Dietitian vs Nutritionist

HSC 2000 Guest Speaker – Unger (Pharmacy)

Pharmacy School: How to Get In, What It’s Like and What You Can Do After

Nathan Unger, Pharm. D.

Assistant Professor, Pharmacy Program

NOVA Southeastern University

Again my name is Nathan Unger and I’m an assistant professor in the College of Pharmacy at

Nova Southeastern University. I’m based actually out of the Palm Beach Campus, but we’ll talk

about the three different campuses with the College of Pharmacy. One is Davie, Palm Beach, and

also in Puerto Rico and I’m out of the Palm Beach one. So in general the overall presentation

today we’re going to try to give you an overall idea about Pharmacy School. I’ll give you guys a

few more minutes to get some responses in. So you want to send the text to 37607 and then the

code of the healthcare field you’re most likely in.

Slide 1 [00:45]

How to get in, what it’s like, also what you can do afterward. And before we get started I

want to get an idea of whose in the audience today based on profession. So a couple of the poll

questions today are going to use your cellphones. That’s right-you’re allowed to use your

cellphones in class today for my message polling only. Please no Facebook, twitter, tinder,

Instagram, whatever else you guys want to do during class today. Focus on my text messages.

So, in general this is a brief way to respond. You’re going to send a text to 37607 and before you

respond with your answer you’re going to have the number 304263 and then space after that

number and then your answer. Some of them are multiple choice which are very similar, and

then you’re just going to send it as a practice just so you can get an idea of how this works. How

good is your eyesight today, just kidding. I’ll give you guys a few moments to get some

responses in. We’re approaching my maximum. It’s free so I only get 40 responses. I know I

chepaed out, sorry about that, guys. So it looks like the majority of you guys, well out of 40 out

of 200 students are leaning more toward nursing and physical/occupational therapy. The one I’m

interested in so far is the one student interested in pharmacy. Do you want to raise your hand?

I’ll find you later. Well, I guess you won’t get in to pharmacy school. A few of you were honest

and said you were only here because Dr. Cooperman Rocks. And I agree with that one. So

because we’re not all interested in pharmacy, I wanted to give you a brief overview of what

pharmacists do. So the next one is “In what settings do pharmacists work?” In this instance

you’re going to send a message to 37607 and you’re going to precede your answer with 310201

space and then your answer. As I expected we do have some comedians in the classroom. So the

majority of you guys identified CVS, Walgreens, Publix, and that’s where we typically expect to

see pharmacists, that’s where we get our prescriptions from. What else do pharmacists do? I see

a few of you mentioned hospitals-very good. I’m impressed to hear that some of you realized

that there are pharmacists in the hospitals, making sure your medication orders are accurate.

Target, again another community type pharmacy. Army, absolutely, I don’t know who put that,

but it’s great. There are pharmacists in the Army, Navy, Air Force. There are some incentives to

filling the pharmacy roles in those venues because they do provide some kind of reimbursement

for tuition. So to get started, you want to know who am I and how am I eligible to talk to you

guys about the profession of pharmacy.

Slide 2 [05:26]

As I mentioned I am Assistant at NSU College of Pharmacy. I graduated with my BS and my

Doctorate of Pharmacy from the University of Florida-go Gators! And I completed two years of

residency training right across the street at the VA at the University of South Florida. And I did

two years of residency training after pharmacy school to specialize my training. To tune in my

clinical skills and to become a better and more advanced practitioner. And I chose to specialize

in infectious diseases. I have a variety of research interests based around penicillin allergies. You

know, penicillin allergies really get in the way of what I do-which is antibiotics. So when I see a

penicillin allergy on a patient’s chart, I get frustrated with that allergy, and I want to do more

research regarding that allergy. And looking into alternatives including skin testing which can

help us use it if we need to. I also like to look into antimicrobial stewardship which is essentially

the appropriate use of antibiotics. I’m also interested in prophylaxis as well as HIV. Raise of

hands, who picked Florida this year to win March Madness. You guys come see me afterwards

and I’ll get you guys into pharmacy school, good. So you guys are here right now. USF,

interdisciplinary sciences. I know potentially some of you, well I know of one, is looking into

being a pharmacists and you may have no idea besides filling a prescription what pharmacists do.

Slide 3 [06:55]

Well in general, pharmacists will counsel patients on medication therapy and adverse effects. So

we make sure that the patients who are receiving those medications are aware of the drug they’re

on, how often they’re supposed to take it, food/no food, what they expect when they take it, and

also adverse effects of those medications. We review the medications for drug/drug interactions.

Now most of you are pretty young so when you get a prescription you’re usually just getting one.

Maybe an antibiotic, oral contraceptive, maybe something along those lines so drug/drug

interaction is not something tha tyou think of. So our older patients, or older populations are on

seven, ten, eleven medications at one time. So as pharmacists we can review those medications

and make sure they’re safe to take those together and that there are no serious adverse effects or

consequences from taking those medications together. We also counsel on healthy lifestyle

habits. So you’re thinking of being a dietician, well pharmacy incorporates that a lot. We often

education out patients about nutrition, proper health and diet, because that affects your blood

pressure and cholesterol which effects medications that we use, we counsel on exercise, tobacco

use, avoiding tobacco use, cutting back on smoking, drinking alcohol in moderation. We talk

about all of that with our patients. We perform complex medication therapy management. So

those patients who have multiple medications, we can sit down with those patients and go one by

one with each of these medications and actually see if the patient needs that medication. A lot of

times prescriptions are written by doctors and they might not even need that medication. Perhaps

