SUMMARY OF FACULTY DISCLOSURE INFORMATION

Faculty Disclosures: As a sponsor accredited by the ACCME, the University of Massachusetts Medical School Office of Continuing Medical Education (UMMS-OCME) must ensure balance, independence, objectivity, and scientific rigor in all their individually sponsored and jointly sponsored educational activities. All faculty participating in a sponsored activity are expected to disclose to the activity audience any discussion of off-label use or investigational use of a product, and any relevant financial interest or other relationship which they, or their spouse/partner, have or have had (1) with the manufacturer(s) of any commercial product(s) and/or provider(s) of commercial services discussed in an educational presentation, and (2) with any commercial supporters of the activity. (Relevant financial interest or other relationship can include such things as grants or research support, employee, consultant, major stockholder, member of a speaker’s bureau, etc.)

The following faculty members have indicated their financial interests and/or relationships with commercial manufacturer(s) [and/or those of their spouse/partner] below. Faculty with no relevant financial relationships are listed with N/A.

FINANCIAL INTERESTS OR RELATIONSHIPS

The speakers must disclose any discussion and cite references for off-label use and/or investigational products to the audience during their presentations.

Committee/Staff Disclosures: The following CME program planners have indicated their financial interests and/or relationships with commercial manufacturer(s) [and/or those of their spouse/partner] below. Planners with no relevant financial relationships are listed with N/A.

FACULTY BIOGRAPHIES

Richard V. Aghababian, MD
Dr. Aghababian graduated from Harvard College in 1970 and the University of Massachusetts Medical School in 1974. He then completed training in internal medicine at Mt. Auburn Hospital and in emergency medicine at the University of California, San Francisco. From 1978 through 1982, Dr. Aghababian served as a staff emergency physician at the University of Massachusetts Memorial Health Alliance Hospital at Burbank. He was Chief of the Division of Emergency Medicine with the Department of Medicine from 1983 to 1992. Dr. Aghababian was the founding Chair of the University of Massachusetts Medical School Department of Emergency Medicine; he served as chair from 1992 through 2007. Dr. Aghababian has been the Associate Dean for the Department of Continuing Medical Education since 1992. His professional interests include helping health care professionals improve their medical knowledge and patient interactive skills, and the use of medical education to translate the conclusions drawn from well designed and conducted clinical trials into improved medical care.

Elias J. Anaissie, MD
Dr. Anaissie is a Professor of Medicine and Director of the Division of Supportive Care and Vice Chair of the Myeloma Institute for Research and Therapy at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. He attended medical school at University of Paris XII, graduating in 1979. He completed his residency in internal medicine at the American University of Beirut Medical Center in Lebanon, and a fellowship in infectious disease at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas. Following completion of his fellowship, he was on the clinical faculty at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. In 1996, he joined the faculty at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences in Little Rock. Dr. Anaissie is also Adjunct Professor of Pathology for the WHO Center for Tropical Diseases and the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston.

Dr. Anaissie is a reviewer for several peer-reviewed journals and is on the editorial board for Cancer and www.doctorfungus.com. He has lectured both nationally and internationally. He is the Principal Investigator on a National Cancer Institute project on growth control of multiple myeloma, currently in its 14^th year of funding. Dr. Anaissie has published almost 400 peer-reviewed original articles, reviews, chapters, and editorials, mostly pertaining to invasive fungal infections and oncology.

Jeffrey Blumer, MD, PhD
Jeffrey Blumer, MD, PhD, is a Professor of Pediatrics and Pharmacology at Case Western Reserve University and serves as the Director the Center for Drug Research at Rainbow Babies and Children’s Hospital in Cleveland, Ohio.

Dr. Blumer earned a doctoral degree in pharmacology from Northwestern University in 1977 and received a medical degree from Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine in 1979. He completed postdoctoral studies at Case Western Reserve University. Dr. Blumer is a Fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American College of Critical Care Medicine, as well as the American College of Clinical Pharmacology.

