When: Thursday December 11, 2014 – 7:30 PM
Where: Montgomery Community College (Rockville Campus) – Humanity Building (HU), Conference Room 009 (Get Directions, Campus Map )

Speaker: Mohammad Kazem Attari, M.D.
Language: Farsi

Synopsis:

Congenital abnormalities (also referred to as birth defects or Congenital anomalies) affect an estimated 1 in 33 infants and result in approximately 3.2 million birth defect-related disabilities every year in world. Although congenital anomalies may be genetic, infectious or environmental in origin, most often it is difficult to identify the exact causes. These are the second or third commonest cause of infant deaths in all countries; although the vast majority of infants born with a congenital anomaly will survive.
A birth defect may affect how the body looks, works or both. Some birth defects like cleft lip are structural problems that can be easy to see. To find others, like heart defects, needs use special tests.  Infections during pregnancy, exposures to medicines or chemicals can result in birth defects. For most birth defects, the cause is unknown. Some birth defects can be prevented. Some medicines can help prevent some congenital abnormalities. And some medicines can cause serious birth defects.
Babies with birth defects may need surgery or other medical treatments. Today, we can diagnose many birth defects in the uterus. This enables us to treat or even correct some problems before the baby is born. In this lecture, different aspects of congenital abnormalities and their prevention will be presented.

About the Speaker:

When: Thursday November 13, 2014 – 7:00 PM
Where: Matt’s House of Kabob (15108 Frederick Rd #A Rockville, MD 20850

Program Agenda:

7:00 Registration

7:15 Opening Remarks by Dr. Aram Hessami, Vice President of Planning

7:20 Dinner

8:00 Presentation of IAAP Lifetime Achievement Award to Dr. Hossein Razavi by Mr. Mohsen Shirazi

8:15 Traditional Music / Avaz

8:30 IAAP, and the Scholarship Award Selection Criteria, Dr. Manouchehr Farkhondeh, President, IAAP

8:45 Summary of the 2014 Student Scholarship Program and introducing the awardees by Hossein Ebneyousef, Chair of Scholarship Committee

9:00 Short presentations by recipients of 2014 scholarship awards

10:45 Closing Remarks

When: Thursday October 9, 2014 – 7:30 PM
Where: Montgomery Community College (Rockville Campus) – Humanity Building (HU), Conference Room 009 (Get Directions, Campus Map )

Speaker: Dr. Kazem Kazempour
Language: Farsi

Synopsis:

This talk covers the discussion of drug development/approval from discovery to market in USA. All clinical products must go through the FDA approval process before they are allowed to go to the US market. This includes all clinical products that have been approved and are being used in other countries. That is after their animal tastings, and before the human testing they must go through FDA approval and review process.
The FDA approval process on average takes around 10 years and costs on average around 100s of million dollars for each clinical product. Maryland in general and Montgomery County in particular houses hundreds of pharmaceuticals, biotech industries and especially it houses the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Food and Drug Administration (FDA). These two institutions are the essential parts of the clinical research and review in the US.

About the Speaker:

Dr. Kazempour is the President and CEO of Amarex Clinical Research since 1998; in addition he is teaching at The George Washington University, and serving on GW Regulatory Affair Advisory Board. Amarex Clinical Research is a global clinical research organization, working with international pharmaceutical, biotechnology, medical device companies, and the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
Dr. Kazempour received his MS and PhD degrees in Statistics from Colorado State University and began his career as a mathematical statistician by working at the Genetics Institute in 1975. He has worked in multiple therapeutic areas including anti-infective, AIDS, cardiovascular diseases, vaccines, and wound healing. He has chaired, established, presented to, and participated in, several Data Safety Monitoring Boards for compounds within his area of expertise, and has authored and refereed numerous publications and technical reports both in/for mathematical statistical journals as well as clinical literatures.
Dr. Kazempour has presented, and participated in hundreds of US Food and Drug Administration FDA meetings as well as other regulatory bodies around the world. His expertise has earned him multiple recognition awards from the FDA for his contributions to the drug approval process, particularly for his work on HIV and AIDS clinical trial designs and analyses. He has conducted presentations to the FDA meetings and FDA advisory committees on more than 50 different clinical trials and medical devices ranging from Antiviral, HIV to septic shock, to Diabetics and wound healing.