In Xavier University of Louisiana’s College of Pharmacy, students are encouraged to strive for excellence in their careers and research endeavors to carry out the goal of achieving health equity. Through the All of Us Research Program, two Xavier pharmacy students were allowed the chance to present their research at the All of Us Researcher’s Convention held on March 29-31.

The All of Us Research Program is a national initiative by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). In 2015, the NIH formed the Precision Medicine Initiative Working Group of the Advisory Committee to the Director, a group of experts in precision medicine and large clinical research studies to research how individual differences play a role in health to better inform prevention and treatment strategies tailored to address an individual's unique biology. From the efforts of this group, the framework for the All of Us Research Program was developed. The purpose of the database is to include expansive health data from diverse, underrepresented populations in biomedical research.

For the past two years, Xavier’s College of Pharmacy (COP) has been a sub-awardee of Pyxis’s Partners and the NIH’s All of Us Research Program. This year, the program hosted four Xavier students, three of whom were Xavier College of Pharmacy students. Two of these students, fourth-year (P4) pharmacy student Andre Nguyen and second-year (P2) pharmacy student Vu Pham, were invited to present their research projects at the All of Us Researchers Convention, a national stage where students are invited to showcase their findings using the All of Us Research Hub and Workbench. Their research was titled “Ethnicity Association in Metformin Use and Breast Cancer Carcinoma,” and “Healthcare Access and Utilization in Asian Breast Cancer Patients,” respectively.

Another student attendee from Xavier’s COP, Alexandria Thomas, is a P1 student who is conducting research titled “Second Degree Heart Block: Population Disparities Identified in the All of Us Data.”  Thomas also used the All of Us workbench and data set for her research that she has been presenting at other conferences.

“[The] All of Us [Program] has allowed me the opportunity to develop my research skills and tell an important story that informs different audiences about a specific population who are dealing with a serious chronic condition,” said Thomas, who also presented her research at the 16^th Health Disparities Conference hosted by Xavier University of Louisiana in February 2023.

“As investigators and scholars, we teach our students how to use the All of Us Research Program Workbench. The data set that we are creating is to help better understand health and health disparities to address health inequities,” said Dr. KiTani Lemieux, a Xavier College of Pharmacy professor and principal investigator of Xavier University of Louisiana’s All of Us Research Program, “That is what we do here at Xavier to make a more just and humane society.”

The free and virtual All of Us Researchers Convention was open to anyone interested in further understanding health and disease, reducing health disparities in underrepresented populations, and enabling more tailored approaches to healthcare. With breadth, diversity, innovation, access, and engagement at the forefront of the All of Us Research Program, the All of Us Researchers Convention sought to embody those ideals in principle and practice. Because of the work that the All of Us Research Program has done to give researchers access to more expansive and diverse health data, more people, including Xavier pharmacy students, are able to conduct research that can contribute to the overall improvement of health for everyone, especially those from underserved communities.