Dr. Elizabeth (Renu) Tharion MD, DO

Educational Qualifications

Professional Experience

Overseas Experience

While on Study leave from CMC, Vellore, worked as Lecturer (Grade B) in Physiology/Clinical Physiology at the School of Medical and Applied Sciences at the Rockhampton campus of CQUniversity, Queensland, Australia from 01/03/2012 to 31/01/2013.

Administrative experience

1. Head of the Department of Physiology, Christian Medical College Vellore, from 2nd June 2018 to 20th April 2023. 

2. Registrar of Christian Medical College, Vellore from February 2017 to February 2021. 

3. Deputy Registrar of Christian Medical College, Vellore from July 2013 to February 2017. 

4. Member of the Women’s Grievance Redressal Cell of the Christian Medical College, Vellore from October 2011 to March 2013. 

5. Program co-ordinator of the Postgraduate teaching program at the Physiology department, Christian Medical College, Vellore since March 2011 to May 2018. 

6. Faculty advisor for Elective and Exchange programmes of Christian Medical College, Vellore from October 2006 to July 2010. 

7. Deputy Warden of Women’s hostel of Christian Medical College, Vellore from February 2003 to February 2006.

Research Interests

Studies on human subjects, especially in the areas of muscle and exercise physiology, autonomic functions and sleep physiology. 

PhD Guideship

From June 2021, is recognised as a Ph.D. Guide by the Tamil Nadu Dr. MGR Medical University, to guide candidates in research leading to the award of the Ph.D. degree of the University. 

Membership in Professional societies

1. Life member of the Association of Physiologists and Pharmacologists of India 

2. Life member of the Association of Physiologists of Tamil Nadu (L.M.No.268)

3. Member (Regular) of the American Physiological Society (ID number: 00345125)

Invited lectures and chairing sessions

1. Lung pressures in Normal breathing and Positive Pressure Ventilation – invited lecture on 31st August 2023 for the CME “Pseudobreathing: Artificial breathing– Mechanical ventilation” organised by the Department of Physiology, Government Tiruvannamalai Medical College, and Association of Physiologists of Tamil Nadu, under the auspices of The Tamil Nadu Dr. MGR Medical University, Chennai. 

2. Sleep physiology – invited lecture on 24th March 2023, for the NextGenU Study Group, organised by the Lifestyle Medicine team of Unit IV of the Medicine Department, CMC, Vellore. 

3. Sleep Hygeine - 11th January 2023, as part of the CME on lifestyle medicine conducted by departments of medicine and continuing medical education. 

4. Chairperson for the National webinar on Sleep, conducted on 16/07/2022 by the Vinayaka Mission’s Kirupananda Variyar Medical college, Salem. 

5. An overview of Respiratory Physiology – invited guest lecture by Chettinad Hospital and Research Institute, Chennai in August 2020. 

6. Diabetic Retinopathy – 2004 to 2008 – As part of the Diabetes Education programme to peripheral mission hospital doctors and nurses, funded by the World Diabetes Foundation, and run by the Endocrinology department of Christian Medical College, Vellore.

7. An investigation into small muscle exercise – 31st May 2005 – Department of Biomedicine, Orebro University, Sweden.

8. Cardiac Autonomic Function tests: Variability of the heart rate – September 2008 - Workshop in Experimental Physiology, Christian Medical College, Vellore.

Conference presentations

1. Tephilla Epsibha C, Shalini Jeyapaul, Vinod Abraham, Elizabeth Tharion. Effect of isometric exercises on orthostatic hypotension among elderly. Poster presented at Conference of Health Sciences, Association of Physiologists and Pharmacologists of India (APPI) conference, 2022, ESIC, Faridabad, India. 

2. Ankita Priya, Gowri M, Elizabeth Tharion. Acute sleep deprivation causes gender specific and speciality specific oxidative stress among doctors. Won 2nd prize in Faculty e-poster presentation at the 12th annual conference of the Association of Physiologists of Tamilnadu, October 2018, at Karpagavinayaga medical college, Kancheepuram, India. 

3. Ankita Priya, Gowri M, Elizabeth Tharion. Sleep hygiene in a tertiary care hospital in South India: Cause for concern or not? International conference on Sleep Medicine and Research, The silver Jubilee conference of the Indian Society for Sleep Research (ISSR), September 2017, Goa, India. 

4. Pijush Kanti Bagchi, Judy A David, Samuel Kamalesh Kumar, Grace Rebekah Samuel and Elizabeth Tharion. Motor hand function in children with cerebral palsy following sensory stimulation. Poster presented at Association of Physiologists and Pharmacologists of India (APPI) conference, 2014, Odisha, India. IJPP. Vol 58 – No.5 – Supplement 2014, pg 140. 

