Student Rainforest Fund

Publication of The Student Rainforest Fund Fall 2005
P.O. Box 238
Wildwood, PA. 15091
(412) 486-4588
web: www.nutrifarmacy.com

SRF: Ten Years of Taking Pharmacy Students to Find Their Roots
By: Dr. Dan Wagner
PART 1 of 2

It all started with a novel idea. In 1993, I was most fortunate to be part of an international team of health professionals who set off on an unprecedented expedition to the Amazon Rainforest of Peru. The group was organized by the American Botanical Council, an herbal research and interest organization from Austin, Texas. The trip was called "Pharmacy from the Rainforest," and afforded American pharmacists the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to study natural products and medicinal plants in the world's greatest pharmacy?the rainforest. On that first trip, nearly seventy pharmacists took two weeks out of their hectic schedules and set off for the deep jungle to commune with nature and learn from the indigenous peoples who live there. To get that chance to tap into the timeless knowledge of the shamans and traditional healers who have learned the secrets of the healing plants was reason enough to make the commitment. Earning twenty continuing-education credits was enticing too.

This initial rainforest trip for pharmacists had a faculty world-renowned in their knowledge of ethnobotany and herbal medicine. The late Dr. Varro Tyler was one of the lecturers for the group. Joining him was Dr. James Duke, author of The Green Pharmacy, noted ethnobotanist Dr. Mark Plotkin, famed natural-medicine healer Dr. Rosita Arvigo, and Mark Blumenthal, president and founder of the American Botanical Council.

Upon my return, I found myself looking at the professional practice of pharmacy in a new light. Although I owned and operated a successful independent, community pharmacy located north of Pittsburgh, PA, I started yearning for ways to look at my practice in a natural way.

Opportunity came knocking a second time, when I signed up for the second "Pharmacy from the Rainforest" expedition a year later, this time to the eco-friendly, Central American country of Belize. Many of the same famed faculty went along. Belize was the home of Dr. Rosita Arvigo who would go on to be the main teacher of our student group for the next eight years.

Upon my return home, I was determined to make this unique rainforest experience a bigger part of my practice, and my life. Late in 1996, I decided to sell my independent pharmacy after 17 wonderful years to a chain drugstore. I refused employment offered by the chain and took a giant leap of faith. I opened an all-natural pharmacy that would be more dedicated to selling quality herbs, vitamins, and botanicals, and integrating these dietary supplements with prescription and over-the-counter drugs in a safe and efficacious manner. I named the new concept pharmacy "Nutri-farmacy," coined from a lecture I attended in the Amazon by Dr. Jim Duke entitled "food farmacy." I chose not to sell pharmaceuticals to the public any longer, although I still maintained a closed pharmacy for nursing-home patients. My new role would be primarily as a consultant pharmacist (for patients taking both conventional and alternative medicines). I would also remain a retailer selling supplements not pharmaceutical drugs.

My sincere desire was not just to alter my personal practice, but also find a way to give pharmacy students a grand opportunity to experience first-hand, as I did, the wonder and awe of the rainforest, the source of many of the drugs they would one day dispense. I needed a plan and a partner. My former college professor, Dr. Norbert Pilewski, was still teaching pharmacognosy and alternative medicine at Duquesne University's School of Pharmacy. He was a friend and colleague and knew he would be the perfect partner to get the university faculty interested in my plan.

In 1995 I presented my idea to him. I wanted to take pharmacy students to the rainforest and give them the opportunity to study natural medicine and the "roots" of their profession. What a fantastic classroom the rainforest would make! Dr. Pilewski was immediately impressed with the idea, but was not sure how many clinical members of the faculty would have an interest. There was a need to raise funds as it was unlikely that pharmacy students, burdened with high tuition costs, would have enough extra money to cover the expenses of a ten-day trip out of the country.

Over the next few months, a synchronicity of events transpired which cemented our future as the Student Rainforest Fund (SRF). I did not particularly want the SRF to be an organization, but more of a fund that would help to meet the expenses any student would incur if they desired to make such a excursion. I met with Dr. Richard White, who was vice president of the Pittsburgh-based division of Bayer Corporation. Dr. White was a member of the Duquesne University Board of Directors, and I knew his influence and support would be critical. After meeting and presenting my plan, he genuinely liked the idea and gave me a verbal pledge of $5,000 to get the SRF up and running. We now had a initial funds to proceed.

Within weeks, Dr. Pilewski posted a notice on the bulletin board at Duquesne University's School of Pharmacy about our first SRF trip to Belize to study medicinal plants and natural products with Dr. Rosita Arvigo and other members of the Belizian Healers Association. Just 14 students from Duquesne signed up for the May 1996 expedition. We charged the students only fifty percent of the total cost. The SRF had raised sufficient funds from the Bayer grant along with other individual donors to cover an extensive amount of the cost.

Our mission is to provide higher education for college and university students with the opportunity to explore the natural history of medicine and evoke the healing edge of knowledge regarding natural products and phytomedicinals in the world's greatest pharmacy--the rainforest. We are pursuing a holistic approach to the healing of the body, mind, and spirit by learning from unique practitioners. Our organization gains an invaluable international perspective from the indigenous peoples of different cultures that we encounter.

