I'm Pharmacy Podcast
The I'm Pharmacy Podcast comes from the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy at the University of Toronto. Host Mina Tadrous, a pharmacist and researcher, explores pressing questions in health care, from drug discovery and deprescribing to the broader medications and health-system landscape. The show takes listeners from bench to bedside through conversations with pharmacy leaders and researchers. It is produced by the faculty, with Season One recorded and produced by PharmD students.
Episodes
S5.E5 - Misinformation & Disinformation
Misinformation spreads fast—but how do we separate fact from opinion in an increasingly noisy information landscape? In last episode of season five, we dig into misinformation and disinformation in healthcare. We chat with Assistant Professor and Pharmacist Jennifer Lake on the critical difference between misinformation and disinformation and Associate Professor Colin Furness on why expert voices
S5.E4 - A New Hope: AI in Healthcare
Artificial intelligence is transforming healthcare and research—but how much of it is real progress, and how much is hype? In this episode of The I’m Pharmacy Podcast, host Mina Tadrous explores the practical impact of AI across clinical care, population health, and drug discovery. Featuring insights from Dr. Devin Singh (SickKids), Professpr Laura Rosella (University of Toronto), and Assistant Pr
S5.E3 - Relieving the Pressure LIVE
Pharmacy is changing fast — faster than anyone expected. In this special live episode of I’m Pharmacy, recorded at the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy, host Mina Tadrous brings together a panel of pharmacists, physicians, learners, and educators to ask a big, urgent question: How do we turn scattered progress in Ontario’s healthcare system into coordinated, collaborative, patient-centred care?
You
S5.E2 - Priced Out: In conversation with Dr. Jerry Avorn
A few years ago, a bus full of Americans crossed the border into Canada with Senator Bernie Sanders. They weren't coming for sightseeing. They came to buy insulin.
Unlike the bus of patients heading north for insulin, most Americans can't simply cross a border to escape the system. They live with it every day. How the U.S. end up with the most expensive drug pricing in the world?
In this episod
S5.E1 - Defunding Discovery
Trump’s Whitehouse is at war with national funding institutions, pausing hundreds of research projects both nationally and internationally. How are Canadian researchers coping with widespread funding cuts, and who pays the price when science is under attack?
Featuring:
• Bradly Wouters, executive vice-president science and research, University Health Network
• Adam Bjorndahl, associate professor
Season Five Teaser: Rounds Table x I'm Pharmacy: Tableside Chat with Mina Tadrous
We're baaaaaack! Season Five launches September 17. As a sneak peek of what's to come, we sat down with Dr. Mike Fralick on the Rounds Table to chat about the upcoming season, musings on the future of AI and drug discovery, and whether Mike can hold his own in a 90's-style rap battle.
Check out episode one of our new season, launching September 17.
S4.E7: Consider This - Part Two
In the final episode of the season, we continue our discussion exploring the often overlooked consequences of innovation. In the last episode, we focused on the outcomes of new innovation on existing healthcare systems, exploring ethical access and economic influence. Today, we discuss who innovation can leave behind, and why it is essential that medical breakthroughs benefit everyone.
Featuring:
S4.E6: Consider This - Part One
Like a train moving at a fast pace, innovation can feel unstoppable. In many ways, the only path is forward.
But like all good things, we must take a pause to ensure we aren't blinded with the excitement of potential and hope. To end the season, we wanted to use the next two episodes to do just that—pause and explore what we must and should consider as we create this new future with innovations.
S4.E5. - Spreading the Cure: Diffusion and Implementation
The internet is full of examples of failed innovations... The Segway, The PalmPilot, MySpace... tech that started revolutions, but failed to scale. This phenomenon is not specific to Silicon Valley. In fact, it is very present in healthcare.
On this episode of the I'm Pharmacy Podcast, we chat diffusion and implementation. What can innovators learn from failed innovatrions to better navigate the
S4.E4. - Prototyping Progress
So you have a good idea... no, a great idea. The science is solid. The tech is exciting. People are interested. Your innovation and its success seems certain. And yet, you fail to make the jump from an exciting idea to scaling up and being successful.
As we explore the art of prototyping, and early launches, we'll explore how these foundational ideas are assessed for market fit. Join us as we ex
S4.E3. - Champions of Change
Here we go on the path of innovation. On this episode, we build on the pathway of innovation to better understand how change occurs, how the spark of a novel discovery can really kick start this journey. We do believe that all good innovation should be grounded in strong science. But how and where does it start? Where does the initial spark come from? How does the scientist see a discovery and sel
S4.E2. - From Lab to Market
Historically, academia has been breeding ground for groundbreaking discoveries. But often these findings remained confined within Academic Journals lacking the pathway to real world applications. However, as technology transfer offices popped up around universities around the world, entrepreneurial programs, catalysts, collaborative initiatives, universities are more and more recognizing the value
S4. E1. - Eureka!
Welcome to Season Four.
Join us in kicking-off a new season of the I'm Pharmacy Podcast as we explore the heart and soul of the academic endeavour, innovation.
Now, before you roll your eyes about another podcast focusing on innovation, this season goes beyond a re-telling of success, and gets to the bottom of where innovation comes from. We dive deep into where ideas come from, what failures le
MINISERIES Ep 3: The Future of Pharmacy Is...
In the final episode of season three, we're turning our spotlight to the ones who will be the forefront of tomorrow's pharmacy landscape, our pharmacy students.
Featuring:
Theodora Udounwa, fourth year PharmD student, Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy
Al-Amin Ahamed, fourth year PharmD student, Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy
Madelynn Hannah, pharmacist and MScPhm trainee, Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharm
'MINISERIES Ep 2: Blank Slate - Live from CPERC 2023
What is the pharmacist of the future, and how do we train them?
