Category: News

At the 2018 GPEN ¹  conference in Singapore, Dr. Rodney Ho and Jesse Yu, a graduate student presented TLC-ART research progress. Jesse’s presented his work on, “Novel drug combination matrix in solid  states enabled by stable interactions of hydrophilic and hydrophobic HIV drug combination plus lipid excipients.” Dr. Ho’s held a workshop entitled, “Development and Validation of a MBPK (mechanism-based pharmacokinetic) Model to guide complex injectable drug-combination products”. Sept. 2018

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

¹ GPEN, Globalization of Pharmaceutics Education Network (GPEN); the meeting was organized by students assisted by faculty advisers for the sole purpose of fostering and facilitating international pharmaceutical science exchange.

Dr. Ho received the Luminary Innovator Award from CIE ¹. He was recognized in Sept 2018 in Bellevue, WA for his innovations in science and product development.  Sept. 2018

 

¹ CIE is the Chinese Institute of Engineers.  CIE Seattle promotes academic and professional excellence in the Asian Pacific American community through programs advancing innovation, collaboration and education.

Thank-You Board Advisors–Flexner, Becker, Chen, Robert, Nicoll-Griffith and PO’s- D Livnat, H Zhang, M Protopopova for their input in the 2018 annual Scientific Advisory Board meeting. We also have benefited from input of Drs. Z Gu and D Zhang on an IND-enabling plan.  Their support and guidance are much appreciated as the program is planning for a first-in-human study in the near future.  Oct. 2018

TLC-ART Director Dr. Rodney Ho shared at the Global WACh ¹ 2018–Bioengineering forum to develop drugs for Children and Women. Dr. Ho spoke on systems approach to targeted, long-acting and drug combinations as an engineering solutions for HIV intended for women and children. Oct. 2018

¹ WACh stands for the Global Center for the Integrated Health of Women, Adolescents and Children.

TLC-ART PI’s  Drs. Collier and Ho discussed innovation in first-in-human study at the 2018 Conference on Retroviruses & Opportunistic Infections (CROI).

Dr. Jane Simone presented HIV-patient preferences on long-acting-injectable treatment.  Her presentation at UCLA was titled, “Getting to 2020: Top Challenges in Biobehavioral HIV Prevention”.

AAPS RMDC invited Dr  Ho to lecture on Targeted Therapy at the 2018 American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists –  Rocky Mountain Discussion Group Annual Meeting (AAPS-RMDG).  The RMDG provides a forum for interacting with scientists from industry and academia to promote basic and pharmaceutical sciences in the Rocky Mountain and Pacific Northwest regions.  Dr. Ho spoke on, “Systems Approach to Targeted Drug Combination Therapy: Integrating Medical and Pharmaceutical Sciences”.

 

 

 

This past March, Drs. Rodney Ho and Ann Collier attended the Long-Acting/Extended Release (LA/ER) Antiretroviral Research Resource Program (LEAP) in Boston, MA.   Dr. Ho spoke on, “Phase 0 development of combination LA ART delivered subcutaneously”.   Select TLC-ART scientists also attended, displaying their research at poster sessions.

The objective of the behavioral section of the TLC-ART program is to measure preferences among potential end users for long-acting regimens. These preferences will be used to guide the TLC-ART drug development process. Conducting focus groups with key populations in Sub-Saharan African was recommended by the external advisory committee as an important component of  the acceptability research. Under the auspices of  Dr. Susan Graham’s “Key Challenges” protocol and Dr. Scott McClelland’s “Exploring Women’s Lifecourse Events & HIV Transmission Potential: A Qualitative Study” protocols, Dr. Jane M. Simoni, along with Zahra Mohamed and George Wanje, completed collecting additional acceptability data in Mombasa, Kenya through a series of focus groups with study participants in the Ganjoni HIV care facility.

The target populations for the focus groups were persons living with HIV, characterized as follow:

1. Homosexual men
2. Heterosexual men
3. Women
4. Female Sex Workers (FSW)
5. Young female adults ages 18-24
6. Young male adults ages 18-25

The focus group discussions were conducted in June 2017; each lasted ~90 minutes, and were recorded for later translation and transcription. Participants also completed a short socio-demographic questionnaire. The discussion guide explored domains hypothesized to influence TLC-ART acceptability including:

1. Geographic location
2. Pain intensity
3. Injection location
4. Number of injections
5. Volume/size of the syringe
6. Potential side effects
7. Frequency of dosage
8. Medication storage
9. Effectiveness

The team also explored current experiences with ART and other factors influencing acceptability. Analysis is ongoing.

The team gratefully acknowledge the generous collaboration of UW colleagues Drs. Graham and McClelland, as well as the participation of the patients and assistance with recruitment and administration from the expert clinic staff.

In the AIDS journal, the TLC-ART team reported that a dose of HIV drug combination, targeted to the residual virus in lymph nodes-exhibiting drug insufficiency, persisted with high levels over 2 weeks. Currently HIV patients take multiple pills daily and do not have drug levels high enough to clear the virus in the nodes. The results, improved lymph node drug levels over two weeks, was demonstrated in monkeys and will be published in the March 2017 issue of AIDS, one of the most respected HIV/AIDS journals. John Kraft, Lisa McConnachie, Josefin Koehn, Loren Kinman, Carol Collins, Danny Shen, Ann Collier and Rodney Ho lead the research team. The linked article is entitled, “Long-acting combination anti-HIV drug suspension enhances and sustains higher drug levels in lymph node cells than in blood cells and plasma”

A pre-print version of this article is available online

This study is sponsored by NIH Grant  UM1 AI120176.