5. Tharion E, Parthasarathy S, Mani T. Reproducibility of short-term HRV parameters during different physiological states. Conference proceedings of Physiological Society of India, St. John’s Medical College, Bangalore, December 2010 Pg 128.

6. Tharion E, Rajalakshmi R. Comparative  study  of  short-term  heart rate variability  measures  at  two  different  time  periods  of  the  day  in  healthy  subjects. Conference proceedings of Physiological Society of India, St. John’s Medical College, Bangalore, December 2010, Pg 136.

7. Tharion E, Gnanasenthil G, Mani T. Comparison of resting short-term HRV parameters in habitual caffeine consumers with and without pre-test abstinence of caffeinated beverages. Conference proceedings of Physiological Society of India, St. John’s Medical College, Bangalore, December 2010. Pg 136.

8. Elizabeth Tharion, Rajalakshmi, Rajam Krishna, Gnanasenthil, Prasanna Samuel. Deep slow breathing exercise reduces spontaneous respiratory rate and increases heart rate variability. Tamilnadu State APTCON proceedings, October 2010, Pg. 49.

9. Breathing training modifies spontaneous respiratory rate but not heart rate variability. Elizabeth Tharion and Swarnalatha N. Poster presented at International conference on Cardio-pulmonary regulation in health and disease: Molecular and Systemic Integration. 2007, VP chest institute, University of Delhi, India.

10. Effect of breathing at 0.1 Hz on heart rate variability: A comparison between the supine and standing positions. N Swarnalatha and Elizabeth Tharion. Presentation at Association of Physiologists and Pharmacologists of India (APPI) conference, 2005, Pondicherry, India.

11. Isometric exercise of the first dorsal interroseous muscle induces the metaboreflex. Elizabeth Tharion and J Prakasa Rao. Poster presented at Association of Physiologists and Pharmacologists of India (APPI) conference, 2004, Bangalore, India.

12. Analysis of the force-frequency relation in the frog-heart. Caroline Vijayanand, Elizabeth Tharion, Abrar Alvi, Prakasa Rao, and Sathya Subramani. Best poster award in the Winter symposium 2002, Christian medical College, Vellore, India. 

Awards

1. Won the second prize for faculty e-poster presentation at the 12th annual conference of the association of physiologists of Tamilnadu held at Karpagavinayaga medical college, Kancheepuram on 6th October 2018.

Publications

1. Nedumaran L, Tharion E, Rebekah G and Tharion G, 2024. Exploring factors associated with heart rate variability in newly injured traumatic cervical spinal cord injury patients. National Journal of Physiology, Pharmacy and Pharmacology 14, 678–678. https://doi.org/10.5455/njppp.2024.14.02082202428022024

2. Senthamizselvan R, Amirtham SM, Tharion E, Sandya Rani B and Prince N, 2024. Pilot testing of a simple alternative tissue processing method for immunofluorescence staining. National Journal of Physiology, Pharmacy and Pharmacology 14, 0–0. https://doi.org/10.5455/njppp.2024.14.02080202423022024

3. Senthamizselvan R, Tharion E, George K, Zachariah A, Rani J, Rebekah G, Christudoss P. Cardiac Autonomic Dysfunction Measured as Reduced Heart Rate Variability, in the Intermediate Post-Covid State in Men. Current Medical Issues 22(1):p 14-20, Jan–Mar 2024. | DOI: 10.4103/cmi.cmi_71_23

4. Tharion E, Kachroo U, Noel J, Samuel P. Cardiac Autonomic Activity, Personality Traits, and Academic Performance in First-Year Medical Students: A Gender-Specific Relation. Cureus. 2023 Nov 20;15(11):e49087. doi: 10.7759/cureus.49087. PMCID: PMC10660775.

5. Tephilla Epsibha, Elizabeth Tharion, Shalini Jeyapaul and Vinod Abraham. Orthostatic hypotension in the elderly: Prevalence and its management by simple isometric limb tensing exercises. Journal of Family Medicine and Primary Care 12(11):p 2661-2666, November 2023. DOI: 10.4103/jfmpc.jfmpc_1009_23 

6. Aneesh Joseph, Praghalathan Kanthakumar and Elizabeth Tharion. Exponential modelling of heart rate recovery after a maximal exercise. Indian J Physiol Pharmacol 2023; 67(2): 125-130. https://dx.doi.org/10.25259/IJPP_122_2022

7. Elizabeth Tharion. "Sleep stages” in physiology teaching: a wakeup call! Adv Physiol Educ. 2023 Sep 1;47(3):499-500 [Pubmed]

8. Ankita Priya and Elizabeth Tharion. Sleep and Exercise among Young Doctors in a Tertiary Care Hospital in India: A Pilot Cross-Sectional Study. Journal of Lifestyle Medicine 2022;12:164-70 [Pubmed]