they wrote a drug to counteract another drug’s side effect. We can counteract that. And in some

states, mostly in the federal government right now in the Veteran Healthcare System, we have

prescriptive authority. Certain pharmacists have gone through the right standings and they

qualify for writing prescriptions within their scope of practice. So if you are an ambulatory care

pharmacist and you’re seeing a patient with diabetes and that physician consulted you to see that

patient with diabetes, you can write whatever prescription necessary that you need to treat that

patient’s diabetes. So you are the provider. You are writing that prescription. And right now

there is are bills moving up through congress that are trying to get pharmacists most prescribing

authority, more provider status. So soon we will billing insurance companies for our patient

therapy management. We will be potentially writing our own prescriptions as pharmacists, well,

certain pharmacists who qualify. So those bills are being moved up the chain of government and

that may be forthcoming. Through the Affordable Care Act, more people are getting insurance.

Insurance means more patients, more patients means this exceeds the demands of the physicians.

They can’t see all these patients timely enough. SO they will bring in pharmacists to fulfill that

role. And we work as a team with the pharmacists and the physicians, the nurses, the dieticians.

We make rounds with the teams. We make recommendations for drug therapy. We identify

potential drug/drug interactions. We make sure there are no side effects. We monitor their blood

levels for adequate drug therapy. We make sure things aren’t too toxic, or the doses are just right.

So that’s a lot that we do if you didn’t’ realize that. We’re more than just the CVS, Walgreens,

Target. So with that in mind, let’s talk about what you need to do to get into pharmacy school

Slide 4 [10:07]

So maybe I’ve intrigued you a little bit and you’re like ok so tell me more about this

pharmacy pathway. What do I need to do to get into pharmacy school? Well, pretty much what

you’re already doing. We have our pharmacy prerequisites, our biologies, chemistries, organic

chemistries, and physics, more advanced biologies, calculus, and math is a big component of

pharmacy. So basically what you can expect to see, you might already be doing as part of your

pre-professional classes. So nothing too different. We do ask that you have a good, solid GPA to

get into pharmacy school. Usually a minimum of 2.75, sometimes 3.0. To really be competitive

you really need a GPA of around 3.4 or 3.5. You know if you have a GPA around that then you

have a better chance of getting into pharmacy school.

Slide 5 VIDEO ONE [11:01]

We also have something called the PCAT. On that PCAT we test your reading, your

verbal, quantitative (so math), chemistry, biology, and there’s actually a writing portion on the

PCAT. Ok so somebody goes through and reads your essays and gives you a score on your

writing ability. The PCAT is scored on a percentile basis from 1-99. And obviously percentile

the better you did on that test. In order to be competitive, you need a PCAT score of above 50.

You need to have done better than 50% of those who took that PCAT. 70,80, now you’re really

competitive. The higher the PCAT school the better. Think of your GPA above 3.4 or 3.5, a

PCAT above 50%, and those are some goals you guys have set yourself up for.

Slide 6 VIDEO ONE [11:55]

Get to know your faculty, your professors, because one day you might be asking upon them to

write you a letter of recommendation. Don’t’ be in Dr. Coopermans’ class and be like oh yeah I

sat in the back with my lime green apple laptop surfing Facebook the whole time. I’m not calling

out on your, all of you guys with Apple computers with lime green/teal backing. So all of you

guys get to know your faculty. Those who you work for. So if you work at a CVS or Walgreens

or volunteer those people are potential writers of letters of recommendation. Think of them as

letters now, not after the fact. Like oops I should have gone there more often, I should have sown

up. Those are your letters. You’re looking for professors, science people, even liberal arts

professors, but we’re def. looking at more people in the science and pharmacy fields.

Slide 7 VIDEO ONE [12:46]

We also look for pharmacy experience. We don’t’ want you to show up with a full

application that is inept of pharmacy experience. We want to see that you have some kind of

experience whether it be volunteering in a hospital, working in a community pharmacy, as

employment, as a volunteer, get your hands on some kind of health fair that is health care related.

Someway you can tell your story about why you’re interested in pharmacy and why pharmacy is

a passion for you. Which brings me to essentially doing more outside of school. Don’t’ just go to

class and get straight A’s.

Slide 8 VIDEO ONE [13:20]

We want to see community Service, we want to see your leadership. We want to see you

involved with organizations that are contributing to the community because we want that too. At

pharmacy school we don’t’ just want you in the classroom getting good grades, we want you to

apply the knowledge you’re learning in the classroom to actual patients. We go out into the

community and we do counseling sessions with the patients. They bring in all their medications,

what they’re for, how to take them, if they should be seeing a doctor more of often. So we’re out

in the community making a difference and we want to see you guys doing that already before

you come into pharmacy school.

Slide 9 VIDEO ONE [14:01]

In the interview. So every pharmacy school requires you to do an interview. Every school in the

nation requires you to do an interview. Please come to that interview ready to talk about why you

want to be a pharmacist, with a good background and a good story. I’ll tell you that maybe this

seems like an obvious question, but it stumps a lot of people. So do your due diligence and come

prepared for pharmacy school.

