Division Director - Clinical Pharmacology & Toxicology

Division Director of Clinical Pharmacology, Toxicology, and Therapeutic Innovation

The Department of Pediatrics at Children’s Mercy seeks a creative and scholarly leader to serve as Division Director of Clinical Pharmacology, Toxicology, and Therapeutic Innovation. The Division Director will be responsible for leading the research, educational, and quality missions of Clinical Pharmacology, an academic division focused on providing clinical consultation and research programs aimed at making the use of medications in children safer and more effective.

Within the division, the Section of Medical Toxicology provides consultative services for potential poison exposures, including overdoses, environmental exposures, and envenomations. The Division Director will foster collaborative ties throughout Children’s Mercy, bridging the division’s research missions in genomic, clinical research, and translational interests across the Department of Pediatrics and CMRI.

This is a faculty position offering academic appointments at the University of Missouri – Kansas City School of Medicine and the Kansas University School of Medicine, rank to be commensurate with experience.

Established in 1996, Clinical Pharmacology has a national and international reputation for impactful translational science and excellence in training. The Division has a strong record for successful extramural funding and an outstanding publication record. Clinical Pharmacology faculty and staff are national leaders in pharmacogenetics, institutional leaders in health equity research, and outstanding clinicians, using pharmacology and toxicology to improve the care of patients.

Among the groups in the Division are:

• GOLDILOKs Clinic – A multidisciplinary clinic with a pediatrician, clinical pharmacist, and nurse who see patients with a variety of conditions including adverse drug reactions, drug–drug interactions, and medication nonresponse. The clinic offers educational opportunities to pharmacy students, medical students, residents, and fellows.
• Medical Toxicology Consult Team – Provides consultative services for a variety of environmental, exposure, overdose and poison issues. A Children’s Mercy Medical Toxicologist is on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week. This service averages 150–200 bedside consults per year and provides medical direction for the Kansas Poison Control Center.

Children’s Mercy Hospital (CMH) Pediatric Clinical Pharmacology (T32) training program is the Division of Clinical Pharmacology and Toxicology at CMH, one of the largest and most comprehensive Pediatric Clinical Pharmacology programs in North America. Our fellowship training program is accredited by the American Board of Clinical Pharmacology (ABCP) and has formally trained 31 fellows since 1998 (21 pediatricians, 6 pharmacists, 1 advanced practice nurse, 3 PhD scientists).

The drug biotransformation core serves to characterize drug disposition pathways along with the consequences of drug metabolizing enzyme (DME) polymorphisms in subcellular systems derived from pediatric tissues. A cell culture facility permits fellows and faculty to explore the regulation and expression of DME related proteins. A robust analytical core supports in vitro and in vivo pharmacology‑ and metabolomics‑related research, emphasizing the characterization of developmental trajectories of drug disposition and response pathways.

Partnerships with University of Kansas Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) spectroscopy core allow for the characterization of drug metabolites or biomarker development. The Analytical Chemistry Core Director can provide both didactic and hands‑on instruction to our trainees on quantitative pharmacology methods.

We have an internationally recognized pharmacogenetics/genomics (PGx) program defining gene sequence variations related to drug disposition and action. This program also administers the Pharmacogene Variation (Pharm Var) Consortium, a globally recognized central repository for pharmacogene variation and a unifying designation system for the community.

A team of dedicated health care providers and researchers in our Clinical Pharmacology Division and Division…