A Standing O for the PQA Annual Meeting 2023

Olunife Akinmolayan, PharmD, aka "O",  APhA Executive Resident, Practice & Government Affairs, American Pharmacists Association, praises his experience at the PQA 2023 Annual Meeting and provides his takeaways from the event on the Quality Corner Show.
Podcast Host Nick Dorich, PharmD, PQS Associate Director of Pharmacy Accounts, asks "O" about highlights from the event, and "O" details sessions pertaining to collaborative practice agreements and the medication use quality workshop.

https://www.pqaalliance.org/online-courses

Olunife Akinmolayan, PharmD
Olunife on Instagram

Transcript

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00:00:00:21 - 00:00:23:03

Olunife Akinmolayan "O"

Pharmacists can really fill all the gaps, even with HIV AIDS. And there's so many different disease states that pharmacists are so knowledgeable about that they can really help to provide services. But we need to create the models so that we can collaborate with the different physicians so that we're ensuring that we're staying within our scope of practice and also respecting the scope of practice of others.

00:00:23:05 - 00:00:47:11

And so I was really grateful to really see what are the steps to creating, you know, a collaborative practice agreements, understanding the different standing orders that are in place from state to state so that we can actually practice at the top of our license. And we don't want to we don't want to continue to be an untapped unutilized resource when there's so many things that we can do as pharmacists for our community.

00:00:47:13 - 00:01:13:10

Intro 

And welcome to the Pharmacy Quality Solutions Quality corner show where quality measurement leads to better patient outcomes. This show will be your go to source for all things related to quality improvement and medication use in health care. We will hit on trending topics as they relate to performance measurements and find common ground for payers and practitioners. We will discuss how the platform can help you with your performance goals.

00:01:13:12 - 00:01:34:23

We will also make sure to keep you up to date on pharmacy quality news. Please note that the topics discussed are based on the information available at the date and time of reporting. Information or guidelines are updated periodically and we will always recommend that our listeners research and review any guidelines that are newly published. Buckle up and put your thinking cap on.

00:01:35:00 - 00:01:49:00

The Quality Corner show starts now.

00:01:49:02 - 00:02:12:03

Nick Dorich

Hey everyone. We're back with another interview about the PQA 2023 annual meeting and for this interview, I decided to bring in a student pharmacist. Well, actually,  he's now a pharmacy resident, but we'll have to explain that in just a moment. But I'd like to introduce to the show Olunife Akinmolayan or better known by his friends as O, O, Welcome to the Quality Corner show.

00:02:12:04 - 00:02:13:08

Dorich

How are you doing today?

00:02:13:10 - 00:02:16:10

O

I'm doing well. It's great to be here. Thanks for the opportunity.

00:02:16:12 - 00:02:36:11

Dorich

Absolutely. Well, let's get started. Let's just jump right into it. Okay. So you attended the annual meeting this year as a soon to be graduating pharmacy student. You have now graduated from pharmacy school. But can you tell us, you know, what it is that you do now and then I guess you know, what you were doing at the meeting or what was your career experience at that point?

00:02:36:13 - 00:03:01:08

O

Yeah, for sure. So really grateful for the opportunity to attend PQA 2023 So as you mentioned, I was a student more so coming out of my training phase and now graduated and now serving as a resident with the American Pharmacists Association, a And I'm an executive resident, one of two, serving in the pharmacy practice and government affairs departments.

00:03:01:13 - 00:03:21:15

Speaker 1

So it's really great to honestly see how I've transitioned and learned a lot through the conferences I've been able to attend like PQA 2023. And so a lot of the opportunities that I've had, you know, going through school have really informed me about how I can make a difference in the pharmacy profession. And so I went to the University of Findlay.

00:03:21:17 - 00:03:44:22

It is a six-year pharmacy program, so I applied straight out of high school. And so, I mean, some people asked you, like, how did I know I want to be a pharmacist, like out of high school? And sometimes I don't know how to answer the question, but I believe that everything happens for a reason. I'm grateful because all of the experiences that I've had have really helped to grow me as an individual and as a health care provider, even if I work in a different setting.

00:03:44:22 - 00:04:03:23

So I've been fortunate enough to serve as, you know, student government, president. And then as a resident director, I like to throw those things in there because it it adds a different perspective, which is not typical of, you know, maybe a health care student. But it has informed me a lot about how to make decisions and how to work with different teams.

00:04:04:00 - 00:04:29:14

And so all of those experiences serving in those roles helped to better inform me for my transition. And to ACP, the Academy of Student Pharmacists. And so while I was in pharmacy school, I also served as a ACP National Project coordinator with the International Pharmaceuticals Students Federation, which was a great opportunity just to learn how to implement projects and working on a national level.

