Vida Pharmacal

Roy T. Madigan, D.V.M., is the principal scientist in the Canine Chagas Treatment Study, Lackland Air Force Base, San Antonio, TX—research into treatment of canine Chagas disease in Unites States Army military working dogs. Madigan is also the director of The Animal Hospital of Smithson Valley in Spring Branch, TX (Chief Medical Officer and coordinator for small animal medicine). He is the founder of Vida Pharmacal, a nonprofit human and veterinary pharmaceutical manufacturing company. The company’s focus is development of novel therapeutics to address neglected parasitic diseases in both humans and animals. Madigan’s work includes filing the first veterinary drug patent for anti-T. cruzi activity in dogs and conducting pioneering research in studying the curative effects of drug combination in human heart cells infected with Chagas disease. He is a member of the Texas Chagas Task Force, Centers for Disease Control and University of Texas Health Science Center, San Antonio, TX, as the veterinary lead for canine Chagas disease in Texas. The Task Force increases public awareness of Chagas disease by working with healthcare providers, entomologists, marketing, and the public. He is working with the FDA for approval of treatment regimens for canine Chagas, and with commercial laboratories to develop serologic techniques to diagnose T. cruzi infection in dogs. He resides in the Texas Hill Country with his wife, two children, five dogs, cat, and ferret.

Alberto E. Paniz Mondolfi, M.D., M.S., PhD., FFTM RCPS (Glasg), is Academic Director and Chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases and Tropical Medicine at the IDB Clinic in Barquisimeto, Venezuela. He is also head of the Infectious Disease Pathology Laboratory and the Zoonosis and Emerging Pathogens Regional Collaborative Network, a Venezuelan Research Incubator; as well as member of the Directorate of Health, Department of Research and Academic Affairs at the Instituto Venezolano de los Seguros Sociales (IVSS) in Caracas, Venezuela. Dr. Paniz Mondolfi is a U.S., EU, and Venezuela-licensed physician and a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons.

Dr. Paniz Mondolfi headed the infectious disease pathology section of the Laboratory of Biochemistry and served as national coordinator for epidemiology and control of leprosy and leishmaniasis at the Institute of Biomedicine in Caracas, Venezuela. He was also an Associate Researcher to the Infectious Diseases Developmental Laboratory (Department of Medicine) at St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital Center (University Hospital of Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons) in New York.

Dr. Paniz Mondolfi received his medical degree from Universidad Central de Venezuela in Caracas, Venezuela. He completed a research fellowship at the Institute of Biomedicine (PAHO center for training and research in leprosy and other endemic diseases) in Caracas, and residency training in Internal Medicine (IVSS, Caracas Venezuela) and Anatomic and Clinical Pathology at St. Luke’s-Roosevelt and Beth Israel Medical Center in New York City. He also completed a fellowship in Dermatopathology at Tufts Medical Center in Boston, as well as a master's of science in Parasitology from the University of Valencia (Spain), and advanced fellowship courses in Infectious Diseases at the WHO/TDR Immunology Research and Training Centre in Lausanne, Switzerland, and the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology in Washington D.C. (Donald West King Fellowship). He pursued further training in cancer diagnostics and completed his Molecular Genetic Pathology fellowship training at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston. He was also a Winchester fellow in Medical Microbiology at Yale University School of Medicine. He has published extensively in internationally renowned journals, such as the New England Journal of Medicine, the Lancet, Science, and Nature.

He is a specialist in travel medicine and infectious disease and is also a skilled pathologist with strong research and professional interests in molecular diagnostics of cancer and infectious diseases. His main research interests are focused in the eco-epidemiological and pathological aspects of arboviral and trypanosomatid parasite infections. His expertise and knowledge on antimicrobial and antiprotozoal chemotherapy has led him to focus his research on the identification and evaluation of novel drugs and formulations for the treatment of leishmaniasis and Chagas disease. Current research interests include the development of novel diagnostic methods as well as the development of predictive models for drugs and vaccines.