Slide 10 VIDEO TWO[00:02]

Know why you want to be a pharmacist and don’t just say oh I did health screenings and

I like helping people. That’s awesome. Thank you for coming. Have a good day. So what did

you enjoy about the screenings? What about that patient interaction did you like? What makes

you think that you helped them? You told one patient about the fact that their medication should

not be taken with another medication and they should go see their physician about it. What did

you do in your community that made a difference and also what was your role in that student

organization. Were you just a member or did you have a leadership position. What did you do in

that position? Know pharmacy, know the profession. And don’t just say you know I want to

work at CVS like the guy that fills my birth control pills. He seems like he’s happy and makes

good money. Think of your verbal and non-verbal communication. You know, how you sit. How

the words you’re choosing come across to the interviewers. So

Slide 11 VIDEO TWO [01:00]

So if you’ve done all that, get your applications in, got into pharmacy school. OK what’s

next? Well first I’m going to tell you about Nova Southeastern University College of Pharmacy

which is where I teach. So we were established over 25 years ago. We have longevity. We’re not

a really new school, but we’re not 80 years old.

Slide 12 VIDEO TWO [01:22]

We’re 25 years old. We’re established. We’re ACPE-Accredited, which you want to

check into for all of the pharmacy schools you apply to. And we have three beautiful campuses.

We have Davie, established in 1987, Palm Beach, established in 2001, and also we have a capus

that is in Puerto Rico that is currently located in Ponce, but is being relocated to San Juan. So if

you want to go to the Caribbean, Puerto Rico site is fantastic, it’s close to the beaches, and our

students in Puerto Rico really enjoy it. And it’s going to be even more beautiful once it moves to

San Juan. We lead the nation in diversity. We have the highest level of Hispanic students

enrolled in our program—higher than any other College of Pharmacy across the US. We also

have an international program. We have students from Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the Middle East,

China, Taiwan, from all over the globe to come to our program. SO it’s a very diverse

background. You get exposed to a lot of different cultures and a lot of different pharmacy

practices. It’s a unique program. We’re pioneers of technology, like the text message polling

we’re using today, we use flickers like Dr. Cooperman uses for attendance today. We also have

IPAD based examinations. All students coming in take their exams on IPad. No more scantrons,

but taking your exam on an IPad. And you can get your score right away after that test so you

don’t have to wait two weeks to see what happened…nervous…oh how did I do. So you could

actually get your score right after you hit submit on that Ipad exam. So I think it’s really fantastic

and we’re really leading the way in innovative classroom technology. Let’s give you some

feedback and experience from some of our current students.

VIDEO

First of all I’d like to say that I’m proud to be a shark. The organizations that are on

campus and interact with the students and give the students opportunity to get out into the

community and give backa little bit. That spoke to me. I appreciated that. Along with the faculty

as well. I met several of the faculty during my interview and visit and they were down to earth

and I felt comfortable here. When I came to realize that Nova Southeastern University had an

open door policy for students, aside from the rgular set office hours. You could walk into your

professor’s office and get one on one engagement and feedback. With the dynamic academic

environment here and the mentorship of our great faculty, the sooner I realized the pharmacy

field is not just about a job or the profession itself, it’s about being involved and being a leader.

We have a large amount of diversity with both the international class, we have a separate site in

Puerto Rico, we have a separate site in Palm Beach, we have people from all around the world

come here and we’re interacting with them. We have the study abroad program and teachers

from around the world and we learn alternative medicine from them that may not be something

you’d learn at another school because they don’t focus on it because they don’t have the students

that actually know it and take advantage of it. For me, Nova Southeastern University College of

Pharmacy represented excellence in terms of academics, in terms of leadership potential for the

students and especially in terms of research because Nova Southeastern University College of

Pharmacy has a very, very huge faculty that is devoted with research and that is something that

fits in with my personal goals. I see the overall picture and the wealth of knowledge that these

professors have given me is an unconscious thing that I don’t think about, but as soon as I go into

the industry of pharmacy through rotations experience, I know that I am confident and that I can

portray what I’ve learned to professionals, students, and patients alike.

END VIDEO

So the students in the video have the opportunity to collaborate with a lot of faculty. So if

you want to work with faculty and research, NSU is a big hub for that. Several students that

work, not just in the lab, and here we have some of our clinical trials that are ongoing. So think

of research, it’s a great opportunity to work with faculty with research. And a lot of time the

collaborations lead to presentations. A lot of times our students end up presenting their research

at national meetings, at national conferences across the United States and even internationally.

As well also ur faculty. One of our faculty is presenting on some of her research in Europe in

May. So we have a lot of opportunity for bonding and working with NSU faculty. We’re very

accessible I would say, especially the Palm Beach campus and the Puerto Rico campus because

they’re smaller campuses. So we have a campus of about 50 students per class so a campus with

100 students at one time and a lot of faculty to be able to approach for advice and guidance.

Slide 13 VIDEO TWO [06:04]

Dr. Jean Latimer who is a leading scientist researcher in breast cancer who has several

well-known publications and big funding from NIH and other breast cancer societies like

Komen’s funding her research. The students have the opportunity to work with Dr. Latimer as

well as our other outstanding faculty in the lab. We also have patient-centered research, like

myself, working with patients hands-on care rather than just a lab. We have a variety of

opportunities for students to work in whatever realm they’re interested in. So don’t just think of

research as just in a lab looking through a microscope in a lab with pipettes, but also as patient-

centered. We actually get to see how the drugs effect the patient and see if this drug therapy

better than another drug therapy, we can see that.