00:04:29:18 - 00:04:54:07

And that helped to set me up for my next role as a GSP national member at large. So I served on the National Executive Committee. I knew that you have to in your past role as well, and it honestly has given me a great perspective on what we can do on a national level. And all of those experiences really informed me about who I am and what kind of person I want to be within the pharmacy profession.

00:04:54:09 - 00:05:10:10

Speaker 1

And I'm grateful for opportunities like PQA 2023 and the scholarship, which we'll talk about further in the podcast because it gave me and it gave me a door to really walk through and go and meet new people that can help me to learn more about the profession and what I can do to help out.

00:05:10:12 - 00:05:26:01

Dorich

Yeah, So let's talk about that because as you said, you were attending the 2023 meeting as a students. That is something where my myself, having been involved with the meeting, that's something that's kind of relatively new. So how does a student how did you get involved as a student and what made you interested to attend?

00:05:26:03 - 00:05:45:11

O

Yeah, so I'm really grateful. I have to shout out to my mentors out there because mentors, they just they see things that you don't see because we have so many obstacles, tasks that we want to kind of get done in the forefront. But our mentors help us to see further into the future and opportunities that may lie ahead.

00:05:45:11 - 00:06:09:13

And so we really want to shout out my mentors because they're the ones that showed me this opportunity of the diversity and quality scholarship through PQA. And I know that PQA has been doing a lot of great work in this year to help develop a more diverse backgrounds and trying to implement more perspectives from different backgrounds through their PQA Diverse Quality Leaders program.

00:06:09:15 - 00:06:40:00

And so I'm very fortunate to have benefited from this scholarship through recommendation from my mentor to just get involved and learn more about quality measures and what PQA can really do for the pharmacy profession. So I found out about the scholarship through my mentor. And so always I always encourage everyone to stay in contact with mentors. You never know what opportunities they can help you find and show you new perspectives so that you can learn more about the work that you want to do going forward.

00:06:40:05 - 00:07:05:09

But this program was really good because it obviously allowed, you know, minority students in the health care profession to get exposure. Just come in, learn, participate in different sessions and really expand your knowledge on, you know, how the pharmacy profession works together with other organizations, how we produce quality measures. And I know we'll talk about this too, but I learned so much that I didn't learn in school, right?

00:07:05:10 - 00:07:27:03

Because these are some topics that are more maybe nuance or more niche areas, but they're very, very pertinent to our profession. And so I'm grateful I got to go and sit down, listen to a couple of different trainings, including the medication use quality Workshop, because it really gave me insight about where a pharmacist can fit in when it comes to quality measures.

00:07:27:05 - 00:07:46:17

And so if you're a student out there that's looking for the opportunities, the conferences like those are great opportunities not only for you to network, but also for you to expand your knowledge, because it will it better inform you about the decisions you want to make going forward. So now I have more information about quality measures which can now better inform me in my role as a resident.

00:07:46:17 - 00:07:50:08

So I'm really grateful for the opportunities that I've had as a student.

00:07:50:10 - 00:08:08:10

Dorich

I'm hearing a glowing review so far. Oh, but let's make sure that we did your mentor's justice by them getting you involved with it. Let's make sure you did some some learning as well at the event. So what what was your biggest takeaway? What did you learn the most about, you know, what was the most intriguing from that intellectual perspective?

00:08:08:13 - 00:08:25:18

O

Yeah, that's a great question. So I learned so much. I tried to take as many notes as I could. I'm really grateful that, you know, technology is available to us because I can kind of keep everything on my iPad in one spot. But the biggest one I know, I spent a decent amount of time kind of looking through the slides.

00:08:25:18 - 00:08:56:09

I mentioned the medication use quality workshop. This was a workshop that was about 4 hours long, but for me it didn't fill it for hours. Because you're learning so much about the patient's perspective, you're learning about how we actually quantify and how we actually develop outcomes for medication use, which is something I didn't have much exposure to in pharmacy school in the sense of who creates these measures and how do we determine that we're actually meeting the goals that we've set out to do?

00:08:56:13 - 00:09:30:05

How are we actually measuring these patient outcomes? And so the biggest one for me, the biggest takeaway for me was really understanding maybe what the patient's perception is. There's a diagram that was shown that I vividly remember in my head of what the patient sees when they're receiving their medication. But all the back end stuff that they don't see, and that's all the different communications between manufacturers, the distributors, the retailers, PBMs, all of these different entities that work together that help to provide medications to our patients.

00:09:30:10 - 00:10:11:02

And then also understanding that patients don't know all the background. So we have to do a better job of educating them on these things so that they're aware of why certain measures are in place. Understand why we look at metrics the way we do so that we can better inform our future decisions. So I really enjoyed that workshop because it just gave you gave you a lot of perspective about what the patient is perceiving when it comes to pharmacy, what pharmacists can also perceive as a good quality measure, and how we can better create more measures so that we can continue to make our health care system better, more improved and just more efficient, because

00:10:11:02 - 00:10:26:08

that's ultimately what we're trying to do. We're trying to be efficient and efficacious, if you will. So those are those are some of the biggest takeaways. I mean, I can go on for 4 hours really talking about, you know, different different things that I learned, but that was be that would be the biggest one for me.