After 38 years of teaching and service to Duquesne University, Dr. Nobert A. Pilewski, is retiring from the full-time faculty of the School of Pharmacy. Dr. P first joined the faculty in 1967 and taught pharmacognosy and applied microbiology.

Dr. P became involved in international education when he first traveled to Belize in 1995 with the newly-formed Student Rainforest Fund. He has returned to Belize 6 times over the past decade, and has traveled to the Peruvian Amazon. He also has visited his ancestral home in Poland on several occasions, once as a Fulbright teaching fellowship at Jagiellonian University on Krakow.

The SRF Board and its many, many students over the last ten years wish Dr. P the best of health and luck in his retirement years. We all hope that he continues to be involved with SRF and continues to join in future expeditions.

SRF President Dan Wagner and BioMed founder Harlan Lahti returned from 2 weeks in Nigeria in April. They worked at 3 hospitals preforming diabetes education and testing. They also had a chance to meet with several traditional healers in the states of Lafia and Bauchi. A recent article on their trip was published in the September issue of the PENNSYLVANIA PHARMACIST. Dan Wagner also presented a lecture at the Olabisi Onabanjo University on "Plant Drugs that Changed the World-And Some that Might."

Everyone associated with SRF is quite pleased to announce that Don Antonio Montero Pisco has agreed to join our Board of Advisors. Don Antonio is one of the most respected and recognized shamans in all of Peru. He worked closely with the SRF team during our June, 2005 visit to southern Peru, and graciously accepted our offer to join the SRF Advisory Board as an active member. His jovial manner, genuine caring, and vast knowledge impressed all the students immensely.

Don Antonio was chosen at birth to follow the shaman's path. Orphaned at an early age, he befriended the jungle spirits and they befriended him. His only schooling was the jungle itself, and as a young boy he was tutored by local traditional healers and quickly learned about the healing plants and the spirits that guide men to them. Shamans are many things to many people who live their lives in the rainforest. Sometimes called "doctor priests," shamans are also healers, mystics, psychologists, and social workers. His life has been dedicated to the healing arts, and years of sacrifice, discipline, and hardship have made him one of the most recognized traditional healers and shamans in Peru.

Don Antonio is a close friend and colleague of SRF Advisor Dr. James Duke. Dr. Duke has worked with Don Antonio for over 15 years. They were instrumental in the development of the ReNuPeRu project that worked to sustain medical plants in the upper Amazon regions of Peru. Don Antonio also works closely with the Amazon Center for Environmental Education (ACEER) , the same organization that SRF worked with this year on our expedition to the lower Peruvian rainforest, Cusco and Manchu Picchu. Welcome! Welcome!

Allegheny General Hospital Pharmacy Student Travels to Peru to Study Pharmaceutical Origins

Renee Mosier, an intern in the pharmacy department at Allegheny General Hospital-Suburban Campus, recently traveled to Peru to study alternative medicine with other college students.

Mosier, 22, is a fifth-year pharmacy student at Duquesne University. The trip was funded through a program called the Student Rainforest Fund, which is run by Dr. Dan Wagner, an alumnus of Duquesne. For ten days in June, Mosier traveled around the Madre de Dios region of Peru with students from St Francis University, Shenandoah University and the University of Montana. Led by a shaman (medicine man), the group learned about plants and other natural medicines used to treat medical conditions and ailments. Among the natural remedies the students atudied was "sangre de grado," which translates into "dragon's blood." Sangre de grado is the sap of a tree used to treat certain stomach ailments.

According to Mosier, 25 percent of pharmaceuticals used in the U.S. have rainforest origins. "The Student Rainforest Fund allows us to learn from other cultures and integrate these lessons into our health systems here in the United States," said Mosier. "It allows us to give credit to non-traditional doctors who are very well known to their people but get very little credit elsewhere. What they do is very useful and important to their people."

The trip consisted of 20 students inclusing two instructors. Dr. Dan Wagner was one of the instructors, and the other was Dr. Wendell Combest, a professor at Shenandoah University. Throughout the trip, the instructors gave lectures on how they incorporate teachings of the shaman into their practices in the United States.

Mosier and her traveling companions stayed at a lodge called Amazonica Reserva, which sits deep inside the rainforest by a conservationist group. Amazonia Reserva works with natives and farmers to educate them about sound farming methods. In turn, Amazonica Reserva supports the local farmers by purchasing their produce.

"I had a wonderful experience in Peru," said Mosier. "It was absolutely amazing, and I will never forget the lessons I learned there."

Dan Wagner, RPh, MBA, PharmD. President
Owner of NutriFarmacy, Wildwood, PA.

Norbert A. Pilewski, RPh, Ph.D., Vice President
Professor, Duquesne University

(For a complete copy of the 990-EZ, Contact SRF accountant James Hune 412-635-9088)

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Thank you !!!
For questions and concerns-contact Dr. Daniel Wagner at (412) 486-4588

SRF is a nonprofit research and education organization with tax exempt status under section 501(C)3 of the IRS code. Tax ID: 23-2939579

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