(Alexandria, VA)-Marcus M. Reidenberg, MD, Professor, Weill Medical College of Cornell
University has been selected by the American Society for Clinical Pharmacology and
Therapeutics (ASCPT) to receive the 2008 Oscar B. Hunter Memorial Award in
Therapeutics.
The Oscar B. Hunter Memorial Award in Therapeutics honors individual scientists for
outstanding lifetime contributions to clinical pharmacology and therapeutics. This award
recognizes a meritorious career in drug research, excellence or contributions in direct patient
care, and a distinguished teaching career. The Oscar B. Hunter Memorial Award is named for
Washington, DC physician Dr. Oscar Benwood Hunter Sr., whose father and grandfather
were also physicians. Hunter was an active ASCPT member who held the offices of secretary
and president.
ASCPT will present this prestigious award to Dr. Reidenberg at its Annual Meeting on
Saturday, April 5, 2008, in Orlando, Florida. At that time, Dr. Reidenberg will present a
lecture entitled, "From Adverse Drug Reactions to Drug Disposition to WHO and Essential
Medicines to Our Discipline of Clinical Pharmacology."
Dr. Reidenberg received his undergraduate education at Cornell University. After completing
his MD and fellowship program at Temple University, he served as Senior Medical Officer at
the US Naval (delete air) Station in Trinidad. He then returned to Temple University where
he completed his residency. He spent a year at St. Mary's Hospital in London where he did
further study on drug metabolism while training with Professor
R.T. Williams and then continued his research with Professor Folke Sjoqvist at the
Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, Sweden where his studies continued to focus on clinical
pharmacology. When he returned to the United States he continued his career at Temple
University before accepting his current position as Professor of Pharmacology,
Medicine and Public Health at Weill Medical College of Cornell University. He also served
as an Attending Physician and Visiting Physician at New York Hospital and Rockefeller
University, respectively, before ending his personal practice of medicine in
2006.
Dr. Reidenberg has had a distinguished teaching career. The American Society for
Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics awarded him the Harry Gold Award for
Research and Teaching Excellence in Clinical Pharmacology in 1999 and in 2000 the Weill
Medical College of Cornell University honored him with their Award for Teaching
Excellence. In 1993 the Departmental Associates of the New York Hospital-Cornell Medical
Center established a program to provide minority college students with summer research
opportunities and named it the Marcus M. Reidenberg Gateways to Science Program in honor
of Dr. Reidenberg.
Dr. Reidenberg has published more that 130 original research articles in peer reviewed
journals including the New England Journal of Medicine and the Journal of the American
Medical Association. He served as Editor of ASCPT's journal Clinical Pharmacology and
Therapeutics from 1985 through 2001. He has been a member of the World Health
Organization's Expert Panel on the Selection and Use of Essential Medicines since 1989,
served on its Expert Committees, and was elected chair of the Expert Committee in 2007.
Dr. Reidenberg has served ASCPT in a number of leadership roles over his 40 years of
membership, most notably as President of the Society in 1984. He was also the recipient of
ASCPT's Rawls-Palmer Progress in Medicine Award in 1981 and the Henry W. Elliott
Distinguished Service Award in 1999.
The American Society for Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics (ASCPT) is the leading
forum for the exchange, development, and integration of translational science into the drug
development continuum from discovery t6 safe and effective medication use. Headquartered
in Alexandria, VA, ASCPT was founded in 1900 and has over 2,100 members worldwide.