Volume 3, Issue 1 - Howard University Health Sciences

Howard University School of Pharmacy
The Black Apothecary
Go Seniors!!
Volume III, Issue I
Congratulations to Rho Chi & Phi Lamda Sigma Inductees
On behalf of
Rho Chi Society Inductees for 2005
Howard University
School of Pharmacy
Congratulations!!!
Phi Lamda Sigma Inductees for 2005
Sumaiya Shareef,
Rachel Hong
Oluwaseum Odebunmi Natanya Jennings
Alana Whittaker
Ubong Ibok
Victoria Aladejana Diana Solana
Ji Shon
PharmD
2005
Spring 2006
Oluchi Nwanajuobi
Natalie Marzouca Andrew Gentles
Oluwaseun Odebunmi Diana Solana
Fun
Memories
Class of
2005
James Ford Ayanna Gardner
Gina Bazemore
Shin Chang
Tondra Harris John Paul Marcus
Stephanie Hector
Joyce Mathew
Victor Morgan Linda Onunka
Ruth Ayuk
Farah Awan
Morgan Roberts Sharanie Sims
Celestina Arowosegbe Anees Chowdhery
Samori Swygert Leonard Valdes
Hakeem Abayomi
Martin Yoon Cellina Mlusu
ASHP Midyear 2004: Decisions, Decisions!!
Inside this issue:
Pharm.D’s Can Become Millionaires
2
Vioxx Mishaps Creates Safety Board
2
2nd Year Students story continued
2
Pictures from Class of 2007 Project
3
Fourth Year Students Surveyed
3
ASHP story continued
3
What the Class of 2008 Has to Say
4
Good luck on
rotations & see you
in the fall!
If you are interested
in writing for us,
please do contact us.
By Adora Nwankwo,
Class of 2005
While enjoying the pleasantries of sunny Orlando,
Florida, the Class of 2005
was slowly hit with the
stark reality of life after
pharmacy school. We
have been sheltered behind the walls of Howard
University School of Phar-
macy for the past four years
without the realization that
sooner or later, a decision
would have to be made regarding our future as health
care practitioners. The 39th
Annual ASHP Midyear clinical meeting held in December
2004 in Orlando, Florida was
truly a remarkable gathering
of health care professionals.
The convention provided several outlets for students to
2nd Year PharmD Students Help Out with Science Fair Projects at Local Elementary School
By Linda Onunka, Class of 2007
The second year HUCP students visited
Cleveland Elementary school starting the
first week in April to assist fifth grade students with their science fair projects. We
all packed into four cars and caravanned to
8th and S Street where the school is located.
We passed the cafeteria and climbed four
flights of stairs to get to their classroom.
Go Bison!
Go HU Pharmacy!
Go Bison!
The walls were adorned with drawings of
stick figures, paintings and other artwork produced by the children. We
walked into the classroom and the kids
seemed to be amazed that there were so
many of us there to help them. We split
off into groups so that there would be at
least two HUCP students for every child.
We read through their experiments with
continued on Page 2
Go HU Pharmacy!
Go Bison!
Go HU Pharmacy!
PAGE 2
VOLUME II, ISSUE I
Pharm. D’s Can Become Millionaires Too!!: A Student’s Perspective
By Andrew Gentles, Class of 2007
Congratulations!!! You have just
been employed as the new retail
pharmacist for J.D’s pharmacy with
a starting salary of $98,000 and a
sign on bonus of $10,000. With a
smile on your face, you might just
be thinking about which BMW series is ideal for your new lifestyle.
Wow! Life is going to be great. But
wait, whatever happened to student
loans, car payments, house payments etc. Luckily for us, the pharmacy profession has one of the highest salaries in the U.S with many
graduates obtaining clinical residencies, MBAs and other certifications to increase both job competency and salary negotiations. Pharmacy today is one of the only professions that new graduates can obtain
an average of $100K annually. So
what are the missing links fellow colleagues??
Advice 1: Never SPEND more than
what you can AFFORD?? Credit card
offers will leave you trapped!!
Advice 2: Always have a monthly
and yearly financial budget complete
with tangible and intangible expenses.