Recorded live at the 2023 Canadian Pharmacy Education and Research Conference in Winnipeg, Manitoba, host Mina Tadrous explores the future of pharmacy education alongside an esteemed panel of pharmacists and pharmacy educators.
Featuring:
Taylor Raiche, University of Saskatchewan
Natalie Kennie-Kaulbach, Dalhousie University
Sandra
MINISERIES Ep 1: Pharmacy's Moment
Tune in to the first episode of our I'm Pharmacy Podcast Miniseries 'Pharmacy in Focus'. Throughout the next three episodes, we'll be exploring the current state of pharmacy practice, education and research, and uncovering what the future holds for the profession of pharmacy.
In the first episode, we take a trip to Southhampton, Ontario to speak to Pharmacist and Pharmacy Owner Kristen Watt about
S3.E5: Our Mental Health Crisis
In today's episode, we tackle a crisis that affects millions of individuals worldwide, and has reached an alarming proportion in Canada. We're going to talk about the mental health crisis. Mental health disorders have long been a significant concern. In recent years, the magnitude of the problem just feels like it's escalated, leaving a profound effect on individuals, families and communities.
Fe
S3.E4: Putting Evidence Into Action
We produce lots of science. There's an estimated 125,000, medical or clinical studies published per month, in 2021. That means that there's over a million different papers with lots of different evidence in different spaces being produced a year.
And yet, with all of this knowledge, we seem to see a plateau in people's health and health outcomes. How can it be that despite the availability of high
S3.E3: Dose of Reality: Access to Medications
Medications are an integral part of our healthcare system, and yet their access is grossly limited around the world. On this episode of the I'm Pharmacy Podcast, we dive into the issue of access to medicine, both globally and in Canada, with family physician Dr. Danielle Martin and Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy Professor Jillian Kohler.
S3.E2 - The Next Pandemic
Where were you when you first heard the news about the pandemic?
On this episode of the I'm Pharmacy Podcast, we dig into the pandemic, what the last three years have looked like, and if we are ready for the next one. To discuss, we chat with Emily Musing, inaugural leader in residence at the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy. And former VP clinical and the chief Patient Safety Officer at the Univer
S3.E1 Bugs and Drugs
In the first episode of season three, we dive into what the World Health Organization calls one of the major public health threats to humanity, antimicrobial resistance. To discuss AMR, and what scientists and health care providers are doing to battle it, we chat with pharmacotherapy specialist Mark McIntyre and Associate Professor in U of T's Department of Molecular Genetics, William Navarre.
Introducing Season Three: Big Problems, Bigger Solutions
Introducing Season Three of the I'm Pharmacy Podcast: Big Problems, Bigger Solutions dropping January 24.
Big thanks to everyone who showed their support for the show and helped us bring home a silver and listener's choice signal award in the category of science and education!
S2.E8: Show me the Money!
The global pharmaceutical market is expected to grow to $1.6 trillion this year. In Canada alone, we spend close to $35 billion a year on prescription drugs. This is big money, and Big Pharma.
On the last episode of season two, we explore the world of drug pricing and access, chatting with Vice President and Head of Medical, Global Influenza and COVID Franchises Dr. Ayman Chit, and GreenShield Ca
S2.E7: Optimized Use
Recent estimates suggest that close to 40% of adults over the age of 65 are prescribed at least five drugs. But is more better?
On this episode on the I'm Pharmacy Podcast we tackle the topic of optimized use, discussing the process of deprescribing, prescribing cascades, and polypharmacy with Clinician Scientist Lisa McCarthy and Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy Professor and Dean Lisa Dolovich.
S2.E6: Drug Safety
How do we study the safety of drugs? Who studies them? And what does that mean to our risk tolerance of medications? Host Mina Tadrous explores these questions with Pharmacoepidemiologist Dr. Tara Gomes and Clinical Pharmacologist Dr. David Juurlink.
S2.E5: On Trial
Today, and as we've seen throughout this pandemic, clinical trials are the commonplace for how any new treatment gets approved. It is the gatekeeper to anything getting stocked on the shelves of pharmacies or hospitals. And that's what I want to dive into in this episode. How are trials planned? What does it take to complete one? What are all the different components that go into this gold standar
S2.E4: Perfect Form
How do we pick how to introduce the right molecule into the body in the right way? Well, there's a lot of things to consider. How was it absorbed into the body? Where and how is it broken down? What's the size of the molecule? What is it treating? And where do we want it to go? There's lots of different questions to determine the right formulation. So today we explore the magic of formulations. Wh
S2.E3: The Big Leap
The process of moving from a potential drug molecule to being on the shelf of a pharmacy is a long and winding journey. On average, from the time the molecule is discovered to when it's actually approved by the FDA, it takes 12 to 15 years. More importantly, it costs close to $1 billion to bring a drug to market. It's also estimated that of the 1000s of molecules that are looked at, only a few wil
S2.E2: On Target
On this episode of the I'm Pharmacy Podcast, host Mina Tadrous finds answers to the questions: How do we figure out how where drugs work? Does this ever change? And are there more than just one way to find that final target?
Featuring discussions with Stèphane Angers, Director and Professor of U of T's Donnelly Centre, and Rob Bonin, Assistant Professor at the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy and C
S2.E1 - Building the Foundation
In 1921. At the corner of university and college in Toronto, two scientists Frederick Banting, and Charles best figured out how to remove insulin from a dog's pancreas. They extracted thick brown sludge. Fast-forward 100 years, and the world is still benefiting from this momentous discovery.
As we kick-off the second season of the I'm Pharmacy Podcast, host Mina Tadrous starts with the pivotal q
