the American Pharmacists Association.”

     Maddox’s experience with the disease became personal, however, when his wife Suzan was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1990. An article by Ronald and Suzan Maddox was developed from that experience and published in “US Pharmacist” in 1994.

     “Breast cancer is the most common cancer among women,” Maddox said. “One in eight women will develop breast cancer in their lifetime and a projected 178,480 women in the U.S. will have breast cancer in 2007. But the good news is that breast cancer is becoming more of treatable disease rather than an immediate death sentence. There is a need for greater community pharmacists understanding of issues associated with oral chemotherapy and new cancer treatments.”

     Maddox, who was named, founding dean of the School of Pharmacy in 1985, served as associate dean of the Mercer University School of Pharmacy in Atlanta, Ga... He earned a Bachelor of Science degree in pharmacy from Auburn University and a doctorate in pharmacy from the University of Tennessee. He also served as a clinical pharmacist (cardiology) at the Georgia Baptist Medical Center. Maddox was recently appointed to the North Carolina Institute of Medicine (NC IOM) by Governor Mike Easley. The NC IOM provides nonpartisan information on complex health issues facing the state and strives to develop workable solutions to these problems.