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Department of Pharmacy

Obstetric-fetal Pharmacology Research Unit (OPRU)

Mission

OPRU LogoThe University of Washington Obstetric-fetal Pharmacology Research Unit is dedicated to the optimization of medications during pregnancy and lactation. Our goal is to understand how the body handles and responds to drugs during pregnancy.
Many medications commonly used during pregnancy and lactation are not well understood.

Through enhancing the understanding of medications in these special populations, we hope to optimize medication selection and dosage and ultimately improve care for pregnant women, their fetuses, lactating mothers and their nursing infants.

Interests

The focus of our work is in identification, study and characterization of drugs that are of therapeutic value during pregnancy and whose disposition and response are altered by the pregnant state in both normal and abnormal pregnancies. We study pregnancy complications as well as a wide range of acute and chronic conditions, including but not limited to:

  • Diabetes
  • Hypertension
  • Preterm birth
  • Preeclampsia
  • Cardiac disease
  • Depression
  • Epilepsy
  • Cancer

Contact

To contact us, please e-mail us at mhebert@uw.edu or call us at (206) 616-5016. (Please note that confidentiality cannot be guaranteed if e-mail is used.)