Folakemi T. Odedina facts for kids
Folakemi Titilayo Odedina (born January 21, 1965) is a scientist and professor from Nigeria. She teaches pharmacy and medicine at the University of Florida in the United States. She leads a big research group called the Prostate Cancer Transatlantic Consortium (CaPTC). This group studies prostate cancer, especially why it affects Black men more often. She also helps advise the American Cancer Society on prostate cancer differences.
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Early Years
Folakemi Odedina was born on January 21, 1965, in Abeokuta, Ogun State, Nigeria. Her parents were Ezekiel Shotayo and Grace Modupe Badejogbin. She grew up in Lagos and went to Apostolic Church Primary School and Methodist Girls High School there.
Education
In 1986, Odedina earned her first degree in pharmacy from Obafemi Awolowo University in Nigeria. Later, in 1990, she started a special program at the University of Florida. She earned her PhD (a very high university degree) in Pharmaceutical Sciences in 1994. Her PhD work was about how to use pharmaceutical care in local communities.
Career
After getting her PhD, Professor Odedina became an assistant professor at West Virginia University. She then taught medicine and pharmacy at the University of Florida. She also became a leader at the Mayo Clinic Comprehensive Cancer Center.
She is also in charge of the Florida-California Cancer Research, Education and Engagement (CaRE2) Health Equity Center. This center gets money from the National Cancer Institute.
Her scientific work focuses on why prostate cancer affects different groups of people in different ways. She studies how genes and the environment play a role. She also looks at how to help Black men with health problems. She has led over 30 research projects on prostate cancer differences.
In 2006, she received a special award called the Fulbright Specialists Program. This allowed her to study how cancer information was collected in Nigeria. She led the first national project on this topic in Nigeria. She also helped write Nigeria's first plan to control cancer.
Professor Odedina has helped more than 300 African scientists. She leads the Research Committee for the African Organisation for Research and Training in Cancer (AORTIC). In 2017, she received another award, the Carnegie African Diaspora Fellowship. This allowed her to work on prostate cancer and new ways to do cancer research in South Africa.
She is the main leader of the Prostate Cancer Transatlantic Consortium (CaPTC). This group gets funding from the United States National Institute of Health/National Cancer Institute. It includes over 50 institutions and research places in Africa, Europe, North America, and the Caribbean.
Awards and Honors
Professor Odedina has received many awards for her important work. Some of these include:
- 1996 Honorable mention for Innovative Teaching, American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy
- 1997 Pharmacy Practice Research Award, American Society of Health-System Pharmacists
- 1998 HBCU Faculty Award in Cancer Research, American Association for Cancer Research
- 2005 Minority Access Role Model Award, Insight into Diversity magazine
- 2006 Fulbright Scholar, U.S. Department of State Fulbright Research Program
- 2008 Researcher of the Year Award, Florida A&M University
- 2016 Inspiring Women in STEM Award, Insight Into Diversity magazine
- 2017 Williams Award for Innovation in Cancer Care, African Organization for Research and Training in Cancer
- 2017 Carnegie African Diaspora Fellowship Program (Nigeria), Institute of International Education
- 2023 AACR Distinguished Lectureship on the Science of Cancer Health Disparities, American Association for Cancer Research
