Medical Faculty News v25i1

As a pharmacist of the emergency department at Austin Hospital in Melbourne Australia prior to joining HKUMed, Dr Esther Chan Wai-yin , Associate Professor of the Department of Pharmacology and Pharmacy encountered situations that spurred her discoveries on sedating drug use for behavioural emergencies and anti-blood clotting (anticoagulation) drugs. Seeing patients in an agitated state who were at risk of harming themselves and others motivated her work on sedation drugs. “The agitation may be due to mental health issues or related to drug and/or alcohol abuse. But there had not been much data about which drugs work quickly and safely or how they compared,” she said. She therefore conducted randomised clinical trials in Drug Solutions for Emergencies Dr Esther Chan Wai-yin 陳慧賢博士 Australia and Hong Kong to determine the best drugs and delivery methods for achieving quick and safe sedation. She showed that olanzapine was safe and effective to be delivered both intravenously and intramuscularly. The Hong Kong trial was the first clinical trial in Asia to compare sedative and antipsychotic medicines for use in behavioural emergencies. Dr Chan also showed in a separate study that haloperidol – the most commonly prescribed antipsychotic medication in Hong Kong was associated with an increased risk of death compared with several other anti-psychotics. The study advised that elderly patients and those at risk of heart disease or pneumonia need careful monitoring or, preferably, should be given a different antipsychotic drug. Her work in these areas have led to practice changes Up-and-Coming Exciting new discoveries have been made by young HKUMed scholars, from unravelling the mechanisms of obesity to identifying the triggers of cancers common among Hong Kong and Asian people. 嶄露頭角 醫學院年輕學者屢獲科研新發現， 從破解引致肥胖的機制， 到辨識在香港及亞洲區常見 癌症的誘發因素，成果令人振奮。 10 Feature