Todd Vanderah, PhD

Todd Vanderah, PhD, is the founding director of the Comprehensive Center for Pain & Addiction at the University of Arizona Health Sciences and a Regents Professor and Head of the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Tucson’s Department of Pharmacology. His research interests include mechanisms of cancer pain, neuronal integration in pain pathways, neurochemical release during conditions of neuropathy, neuronal plasticity, opioid receptor pharmacology, and novel targets for drug discovery. He has more than 20 years of experience researching cannabinoids and other non-opioid options for pain and is determined to find a way to manage pain without increasing the risk of addiction. 

Dr. Vanderah’s father, James Vanderah, had significant pain from metastatic lung cancer and dealt with negative side effects from opioids, which did little to manage the pain. Eventually, Vanderah’s father succumbed to the deadliest of opioid side effects: respiratory depression. The experience convinced Dr. Vanderah that opioids are not the best option for treating cancer pain, a line of inquiry that led him to cannabinoids, the compounds found in the Cannabis sativa plant. Early results from his research on using unique, structured cannabinoids to inhibit pain are promising. Dr. Vanderah’s research is also uncovering new information about how opioids affect metastatic cancer at the cellular level. In recent years, his preclinical research projects have led him to believe that chronic opioid use increases pain and enhances bone loss in metastatic cancer models.

Additionally, Dr. Vanderah co-leads a partnership with Oklahoma State University focused on fighting the opioid epidemic. He leads an AzDHS grant to educate people on responsible adult use of cannabis, and he leads two HRSA grants that are training and expanding a behavioral health workforce that understands and can relate to the unique needs of families and children in crisis, especially surrounding opioid and substance use disorders.