00:10:26:10 - 00:10:45:07

Dorich

Excellent. Well, you get a five star rating for having learned some of the things that you were supposed to learn at the meeting. Okay. You know, I really appreciate that answer because as as you explained it, it was to focus on, well, these measures, the intent with all of these things that we're doing, it's not necessarily about putting pharmacy in the positive light.

00:10:45:07 - 00:11:03:08

We know pharmacists are good and we're going to show our worth. But it's more important, as you noted, that this is about the patient and the patient understanding the process, the patient understanding what their pharmacist is doing, why they're able to do it, that different pharmacies, that different pharmacy staff members may have different skill sets and that, hey, things may be a little bit different.

00:11:03:08 - 00:11:20:14

That's that's okay. But we need to get the patients on board with our role, not just as the medication experts, but as folks that can provide a number of different services related to their health care. Yes. Now, now that question, if I'm thinking about it like a soap note, I kind of asked you that question. That was kind of the objective.

00:11:20:16 - 00:11:49:20

I want to get into the touchy feelings and and the somewhat subjective. So, you know, attending the meeting. And it could be really uplifting and very hopeful for you coming out of the meeting. How do you see pharmacists positively impacting patient care, where know stories are examples that you saw that got you really amped up to go back and bring lessons to your fellow colleagues at your school, at APHA or more broadly with your you know, with your with your community.

00:11:50:01 - 00:12:16:09

O

Yeah, no, that's a great question. And you mentioned it to you that pharmacies can provide so many different services. And some of the things, too. I noticed some patients may actually not know all of the services that a pharmacist can provide. And we have to do a better job of creating awareness. Right. And that comes from pharmacists in the pharmacy profession, you know, understanding where the patient's limitation of knowledge comes from and where we could fill those gaps.

00:12:16:13 - 00:12:35:12

And filling gaps is one of the things that I'll probably say a lot over the course of my residency for pharmacists, because they can really do that. There's a lot of burnout and a lot of shortages that we hear in other professions. And who better to fill the gap than the most accessible health care provider, which is the pharmacist?

00:12:35:14 - 00:13:02:15

And so I see us as conduits to so many different services, referrals and whatnot. But the biggest takeaway I probably say this was there was a session that was more so looking at a collaborative practice agreements and collaborative care models. And I think that's where we really have to start to have further conversations about what that looks like for all of the pharmacists in different sectors and how we can better create those reimbursement models.

00:13:02:17 - 00:13:29:14

I just recently finished a webinar with the NIH and just understanding that pharmacists can really fill all the gaps, even with HIV AIDS and there's so many different disease states that pharmacists are so knowledgeable about that they can really help to provide services. But we need to create the models so that we can collaborate with the different physicians so that we're ensuring that we're staying within our scope of practice and also respecting the scope of practice of others.

00:13:29:16 - 00:13:52:12

And so I was really grateful to really see what are the steps to creating, you know, a collaborative practice agreements, understanding the different standing orders that are in place from state to state so that we can actually practice at the top of our license. And we don't want to we don't want to continue to be an untapped unutilized resource when there's so many things that we can do as pharmacists for our community.

00:13:52:14 - 00:14:10:24

And that is probably the biggest thing I'll take away from the conference, because we need more pharmacists to  hear these things. We need them to understand that we have to be the champions for ourselves and also promoting what we do for the community. And obviously we just came out of a pandemic in which pharmacists helped to save the world.

00:14:11:01 - 00:14:26:19

And so we have to let the world know that that's something that we did and take ownership of it so that they can continue to recognize us for the services that we can provide. So we're really grateful for all of the speakers and the presenters that were able to share their insight at the PQA 2023 conference.

00:14:26:21 - 00:14:44:16

Dorich

Yeah, yeah. Oh great. Well said. It's absolutely a part that is there's a lot of things that pharmacists do. There's a lot of things that the pharmacy community has done, especially over the last several years and with the COVID pandemic. But before that, pharmacists are doing a lot of great things and there's a lot of great things that pharmacists are continuing to do.

00:14:44:22 - 00:15:11:02

And it's good that we do those services when we're having the one on one encounters with the patients, with their family, with their caregiver. But there's still a part of it where just like every other health care provider and then just like most folks, we need to share what it is we're doing, why we're doing it, how successful it is, because that kind of success is just going to breed more success for us, but more importantly, for the patients who may not know that they can get those services from their friendly local community pharmacist. Yes. So. Right. All right. So last question for you as it relates to the to the meeting, if you were a student pharmacist or a resident that's thinking about attending the meeting next year in 2024, what are your thoughts? Would you tell them that, yes, they should go? What's your recommendation?

