Currently an Adjunct Professor in Anatomy and Physiology at Houston Comunity College Systems, Houston, Texas, Dr Odocha is a caring, patient-centered, consultant research physician and surgeon with over 40 years of experience, committed to diversity and inclusion. Carefully measured, in his quest to advance quality patient care and control of escalating healthcare spending through focused drug research and clinical trials, Dr Odocha demonstrated a first of its kind study illustrating the pharmaco-economic utility of combined Ketoconazole and Cyclosporine in Liver Transplantation in safely extending the plasma half-life of Cyclosporine at a given dose and reduced cost. The study carefully appropriated and dose-monitored in a retrospective fashion, the safe in-vivo Ketoconazole down-regulation of Cytochrome P450 metabolism of cyclosporine levels by the new liver.
An effective and sort after advisor, Dr Odocha works closely with other medical and pharmaceutical professionals in applying scientific methodologies in identifying key areas of improvement and designing strategies through innovative and efficient research protocols. As a pioneer Black transplant surgeon in training and in his academic career, he was meticulously engaged in drug research trials with FK506 (now Tracolimus, Prograf), Cyclosporine and Steroids across diverse populations following transplantation. By participating in, and witnessing inclusiveness and diversity during research design, he noted how such clinical drug research efforts, achieved striking clinical outcomes, optimized revenues and opened up areas of further research. An accomplished academic, researcher, teacher, clinician and formerly associate professor of surgery, with proven record in achieving optimal surgical outcomes, Dr Odocha extended his advisory services to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), where he co-authored a seminal publication in the care of Hepatitis C in the community for the CDC. In addition, he was an NIH-funded clinical researcher on a Multi-Institutional Ethno-genetic Diversity of Alcohol Metabolism in Populations study. Also, serving as a grant reviewer and advisor in the early days of solid organ transplantation for Transplant/Immunology Section at The National Institutes of Health (NIH), his excellent eye for detail enabled his quick identification of problem areas in need for improvement in Hyper-Acute Rejection of kidney transplantation. Subsequently, Dr Odocha adapted a pig kidney cell culture model to interrogate the mechanisms behind that fearsome immunologic dread using a simulation of pig-human transplantation (in vitro), with exciting results. Dr Odocha was an engaging member of Speakers' Bureau for Scherring-Plough on Pegylated Interferon adoption and use in Hepatitis C disease, and was also an award recipient from Burroughs Wellcome Co./American Medical Association for his volunteering work at the Genetics Screening Laboratory for Children in Washington, DC at Howard University Hospital.