Slide 14 VIDEO TWO [07:40]

As mentioned in the video, we have a study abroad program, students go over to Europe,

and actually I think they went to China a few years ago, to study abroad and get exposed to

healthcare and especially pharmacy in other countries. This year they’re going to Spain for a few

weeks and they’re going to have classroom times of course, but then they have excursions where

they actually go out and interact with pharmacists and see the culture. And that’s kind of one of

the draws of students that they’re really engaged with the study abroad programs and come back

having really enjoyed them. We also have a lot of medical missions. We have medical missions

that are…we have an annual medical mission trip to Jamaica that we go on. At this point I’m

going to segue to my pharmacy student Mr. Robert Richardson who is going to give you some

insight about what it’s like for him being a pharmacy student at Nova. Well like he said my name

is Robert Richardson and I’m a 4th year pharmacy student from Nova Southeastern University. I

only have one more month to go and then I graduate, so I see that light and it’s definitely getting

a lot brighter. So I’m very, very excited. So as Dr. Unger said I just want to kind of give you the

perspective of a pharmacy student. Now we kind of explained the process…if you’re interested

what it would take to make that particular marker in terms of your prerequisites at USF and your

undergraduate curriculum and the extracurriculars that you may get involved with. And when

you get to that point, what happens when you’re actually a pharmacy student?

Slide 15 VIDEO TWO [09:22]

So what is pharmacy school like?

Slide 16 VIDEO TWO [09:23]

So in the first few years it’s very heavily involved with didactics, so anything you were

exposed to in undergrad, which is why it’s best to get a lot of exposure in undergraduate course

work in terms of advanced biologies, microbiology, biochemistry because those will come back

especially in the first few years of pharmacy school. So as it says here, you’ll see physiology and

pathophysiology. SO this goes into a little more depth about what the disease states are doing to

the body and how our medications are working against those diseases whether it’s curing those

diseases or whether or not it’s slowing the progression of these diseases. So it gives you a

different perspective in terms of before you’re leaning the medications how these diseases are

affecting all of us, or people across the country, and whatever these diseases may be. So

biochemistry, pharmacodynamics. So this is the best way I can explain this is this is how the

drug affects the body. So when you take a drug, what is it doing? What is it’s mechanism of

action? Is it working to lower your blood pressure? Is it working to lower the amount of

cholesterol you make? So the patients who have high cholesterol, hypertension, or high blood

pressure, these medications work against those types of disease states. Same thing so with

pharmacokinetics, this is basically talking about how the body effects the drug. So, how is it

absorbed? If you take a tablet, it’s going to go through your stomach get absorbed in your system

and we understand that better with pharmacokinetics. And also how the drug is eliminated, how

it gets out of our body because we can’t have it there long term because that’s when you start

having or may exhibit side effects or may exhibit toxicities of the medication so we always have

a better understanding of that and especially in the first few years of school. Pharmaceutics is

learning how our drugs are manufactured. Like I said if it’s a tablet, if it’s a suppository, if it’s an

intravenous medication that is going to go into the vein, if it’s an intramuscular medication

which is going to be injected into the muscle. So this type of profession in pharmaceutics is how

those dosage forms are made and how the chemistry or the acid base equilibrium of the

medication to effectively distribute through the body and produce the pharmacodynamics effect.

So this is essentially what you’ll be learning in the first year years. And then on top of all of that,

we’re having what we call introductory pharmacy practice experiences. Essentially this is to ge

tout in the community early on and learn what types of pharmacy there is. So this entails going

into maybe retail pharmacy where you’ll work maybe a few hours a week every week for an

entire year and you’ll see what it’s like to be a retails pharmacist. So it gives you that perspective

early on while you’re in school to see if it really is something that you’ll be able to pursue. Same

thing for hospital practice. You’ll be able to do the same thing, you’ll go once a week and it

gives you that perspective of a hospital pharmacist and what they do day to day and if that’s

something you what to pursue as well. So on top of all this didactic learning, you’ll have all these

other responsibilities. Pretty much. Pharmacy school can be very, very time consuming an very

stressful at times but there are ways to cope with that and I think we’ll be talking about that when

we get to time management.

Slide 17 VIDEO TWO [12:43]

So third year, this is definitely when you take everything you learn in those first two

years, and you’re applying it. So you’re going to see more case-based discussion, you’ll get a

patient and they present you with this, this, and this, what do you do? I remember when that first

happened to me I kind of gave the deer in the headlights start because I had no idea. It’s meant to

prepare you and stress you out because when you’re in the real worked and practicing, you’re

going to have a license and saying what’s best for that patient based on what you’ve learned,

based on what you know. And because of that you have to well-aware of how these medications

work, and that’s why bringing these case-based studies in early-on in the curriculum is essential.

So besides the application-based and critical thinking, you’ll have patient care manage, so that’s

how to manage patients, talk about different types of counseling information, and various

situations that may encompass that. Pharmacotherapy is basically the bread and butter of

pharmacists. This is essentially, what medications have been approved for what disease states

and why. This is what pharmacists are making recommendations on based on what they’ve

learned in pharmacotherapy. They have a patient with high blood pressure, I know which

medication may be best for them based on this, this, and this reason and I know what to monitor

thereafter. So it gives us that perspective on how to manage these patients with multiple

medications to help give them an overall better quality of life. So this is a lot of critical thinking,

a lot of patient-based to get you prepared for your fourth year.