00:15:29:13 - 00:15:51:11

O

I mean, I think you know my answer, but like, obviously I'm I love learning. I'm a friend of knowledge. I'm always looking for it, you know. So if you are a friend of knowledge and always curious to learn, highly recommend this conference for you too, because PCU is also just very well positioned to communicate with so many different entities.

00:15:51:13 - 00:16:24:23

They have many different member organizations and just the networking alone too. You're going to learn from so many different pharmacies and non pharmacies that have some expertise and some insight about how we can improve not only the profession but health care in general. And so that's why I think PQA is just very well poised with the amount of member organizations that they have and then their ability to communicate the outcomes and the different quality measures and what they've been doing to help promote the health care reform that's been going on.

00:16:24:23 - 00:16:50:21

You know, there's different acts that are coming through and things that we have to consider as far as policy. And so if you're curious and you need to learn more about those things, I highly encourage you to attend the PQA conference because you're going to learn so much about where a pharmacist can fit into these different measures. And then you can also learn more about how we can collaborate with other different other entities within the profession so that we can hopefully improve our system overall.

00:16:50:21 - 00:17:14:05

So if you if you're on the fence for sure, yeah, do your due diligence, ask the right questions. Don't be afraid to ask the questions. And there are plenty of great resources that you can, you know, tap into. Really grateful for the mentorship program that PQA also developed when I did attend this conference, because we were all assigned a mentor for the for the conference.

00:17:14:05 - 00:17:36:12

And I think that's a very good addition for conferences for every conference, because it gives you it gives you something to stand on and it gives you someone that you already know to connect with, and they can help to develop and make sure that your conference experience goes very well. So super, super grateful for that. And I'm really grateful for the opportunity to really attend the conference and hope to come back in the future.

00:17:36:14 - 00:17:55:15

Dorich

Excellent. Well, I as I presented that last question, I said that it would be my last question, but that actually I'm revising that that item. I a final actual final question for you, because I think it's important you've talked very warmly about the meeting, why it was important for you to go and how you had positive elements come out of the meeting that you want to go for next year.

00:17:55:21 - 00:18:11:17

So if folks want to reach out to you, if they want to contact you to learn more about your experience, why should they attend PQA? And hey, maybe you're going to be someone's mentor next year for the meeting. Where can they find you? How can they contact you? Can they find you on social media? Do you have an email that you can share anything like that?

00:18:11:19 - 00:18:32:00

O

Yeah. No, I appreciate that. I'm always open to to making new connections and sharing my expertise and my and my knowledge. Though limited, you know, I'm still coming out of school and, you know, still learning the ropes, but happy to share the things that I've learned thus far. I am on socials happy connect on LinkedIn just with my full name, Olunife.

00:18:32:02 - 00:18:50:16

Speaker 1

But yeah, you know, a lot of people call me, O, I'm also on Instagram, too, also trying to start up some more movement in that space for pharmacists because we have to have a social media presence as well so we can communicate a lot of this information. So look me up on on Instagram. Everything should be just my name and my last initial.

00:18:50:18 - 00:18:59:08

And I'm happy to connect with you. Just, just, just let me know when. I'm always hoping to connect with new people and learn new things. So appreciate the opportunity.

00:18:59:10 - 00:19:18:12

Dorich

Thanks so well, really, I'm really glad that you had a great experience at the PQA meeting. Hopefully you and I will get to see each other there next year, although you and I will be seeing each other well before then anyways, so really glad you had a great experience. I'm glad that we were able to capture the student or now resident experience of the PTA meeting because that's not something we've been able to do before.

00:19:18:12 - 00:19:44:15

But it's an important element even just for our audience. As we were doing show prep, there's a little bit of an age difference between oh and I, but similar shared life experiences. So there's a lot we can really learn to help grow and expand the pharmacist coming up and forming the next generation. So hopefully this this lesson, this experience from you is going to add on to what's the next group of students that attend pre-K, next group of students that become pharmacists, that get involved with quality metrics.

00:19:44:15 - 00:19:46:13

So I thank you for sharing your experience.

00:19:46:15 - 00:19:48:13

O

Yes. Thank you for the opportunity.

00:19:48:15 - 00:19:51:21

Dorich

All right. Thanks, folks. We'll be back with a final message.

00:19:51:23 - 00:20:13:11

Speaker 2

The Pharmacy Quality Solutions Quality Corner Show has a request for you. Our goal is to spread the word about how quality measurement can help improve health outcomes. And we need your help in sharing this podcast to friends and colleagues in the health care industry. We also want you to provide feedback, ask those questions and suggest health topics you'd like to see covered.

00:20:13:13 - 00:20:35:18

Speaker 2

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