Dr. Blumer’s major research interest is pediatric clinical pharmacology and toxicology. His work includes studies of the genetic and developmental aspects of the metabolism of drugs and environmental chemicals as they relate to birth defects and pediatric neoplasms; the genetic control of microsomal enzyme induction; genetic determinants of drug toxicity; biochemical and metabolic mechanisms of mutagenesis; and biochemical genetics of acute leukemia of childhood. He is the Principal Investigator of one of the NIH-funded Pediatric Pharmacology Research Units (PPRUs) and the overall Principal Investigator for the first NIH-funded Best Pharmaceuticals for Children Act (BPCA) contracts. He has long been an advocate of rational therapeutic prescribing that takes into account the varying pharmacokinetic/pharmacodynamic characteristics of various drug classes in pediatrics and has published a number of studies looking at therapeutic dosing issues. He has written more than 170 peer-reviewed journal articles, 31 book chapters, and is the editor of the third edition of Practical Guide to Pediatric Intensive Care.

Dr. Blumer has been an invited lecturer and visiting professor at numerous international meetings and medical schools. During his career, Dr. Blumer has received many awards for his work, including Teaching Excellence Award, Department of Pediatrics, Case Western Reserve University; Rainbow Babies and Children’s Hospital Family Centered Care Award; Upjohn Award for Clinical Pharmacology, and others. He has received the Rainbow Babies and Children’s Hospital Teaching Excellence Award on 3 different occasions.

Dr. Blumer serves on numerous national committees: Pediatric Expert Committee of the US Pharmacopeia Council of Experts; Pediatric Oncology Advisory Subcommittee of the US Food and Drug Administration Oncologic Drugs Advisory Committee; co-chair of the Pediatric Cardiology Working Group of the FDA-NICHD Newborn Drug Development Initiative; and the Pediatric Subcommittee of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Initial Review Group.

Donald E. Low, MD
Donald E. Low, MD, FRCPC, is a fellow of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada. Dr. Low is a Fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology and a member of the Association of American Physicians. His primary research interests are in the study of antimicrobial resistance and severe gram-positive skin and soft tissue infections. A recognized authority in microbiology and infectious diseases, Dr. Low has published more than 300 papers in peer-reviewed journals. Dr. Low is Medical Director of the Public Health Laboratory, Ontario Agency for Health Protection and Promotion, and Head of the Department of Microbiology at the University of Health Network and Mount Sinai Hospital. He is a Professor at the University of Toronto in the Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathobiology and in the Department of Medicine.

Peter G. Pappas, MD
Dr. Pappas is a Professor of Medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases and Tinsley Harrison Clinical Scholar, Department of Medicine at the University of Alabama in Birmingham. Dr. Pappas attended medical school at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, graduating in 1978. He completed his residency in internal medicine, chief medical residency, and infectious diseases fellowship at the University of Washington in Seattle. Following completion of his fellowship, he was on the clinical faculty at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine in Chapel Hill, through its affiliated hospital in Wilmington, North Carolina. In 1988, he joined the faculty at the University of Alabama in Birmingham School of Medicine, with a focus on HIV and transplant-associated opportunistic infections, especially the invasive mycoses. His main areas of interest have included the development of new therapies for fungal infections and understanding the epidemiology of candidiasis, the endemic mycoses, and cryptococcosis. He has performed a number of clinical trials in candidiasis, cryptococcosis, aspergillosis, sporotrichosis, blastomycosis, and histoplasmosis through his involvement with the NIAID Mycoses Study Group (MSG). He is the Principal Investigator for the MSG, a group that performs international multicenter trials, creates treatment guidelines for invasive mycoses, describes the evolving epidemiology of fungal infections, and explores newer diagnostic modalities for the more common mycoses. He is also Principal Investigator of the Organ Transplant Infection Detection and Prevention Program (OTIP), a collaborative multicenter group funded by the Centers for Disease Control, to explore the risk factors and epidemiology of transplant-associated infections. Dr. Pappas has published more than 180 peer-reviewed original articles, reviews, chapters, and editorials, mostly pertaining to invasive fungal infections.

William J. Steinbach, MD

Stephen J. Tomlanovich, MD