Slide 18 VIDEO THREE[00:00]

Which is currently what I’m doing right now. This is where you’re out actually working for free…I’m

going to put it out there…for free. But it gives you that perspective. You’re going to be working in

various hospitals, various community settings, various areas of interest that you may have because at

this point in time, after this you’re going to be deciding what you want your career to be. Your fourth

year rotations and your experiences are geared toward getting you ready to know exactly what you

want to get into as a pharmacist. Because thankfully, we have a lot of choice options. And I know in the

beginning when we did the clicker question we heard some of your answers in terms of potential

careers there are for pharmacists based on what you know which is excellent. Some of them were really

surprising, and then there’s more that you may not be aware of. So that’s the perfect opportunity for

our profession to have many opportunities after we graduate. So this fourth year is very important for

us especially because we’re getting ready to decide what we want to do base on our experience. So this

fourth year you’ll have topic presentations for your particular rotations, you’ll have patient case

presentations. So, again, now this is where you maybe even have a real patient that you may be talking

about. So I saw this patient, they had this disease, they came in with these vitals, this lab work, we

ended up giving them this medication because it helps benefit them overall. And then you may have

kind of a similar situation where you’ll be grilled, maybe by preceptors and other pharmacists and say

well why’d you do that? So it’s again trying to get your critical thinking skills, trying to understand why

you’re assessing your patients for whatever reason, why the therapies you choose for whatever reason

as well. So again it’s preparing to be that clinical pharmacist. That pharmacist wherever setting you’re

going into, it’s preparing you to be a good, competent pharmacist. And then finally there are journal

clubs and direct patient care is probably the most essential of all of our fourth year experiences

Video Three [2:00]

Student organizations. Let me just get a really quick hands up. How many are currently either in a

student organization or lead a student organization right now? Just raise your hands. A good amount of

you, wow. That’s essential, that’s important because not only does it look good that you have extra-

curricular especially if you go to nursing school, pharmacy, it gives you that perspective. It gives you a

diversified application to say I went out on the community and I did this, I learned this based on my

volunteer hours. I went and volunteered at USF medical and got experience there. It gives you that well-

rounded experience to prepare you for what you think you might want to do. And pharmacy school

there is no difference. For pharmacy school we have opportunities to get involved in leadership

organizations. And our sole purpose is to not only diversify ourselves as future healthcare professionals

in the career of pharmacy, but to give us opportunities for networking. And networking is something I

stress so much because in our profession, in the profession of pharmacy, I’ve been told this since my

first day that pharmacy is a small world. If you meet someone from a different school you may see them

later on 5 or 10 years down the road. And this is just because we’re a small world. We know everyone

whos’ anyone who’s anyone you can find out in the pharmacy profession, which is a good thing if you

make those professional ties, those early networking, if you need somebody, if you need help, if you

need a job, you have somebody to lean on or to help you out in that regard. And that is why getting

involved early on and developing those professional networking skills is essential in building up your

career in whatever you want to do, it’s not even just with pharmacy; it’s with whatever you want to do.

So it says here collaborating with faculty. I collaborate with Dr. Unger personally; we’re doing research

in various things. We’re looking at preventative antibiotic use for patients who have an open fracture. So

we’re looking at particular antibiotic usage. Is it the appropriate antibiotic to use based on the type of

open-fracture a patient may develop. If they’re coming into the ER, is that the most appropriate? So

we’re looking into research in that regard and other types of research as well that I’ve worked on. So it

gives you opportunities, especially with student organizations it just opens the doors.

At this time we’ll talk questions that you might have about getting into pharmacy school or pharmacy

school itself? Good question. So there are some free pharmacy societies at a lot of campuses. I’m not

sure if USF has one, so if not, get on that. So I think pre-pharmacy school….a pre-pharmacy society is an

excellent one, other general ones like Health Professions Societies are ones that I see a lot of students

join. But in general, anything that exposes you to healthcare is a great one. Anything that gets you out in

the community, doing kind of health care services, at least shadowing health care services, volunteering,

anything that really gets you in that healthcare field. A lot of times you see…the Red Cross., Children’s

Miracle Network. You know we don’t want to see that you just do dance marathons, walkathons, we

want to see that tyou actually saw patients, you were out there in the community doing good work. So

really it varies a lot, but as long as you can back it up as to why it benefitted you in the profession of

pharmacy then you’re good to go. Wow awesome question. So the question was what steps have

pharmacy schools taken to address illicit drug use. One thing you can get involved with in pharmacy

school is called Generation RX. Generation RX are pharmacy students that actually go into high schools

and educate students on the problems of illicit drug use or prescription drug abuse. They get out there

in the community and are actually talking to the students who are abusing these drugs. High school

students, middle school students. So you’re out there educating not only the students but we do drug

take back programs. It’s an opportunity in conjunction with the sheriff’s office of the county that we’re

helping people to be able to drop off drugs with no questions asked. So there’s a lot of different type of

events that you can get involved with that combat prescription drug abuse. Also from a research

standpoint, there is research looking into tamper-proof medications…so prescription drugs like narcotics

that you can’t crush so that you can’t inject intravenously, ones that have a very slow release so you

can’t get the high or the peak that really gives you the satisfaction. So we have community-based

educating people on the dangers of drug abuse but we also have research-based which cuts back on the

abusive possibilities of drugs. Yessir? That’s coming next. Any other questions on getting into school and

on school itself? Outstanding question. Do we have to have a bachelor’s degree? And I don’t want any of

you to drop out…but no. You can get into pharmacy school once you’ve completed your

prerequisites…whatever school-specific ones you’re looking at. So no you do not need a four year

degree to get into pharmacy school. I would encourage it. I think it adds substantialness to your

application but no you can go to a community college, get your prereqs done, take the PCAT, and get

into pharmacy school. Good questions guys.

Slide 19 VIDEO THREE [08:48]

OK so what can I do with a PharmD? This is a doctor of pharmacy degree as Dr.

Cooperman emphasized before the presentation, that might be a test question or something.

Slide 20 VIDEO THREE [08:30]

So what can you do with a PharmD? Well as you guys have pointed out you can work in

the community.