If this becomes too time consuming,
seek the services of a certified
public accountant (CPA) or visit
bookstores such as Barnes & Nobles
which have extensive reading
materials.
Advice 4: Very Important!! Always
ask about your company’s 401K plan.
With the uncertainty of future social
security, diversifying one’s income in
Roth IRA’s, mutual funds, or stocks
can be a good way to build CAPITAL.
Advice 5: Entrepreneurship…always
a good idea!!! Whether it’s a new specialty pharmacy or perhaps a new
business, a good business plan always
has a better chance of succeeding
than a poorly executed one.
Advice 3: Good effective financial
management always goes further
than student loans will ever take you.
By putting life objectives into perspective, financial goals are always
easier to achieve.
Vioxx Mishaps Leads FDA to Create New Drug Safety Board
By Minh Pham, Class Of 2007
The U.S Food and Drug Administration stated Tuesday, February 15th,
2005 that a new drug safety board
will be implemented to protect the
public from adverse effects due to
drugs already in the marketplace.
The FDA currently has the Office of
Drug Safety for surveillance of ad-
verse effects due to drugs that are
approved. However, after concerns
were raised due to an increase in reported youth suicides who took antidepressants, and following Merck’s withdrawal of Vioxx due to cardiotoxic effects, the FDA has gone under major
scrutiny. After a three day meeting,
the FDA announced the development
of a new drug safety board by assembling the “best scientific talent availa-
ble in government and outside government” as stated by Department
of Health & Human Services Secretary Michael Levitt. If any new
warning labels or a drug's withdrawal from the market is
recommended by this board, it will go to
the FDA's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research for consideration.
Source: www.fda.gov
2nd Year PharmD Students Help Out with Science Fair Projects at Local Elementary School cont’d.
them and ensured that they understood the reasoning and techniques
required for each experiment. Visits
to the school spanned three days.
There were a total of twenty second
year HUCP students that visited the
school to assist ten Cleveland Elementary School students. The students’ projects covered a wide range
of topics. Their research included:
taste bud sensation in the absence of
all other sight and smell, the effects
of various pollutants in the environment and testing of tobacco products
to name a few. The children were
well prepared for each of the experiments. Toward the end of our stay,
most of the experiments were completed and carried out successfully.
Our attendance illustrates just how
committed we are and should continue to be to young people, especially
those young students who show early
signs of interest in the sciences. Our
responsibilities as pharmacists not
only include pharmaceutical care for
patients but also concern for children
in the community who are also the
future of pharmacy. Initially, I was
not sure about if our efforts would be
of any assistance to these young people, but when I saw the excitement
in both their faces and the faces of
the faculty I was sure that we could
make a difference. My experience
with the Cleveland Elementary
School fifth graders was one of the
most significant contributions I have
made since I moved to DC from Texas. A special thanks to Dr. Jeanette
Andrews and Gina Bazemore for
organizing this project.
PAGE 3
VOLUME II, ISSUE I
Students from 2nd Year Help Out at Cleveland Elementary School
Graduating Students Surveyed: Find Out Where They Are Going!
About 40 fourth year students were surveyed to
find out about their future
plans. A portion of our
graduating class plan to
accept residencies and
fellowships. Surprisingly,
only one candidate surveyed has plans to open
their own business of practice. Equally surprising is
a lone candidate exploring
a career in Managed Care/
Consulting; however, a
whopping 21% of those
surveyed have no idea what
they’ll be doing after graduation. Sorry to say, no future
teachers were reported.
Signing bonuses are still alive
and kicking in some areas as
multiple students testified to
receiving between $5,000 and
$20,000 courtesy of our
friends at CVS, Walgreen’s
and Rite Aid. The starting
salaries averaged in the
$90,000-$100,000 range for
this year’s Howard University
graduates. About 13% of the
Clinical Other
8%
5%
Retail
28%
Undecided
21%
Residency
38%
Survey Results From 4th Yr
Participants. (Conducted &
written by Black Apothecary Writer,
Victor Morgan—Class of 2007)
surveyed population claim to be surpassing the elusive $100,000 marker.