9. Latha Nedumaran, Grace Rebekah, George Tharion and Elizabeth Tharion. Initial autonomic parameters and subsequent short-term neurologic recovery after inpatient rehabilitation in traumatic cervical spinal cord injury patients. Neurorehabil Neural Repair 2022 Feb. [Pubmed]

10. Aneesh Joseph, Velusamy Saravana Kumar and Elizabeth Tharion. Cardiac autonomic activity, physical fitness, and arterial blood pressure of Kungfu practitioners. Transl Sports Med. 2020;00:1-7 [Link]

11. Elizabeth Vinod and Elizabeth Tharion. Correlation among cardiac autonomic function tests in normal subjects. University Journal of Pre and Para Clinical Sciences. 2016: 2(4). [PDF]

12. Swetha Raman and Elizabeth Tharion. The relationship between short-term HRV indices and heart rate response to Deep Breathing Test in normal subjects. University Journal of Pre and Para Clinical Sciences. 2016: 2(4). [PDF]

13. R. Rajalakshmi, Bridgitte Akila and Elizabeth Tharion. Intra-class correlation among heart rate variability analysis softwares across different physiological postures. Indian J Physiol Pharmacol 2015; 59(1): 2-8 [PDF]

14. Tharion E and Kamalakannan V. The relationship between short-term HRV indices and heart rate response to cold pressor test in physically active subjects. Med Ej. Jan-Feb 2013; 3(1) [Link]

15. Tharion E and Joseph A. Sympathetic hyperactivity in obese and pre-obese Type 2 diabetics with deranged cardiac autonomic function. Med Ej. Jan-Feb 2013; 3(1) [Link]

16. Tharion E and Rajalakshmi R. Extent of correlation among three different softwares for assessment of short term heart rate variability indices. Med Ej. Feb 2012; 2(1). [Link]

17. Elizabeth Tharion, Prasanna Samuel, R. Rajalakshmi, G. Gnanasenthil and Rajam Krishna Subramanian. Influence of deep breathing exercise on spontaneous respiratory rate and heart rate variability: A randomized controlled trial in healthy subjects. Indian J Physiol Pharmacol 2012: 56(1):80-87 [Pubmed] [PDF]

18. Subramani S, Kanthakumar P, Maneksh D, Sidharthan A, Rao SV, Parasuraman V and Tharion E. O2-CO2 diagram as a tool for comprehension of blood gas abnormalities. Adv Physiol Edu. 2011 Sep;35(3):314-20. [Pubmed] [PDF]

19. Tharion E and Subramani S. Ventilatory equivalents for carbondioxide and oxygen are measures of ventilatory efficiency and not of pulmonary gas exchange efficiency. Exp Physiol. 2011 Jul;96(7):709. [Pubmed]

20. Vyas R, Tharion E, Sathishkumar S. Improving the effectiveness of physiology record books as a learning tool for first-year medical students in India. Adv Physiol Educ. 2009 Dec;33(4):329-334. [Pubmed] [PDF]

21. Tharion E, Parthasarathy S, Neelakantan N. Short-term heart rate variability measures in students during examinations. Natl Med J India. 2009 Apr;22(2):63-66. [Pubmed] [PDF]

22. Bhaskar A, Tharion E, Devasahayam SR. Computer-based inexpensive surface electromyography recording for a student laboratory. Adv Physiol Educ. 2007 Jun;31(2):242-243. [Pubmed] [PDF]

23. Sathishkumar S, Thomas N, Tharion E, Neelakantan N, Vyas R. Attitude of medical students towards Early Clinical Exposure in learning endocrine physiology. BMC Med Educ. 2007;7:30. [Pubmed] [PDF]

24. Tharion E. A study of fatiguing isometric contractions of the human first dorsal interosseous muscle. Indian J. Physiol. Pharmacol. 2006 Sep;50(3):319-321. [Pubmed] [PDF]

25. Arvind VH, Tharion E. Sensory input from the moving hand influences saccadic eye movements during reading. Exp Brain Res. 2005 Dec;167(3):458-461. [Pubmed]

26. Subramani S, Vijayanand C, Tharion E. Differential effects of organic calcium-channel blockers on diastolic SR calcium-handling in the frog heart. Br. J. Pharmacol. 2002 Nov;137(6):756-760. [Pubmed] [PDF]

Books/Chapters

Elizabeth Tharion, Padma Paul (2010). Ocular disease and retinopathy. In: N Thomas, K Jeyaraman, J Velavan and S Vasan, ed. A practical guide to Diabetes Mellitus. 5th edition, Academa publishers, Delhi. Chapter 16: 219-235.