Slide 21 VIDEO THREE [08:34]

As you guys have pointed out, you can work in the community. Community includes

chain stores like Walgreens, CVS, Kmart, Publix, Grocery, so you can work in community

pharmacy. You can have your own pharmacy so you can be a philanthropist and go out there and

get your own pharmacy going. You can work in medical centers. Some medical centers have a

pharmacy attached to them so when patients get discharged from the hospital they go to the

pharmacy right downstairs. So there is a lot of variety in community pharmacy. If you’re doing

independent pharmacy you’re your own boss, you set your own hours, and you’re motivated.

You could also work kind of tag along with community pharmacy indecent and get an MBA.

Nova also offers this program if you have any questions Mr. Abraham is up here and he can

answer questions. Nova also offers a joint MBA and PharmD program it’s a 5 year program. And

that could help you rise more in the corporate tree if you’re interested in the business aspect of

pharmacy, managing pharmacies yourself, pharmacy manager, regional manager, etc. etc. An

MBA could help you grow up that path and you could actually be the one overseeing all the

Walgreens or overseeing all of the CVS’s.

Slide 22 VIDEO THREE[09:50]

You could be a nuclear pharmacist. So these pharmacists are unique in that they only

work with radioactive chemicals. These are the ones that help prepare for patients that need

special therapy or imaging. For instance, a CT scan sometimes requires radioactive contact die.

Sometimes scans require nuclear medications so there could be a pharmacist who prepares that.

Their hours are more like 4am to 12pm. They get their work done, they work in isolation or with

their colleagues so maybe that’s something of interest to you guys.

Slide 23 VIDEO THREE [10:28]

We have a Juris Doctor, so you can be a lawyer. With the PharmD program you can be a

patent attorney and they make good money. My father in law is an attorney and he was like go

for your JD, get your JD, you can go to DC and be a lobbyist these PharmD, JD make close to

half a million dollars, so you can make good money combining these degrees. You can work in

medical malpractice practice in the industry. So a drug company makes a drug and they want to

protect that drug. So they might be interested in a pharmacist who is also a lawyer to help

represent that drug in lawsuits to help protect that patent. So you can combine these degrees to

really set you up for a good financial situation.

Slide 24 VIDEO THREE [11:14]

If you want to work in long-term care as patients get older they may end up in a facility

and they may end up on a slew of medications. So the pharmacists in these long-term care

centers who are reviewing patient’s medications daily, looking for those drug-drug interactions

for adverse effects, making sure those lab values are in place, and you can get a job anywhere.

Slide 25 VIDEO THREE [11:35]

You can get your PharmD PhD, which Nova also offers as a joint degree program and

this sets you up for more research in academia, doing your own research, looking at the newest

drug chemicals, new patents to protect these drugs, working in the industry, working for an

actual drug company with your PharmD Phd. Lots of opportunities for researchers at a lab site or

you can also work in academia…so teaching graduate students, PhD students, Pharmacy students

Slide 26 VIDEO THREE [12:09]

You can work in a hospital. It can be a community-based hospital or a teaching hospital.

Usually academic medical centers are a higher level of care, like Tampa General Hospital is an

academic medical center, same thing as the University of South Florida. You can work in a

community hospital maybe like Morton-Plant down the street in Clearwater. So you can work in

different types of hospitals. Either way, pharmacists are in charge of making sure patients are

getting their medications or that the doses are appropriate, the dosing interval is right, making

sure the lab values are in range for that medication to avoid drug-drug interaction before

approving that medication.

Slide 27 VIDEO THREE [12:46]

And leading into the next major section for pharmacy, there’s something called post-

graduate training. By a show of hands, who knew that pharmacists can do residency training

before my first slide? So probably less than a handful of you knew that pharmacists can do

residency training. Usually you think of medical students, but pharmacy students can do it as

well. This is what I did for two years and what Mr. Richards is going on to start is first year of

residency training in a few months. Yay! So post-graduate residency training is great. You learn

so much in pharmacy school, but you barely touch the tip of the iceberg with information. So if

you go on to do a more advanced residency training program, which his like 4 years of pharmacy

school in one year. So you’re actually seeing patients and applying all of this knowledge

acquired over time and getting more knowledge and more clinical application-based training and

more hands-one and this is where you work more with physicians side by side, if you want to

have that provider status that I mentioned early on and have that prescriptive authority, you need

to do a residency training. This is where there is a growing demand to have these residency-

trained pharmacists because they can provide a higher level of care to patients. So to break down

residency training, we have different types of residency training, you can do a fellowship. And

before I get into those, first I’ll tell you about our Advanced Clinical Training at Nova.

Slide 28 VIDEO THREE [14:03]

So as I mentioned, residency-trained pharmacists are in demand so to prepare for that,

Nova has programs that can intensify your experience. As a background, approximately 60% of

our patients match with our resident program. So matching is just like with medical school where

you go in for your residency program. So you’ll have 1,000 students go out and apply for

residency programs, only about 600 of them match with a program. So it’s really intense and

really competitive out there. So you need to have the best training, the best pharmacy schools,

the highest level of electives, you have to have intensive rotations, so to prepare for that, NSU

has both programs and courses that will help prepare you for that training, and also for the

interview so that when you go in for an interview at a residency training program, you are the

most competitive one that is there and that you stand out.

Slide 29 VIDEO FOUR [00:00]

The NSU College of Pharmacy faculty actually wrote the book Get the Residency so

they’re very well-known for preparing students for a residency program and getting the match.

We have a higher match rate than the national average. So we do a very good job training

students for our residency program, which, if you want to be a clinical level pharmacist and be

able to provide that level of care that’s what you’re looking at.