Good luck and please
inform your
underclass colleagues as to where
such opportunities exist! When questioned about their most memorable
experiences at HU, most of our soonto-be graduates cite meeting and
making new friends; they certainly
treasure the loving, learning relationships established with our excellent, knowledgeable faculty; also let’s
not forget as one student stated
“passing biochemistry.”•
ASHP Midyear 2004: Decisions, Decisions!! Cont. from page 1
begin the process of planning their future after pharmacy school. The conference not only provided a NAPLEX
board review workshop for the fourth
year students, it also provided CV/
resume writing workshops, and several
educational panels and presentations.
Students had the opportunity to enroll
in the Personal Placement Service
(PPS) before attendance to the conference. This innovative service notifies
employers of the students interested in
employment opportunities and residency placements, and grants students the
opportunity to interview at the conference site with several employers of
their choice. The residency showcase
was a monumental event for students,
especially those interested in pursuing
resi-
dencies post-graduation. The showcase
gave residency programs around the
country the opportunity to meet and
greet with prospective students and educate them on the programs offered.
Those who attended the Midyear clinical
meeting gave mixed reviews about the
value of the meeting. “It was beneficial
for most people, however I was not prepared for a residency at that moment,
had I been prepared, it would have been
beneficial” says Wunmi Okanlanwon, a
graduating senior. At the same time
others felt that the conference lived up
to all expectations. Some students were
pleased by the presence of all the health
care institutions and seized every opportunity to acquaint themselves with
programs which they found interesting.
Overall, the key to a successful Midyear meeting is preparation, this is
evident by the following statement
from a fourth year student: “For the
past three years, I have done nothing
but plan for my future beyond pharmacy school, however, when granted
the opportunity to apply for so many
residencies at the Midyear meeting,
all the paths which I had previously
carved for myself seem a blur.”
H O W A R D U N I V E R S I T Y SC H O O L O F P HA R M A C Y
2300 4th Street, NW
Washington, DC 20059
Phone: (202)806-4206
Fax :(202)806-4478
Editorial Staff
Student Contributors: Andrew Gentles (Story & Pictures), Audora Nwankwo, Gina Bazemore (Pictures), Victor Morgan, Minh
Pham, Linda Onunka & Nnenna Okeke
Andrew Gentles, Student Editor - Class of 2007 & Minh Pham, Student Editor - Class of 2007
Faculty Advisor/Faculty Editor: Dr. Monika N. Daftary
Send us your comments at [email protected]
Khiana K. Willis a.k.a
“President Extraordinaire”
It’s been an interesting, challenging and rewarding experience
being a part of the class of 2008 so
far. This summer I will be going
back home to Detroit, MI and
doing my 3-week early professional experience with cardinal
health. At Cardinal, I will work in
the area of nuclear pharmacy. The
rest of my summer will consist of
an internship with Walgreen’s
Pharmacy.
Justin Yasay a.k.a “A future
Pharmacist can only look so
cute”
As of now, I'm applying for an
internship position at Safeway and
at CVS.
I'm planning on doing
my rotations this summer here in
DC, because I love this city.
Being able to go to pharmacy
Amanda Jade a.k.a “School is a
Party, didn’t you know?”
Kwadwo ‘Cudjoe’ Bekoe a.k.a
“Better than Boris”
My summer begins as soon as I turn
in my last final exam for the semester, PS3. I'm rushing to the airport to
catch a 1:45pm flight home to Chicago then coming back to the DC/MD
area to start my rotation at CVS on
May 17th for 3 weeks. The plan is to
follow that with a summer internship
at Safeway on June 6th that will go
through the summer. Can somebody
say “Exciting!!” :)
My most memorable experience so far
in the School of Pharmacy has been the
first exam in BMS 2 (Microbiology
and Biochemistry). Conquering that
class was like gaining bigger biceps.
I’m stronger, literally.
school at Howard has been a
challenging and wonderful experience thus far. Incoming students,
get ready!
By Nnenna Okeke, Class of 2008
HU has been a great challenge so far
but this summer though, I will be
working at CVS in Alexandria, VA. I
will most likely be doing my 3 week
summer rotation there as well. I might
also be visiting Minnesota to see some
old college friends.