August 2022
Dear Colleagues,
I am honored to have the privilege to serve as Chair of the Section for 2022-2023. This past year our health system leaders have been challenged on multiple fronts including the ongoing COVID surges, widespread impact of drug shortages, and continued regulatory changes, while our hospitals are looking to restart the initiatives put on hold the past two years. Each of you have shown tremendous leadership throughout this time to meet each of the demands that have arisen. Additionally, your work within the Section has continued and at times accelerated, despite the challenges we have faced.
Many thanks to all of our Section Advisory Groups and Committee Chairs, Vice Chairs, and members. The amount and quality of work done by these groups is always amazing. It is even more amazing this year how much work was done given everything else going on in our health systems. The work of the Section could not be done without the efforts of all of these volunteer members. Thank you also to David Chen, ASHP Assistant Vice President for Pharmacy Leadership and Planning, who listens to all our ideas and truly does the work of many by putting those ideas into action to keep the Section moving forward.
Section members completed many activities this year, including the below resources, webinars and podcasts. I would encourage you to check out all of ASHP’s podcasts, especially the ones with a leadership theme.
- ASHP/SPPL Well-Being Calendar for Leaders
- Pharmacy Leadership and Oversite of Additional Service Lines
- National Trends in Prescription Drug Expenditures: Projections for 2022
- Market Assessment and Business Planning for Health-System Home Infusion
- Home Infusion Overview for Health Systems
The Section also hosted three virtual roundtables sessions on the topics of the technician workforce shortages, three part series on centralized shared services, and three part series on population health service line development. These sessions provided nimble and timely opportunities for members to network and share strategies to support our leadership and innovation for our organizations.
The Section continues to be actively involved in ASHP’s policy development processes and this past year saw two important outcomes. The most recent was the development and passing of ASHP policy during the 2022 House of Delegates “Access to Reproductive Health Services”. Another important item was the successful approval in 2021 and publishing of the ASHP Statement on the Roles and Responsibilities of the Pharmacy Executive.
Leadership development and supporting the growth, advancement, and succession planning for pharmacy executives at all levels is a core component of the Section’s strategic plan. Our profession is experiencing a great number of pharmacy leaders being promoted to various new executive level positions, but have also experienced individuals leaving their positions. Concerns that we are entering a leadership crisis exist as these roles continue to challenge the best of leaders and filling these roles of managing a billion-dollar enterprise while not being in the C-suite is having an impact on the longevity of the positions. In addition, we have well-trained managers leaving for other roles outside the health system. This is leaving us in a position where the frontline leader and executive leader positions are often vacant, straining those leaders remaining in the system.
In addition to leadership challenges, we find ourselves at a pivotal moment in history with the opportunity to lead the way to address and ultimately eliminate sexual harassment and assault within pharmacy. Recent events and publications have highlighted that this behavior remains prevalent in the profession, although rarely discussed. We have the ability to change that by providing guidance and structure to leaders on how to address and respond to sexual harassment claims. Our challenges within health-systems are immense as is and no one deserves to also battle sexual harassment in their work environment.
These two areas will be on the forefront of the Section’s goals during my tenure as Chair and I welcome all comments, words of advice, and perspectives to guide and influence our plans moving forward.
One avenue to providing guidance to our Section members is through in-person conferences. After two years of virtual conferences, we are looking forward to our return to Chicago for the 2022 ASHP Conference for Pharmacy Leaders . We are thrilled to be able to return to a live learning environment to collaborate, network, and share ideas. This event will also include a presentation by the 2022 John W. Webb Lecture Awardee, Steven Sheaffer. Registration is currently open for this event.
I would like to acknowledge several individuals who have donated so much of their time to ensure the success of the Section. Thank you to outgoing Section Executive Committee members Phil Brummond (outgoing Past Chair), Lindsey Kelley (outgoing Director at Large), and David Hager (outgoing Director at Large) for their contributions over the past several years. I would also like to recognize the continued contributions of Jeff Little (Immediate Past Chair) and Mark Sullivan (Director at Large). Additionally, congratulations to Lindsey Kelley, Tony Scott, and Bill Kernan on their newly appointed roles from the Section elections. We are looking forward to working with you over the upcoming years!
In closing, please do not hesitate to reach out if there is anything the Section or I can do for you. We want to know what issues you are facing and how we can better meet your needs. Additionally, our Section vision statement reads, All pharmacy leaders are empowered to advance practice and patient care. We want to hear anything we can do to help this vision become a reality. Please email us at [email protected] at any time.
With gratitude,
Lindsey B. Amerine, PharmD, MS, BCPS, FASHP
Chair, Section of Pharmacy Practice Leaders (2022-2023)
[email protected]