Slide 30 VIDEO FOUR [00:00]

Fellowships are less clinical focused on research. So you’re looking at more patient-

centered research, more bedside research, you’re looking at more teaching experience. You’ll be

in the classroom more often than with the residency program. But fellowships are great, a lot of

our pharmacy students do two years of residency and then do two years of fellowship.

Fellowships are also two years in length. And you’re putting in significant time to prepare

yourself for your career and it really depends on what you want to pursue. There are a lot of

fellowships for whatever you want to do. So if you want to do cardiology, there are cardiology

fellowships. If you want to do infectious diseases, there are infectious diseases fellowships. So

whatever speciality you’re looking at pursing, there are fellowships out there, but they are

research intensive and more teach.

Slide 31 VIDEO FOUR [01:15]

But you contrast that with a residency program with heavy clinical emphasis. So these are

providers who are out there ready to provide direct care to patients. They’re right there in the

patient’s face interviewing them, counseling them, educating them, working side by side with the

physicians, nurses, and the team. They’re also conducting research to a lower level and also

doing some teaching. But the emphasis is on clinical care, so if you really want to be involved

with that’s where this comes in to play.

Slide 32 VIDEO FOUR [01:42]

Fellowship training prepares you for specialized training. There’s informatics, using

technology in the hospital for patient care, so reducing adverse effects and errors. Also

integrating mobile cellphone technology. So our cell phones. So our researcher is looking at how

we can use cellphones to provide better care for our patients. Like how can an app improve

medication adherence to an HIV patient which would improve their immune status. How can an

app improve our patients with diabetes in taking care of their condition and better control their

blood glucose levels? So there are a lot of different sides to informatics but using technology to

improve care. HIV-I specialize in infectious diseases and HIV. When Bobby went on rotation

with me he was able to be with patient’s hospital-side infectious disease physician. He also

worked in ambulatory care and outpatient clinic where he saw a lot of HIV patients and was able

to talk to patients with HIV, talk to them about their medications, and identify any potential

medication errors that they were engaging in. You could specialize in critical care, emergency

medicine…it goes on! So if you think about medicine and specializing in pediatric medicine, you

can do the same thing and maybe have a little bit better work hours. So there’s a lot of options

for you guys.

Slide 33 VIDEO FOUR [2:58]

I myself have chosen the academic route and that involves teaching. So I’m in the classroom teaching

students. Infectious diseases is my topic. I also do research. I’m doing research Robby mentioned with

open fractures, patients with trauma fractures. Looking at the antibiotics for trauma patients. I’m also

looking at HIV patients using some technology to improve their medication adherence. Grants, funding if

you want to secure your job a lot of times they want you to help pay for your job. So conducting

research generates outside funding so like that NIH funding and industry sponsored research. And

community service- a lot of times faculty are out there doing community service like blood pressure

screenings, glucose screenings, educating patients. I also have a bit of interesting research. A little bit

outside of most people’s research.

VIDEO

Sharks coming back to Florida’s beaches and that’s getting a lot of people’s attention. A lot of people are

wading in so they can see into the mouths of the sharks. What they’re finding could save the lives of

shark bite victims. No one went in the water. The sign warned sharks, a lot of them. A lot of them

migrating north were close to shore in Palm Beach-bad for swimmers, good for fisherman Josh

Jordanson. He had one hooked quickly, fighting it through the waves. Working fast, he got it close to

enough to pull it to the beach. This wasn’t about sport, it was about research. Josh and NSU Assistant

Professors Dr. Unger are doing this for bacteria research. We’re going to swab the teeth of the shark

and the gums. Once the sample is collected, the shark is released. They’re hoping to find out what kind

of bacteria the carry and whether it’s the same in every species. We caught a lot of black tips. We’re also

pursuing bull sharks, lemon sharks, Tiger sharks. One of the biggest problems Doctors face when

treating shark bite victims is not knowing what antibiotic will work to fight infection because they don’t

‘know what bacteria they’re up against. The first bite when through the kneecap and the ankle at the

same time so about 17.5 inches wide, the mouth. He was spear fishing in Palm Beach two years ago

when he was attacked by a 10ft bull shark-the most vicious there is. He underwent 5 major surgeries

and spent 5 weeks in the hospital. Much of the time fighting infection that could have cost him his leg.

You name the antibiotic, I had it at that point. They hit you with everything. The biggest problem is once

infection sets in, the patient has to stay in the hospital much longer than if there was no infection. So

the whole care becomes more complicated. This hospital is participating in the research project. IF they

can isolate the bacteria that sharks carry, they’ll know which antibiotics work best. Perhaps a game

change changer for doctors fighting to save victim’s lives. The final question-have you been diving

again? As luck would have it on the very first scuba dive back a big 7ft bull shark came by and checked us

out. No fear. Amazing story. John also tells us they’ve taken samples form 20 sharks so far and they’re

hoping to increase that to 100.

END VIDEO

Thank you Wolf. So in academia you can pursue whatever catches your attention. You can pursue

whatever research you’re interested in. So in this instance we’re looking at West Palm Beach as a good

hub and when it comes to the hospital we end up giving a whole slew of antibiotics because we don’t’

know which bacteria to treat. If you get bit by a dog ro a cat we know which antibiotics to use. But we

don’t’ know what to use if we get bit by a shark. Here in Florida we’re the shark bite capital of the work

and that really goes well with research. Yes that shark was caught from the beach so beware you surfers

and swimmers out there. So that’s a benefit…I’m a pharmacist doing research on sharks. So you

wouldn’t’ make that connection, but in academia you have that kind of freedom and it’s really cool that I

get to pursue that interest.

Slide 34 VIDEO FOUR [7:40]

As I mentioned you can also be a clinical pharmacist. And that’s where you’re with a physician side by

side, rounding with the medical teams and making specific recommendations regarding medication

therapy. So if you’re view a patient’s chart and make sure the medications are accurate, to makes sure

there’s no toxicity and side effects also while conducting research on the side. This is more hospital-

based typically,

Slide 35 VIDEO FOUR [8:]

You can work in industry as a medical science liaison. You would provide new information about new

drugs to Physicians, Nurse Practitioners, and PA’s and those that are using them. They’re also involved

with clinical trials and clinical research. They make a good paycheck-closer ot $120K. They travel to a lot

of conferences that are in both Europe and the US so they get to see a lot of sites.

Slide 36 VIDEO FOUR [8:34]

As I mentioned provided status. As I mentioned there are bills in congress to give provider status to

certain pharmacists. With a higher demand of healthcare from more patients, they’re looking at

different ways to provide that care. So there’s is a lot of potential for pharmacists who have the right

training to provide this direct patient care and really kind of open a new door for us.

Slide 37 VIDEO FOUR [9:03]

So basically pharmacy is a career where there is heavy growth and potential. There are so many

different opportunities for you guys to get involved. SO you can work as a pharmacist almost anywhere.

There are a lot of career options. Advanced clinical training and working with physicians. They are there

to diagnose and provide treatment recommendations. Sometimes we fine-tune those recommendations

to avoid adverse effects and avoid drug/drug interaction and working as an essential member of an

interdisciplinary team. You can always check us out on the web at pharmacy.nova.edu for more

information and what NOVA pharmacy school can do for you. I do have one other question for you guys

to respond to. Let’s just see if I’ve persuaded anyone anymore. So I am considering pharmacy as a

profession. So you’re going to send your text to 37607. The keyword this time is nunger and then

followed by your answer. Come on lie to me. We have one. You guys need to upgrade your cellular

carrier. So if you have any questions regarding the presentation today about pharmacy or about Nova.

So a lot of times we focus on the western medicine with drugs and there is still an option for the

natural/holistic approach to therapy. So we do have electives in that realm. We do have some

pharmacists that are the natural/holistic preceptors so a lot of opportunities to get with pharmacists

who have the same approach looking at herbs as a treatment option. And I think a few years ago on the

study abroad program in China they had a good experience looking into some of these approaches. So a

lot of options. We are also concerned about the use of herbal products. A lot of herbal products interact

with our medication so if you’re using herbal products it’s important to know because it changes levels

of prescribed drugs. So if you’re on antidepressants like Zoloft and you start taking a product called St.

John’s Wart you can increase chances for toxicity because they interact. So that’s an example of a

drug/drug interaction with an herbal product and drug product that t pharmacist could identify. That is a

really good question. We’re moving to San Juan and I believe it’s predominately pharmacy. I don’t’ know

what other programs are going to be offered in Puerto Rico but afterwards I can follow up with you. Yes

sir? So our Davie campus is our main campus. So each year we accept 220 students so we get 120 in

Davie and 50 in Palm Beach and 40-50 in Puerto Rico and then we have about 20 international students.

So the acceptance rates-Davie fills up first because it’s the main campus. But Palm Beach is awesome.

The acceptance rates are higher than they were before because of the demand so we do accept a good

portion of students. Like I said if you’re competitive you’ll get accepted. You’ll find a home. So the

question is what is your pay as a resident? So as a resident you’re looking at 35-40 for a year. That’s

about half of what you’d make working in a community pharmacy. So you do take a pretty good pay cut

to go out there and pursue that additional training. But you take that pay cut and it pays off in the end

and you’re more lucrative for higher paying jobs. Your ceiling as a clinical pharmacist is a lot higher than

it is a community pharmacist. You make your 110 thousand per year and that’s where you stay unless

you go into corporate. But with residency training you have a lot more opportunities to be involved in

research that can be sponsored research. Or you can be a consultant pharmacist. As a consultant, you

make additional money. For example for one project I’m trying to get on, I could make over $100, 000

over a few years in addition to my other paycheck. So there’s opportunities for additional sponsored

research. No questions about the shark research? So we’re looking at bacteria in the mouths of sharks

and the global concern is antibiotic resistance. And I would say that no we’re not finding levels of

resistance in sharks as humans. In fact I’m comforted by this…it exists like almost 505% of sharks had

resistance to 1 antibiotic which isn’t a concern to me, but less than 5% had resistance to 3 antibiotics. So

that was good news to me as an infectious disease provider especially as we see a dwindling number of

options in play. Yes sir? So currently we treat water wounds. So if you’re in Miami and jet skiing and you

crash and get hurt we treat with a certain antibiotic combination which actually works with shark bites

as well. So we have options we can actually use two drugs instead of the 3 or 4 we’re currently using.

We can identify more narrow options for our shark bite victims. But yeah I was really happy to see that

there wasn’t as much resistance as I thought. But we have options. Yes ma’am? One thought is

vaccinating all these surfers. So vaccines would be directed if you had a targeted organism that you

knew the vaccine would certainly cover. Shark bites are really rare. Florida is #1 but they have about 25

shark bites, so it’s not that globally concerning. It’s big newsworthy, if someone gets attacked by a shark

that’s very big news, but in the realm of how often you get bit, it’s not too common. Thank you guys for

your attention