Faculty Spotlight: Steve Caiola, MS — Focusing on the Point of Care
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Faculty Spotlight: Steve Caiola, MS — Focusing on the Point of Care
Focusing on the Point of Care
The list of Caiola’s activities with the University, the School, and professional organizations takes up six pages in his CV, and he is still adding to it. In September 2007, he was named chair of the School’s new Division of Pharmacy Practice and Experiential Education.
Before the PPEE was established, faculty and programs dealing with pharmacy education and the treatment of patients at the point of care were spread across the School’s four existing divisions, which focused their research on drug development, outcome studies, and pharmacotherapy.
The new division brings those programs and faculty together in one unit. PPEE houses the School’s Professional Experience Program, the Pharmaceutical Care Laboratory, and the Postgraduate/Continuing Education Program. Caiola says the division faculty will develop and emphasize best practices for pharmacists in caring for patients at the sites where they receive that care.
“We need to teach our students how to apply their knowledge and skills to most effectively care for patients in real practice sites,” he says. “PPEE will allow us to concentrate our efforts at the interface between pharmacist and patient and between pharmacist and caregiver.
“My goal is for every patient’s experience with a pharmacist to be one of caring and support. I want to fuel the fire within our students to be that kind of practitioner every day.”
Aside from accounting for about forty percent of the School’s doctor of pharmacy curriculum, PPEE will also offer a Master of Science in Health-System Pharmacy Program. Caiola is excited about the program, in part because he holds a similar degree from Ohio State University. UNC previously had a master’s program, but discontinued it about a decade ago. At that time, Caiola says, schools of pharmacy across the country were changing their baccalaureate programs into PharmD programs, and most decided to discontinue their master’s program and pour their resources into the PharmD instead.
As of 2007, only three schools in the country—OSU, the University of Kansas, and the University of Wisconsin—offered an MS degree in health-system pharmacy.
“Their two-year graduates do a master’s program combined with a residency, and they have a skill set that you just can’t get any other way,” Caiola says. “They are probably eight to ten years ahead because of the experience they get in those two years.”
Caiola says UNC is well-equipped to offer a program of that caliber.
“We have one of the best residency programs in the country,” he says. “We have great people leading the pharmacy department at UNC Hospitals, and we have a university that has five outstanding health-science schools. None of the three universities that offer the MS-residency program have all of those resources on the same campus.”
The program will enroll four students in each of its first two years. UNC Hospitals will sponsor two two-year residencies for students from the MS program, while Duke University Medical Center and Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center each have agreed to sponsor a two-year residency. Caiola says other health systems have expressed interest in the program and may provide additional residencies in the future.
Students will take 30 to 40 hours of graduate courses, complete a master’s project, and work in hospital residencies that would likely require 40 to 60 hours per week. Caiola admits it would be an intense two years, but says the rewards are well worth the short-term sacrifice.
It is important to train pharmacists who understand how a health system works and how pharmacy fits into that system, Caiola says, adding that the MS experience offers knowledge and training that students cannot get from a PharmD program.
“Some of the biggest misadventures in the healthcare system stem from the way drugs are used because there are multiple professions involved and they each have a narrow role in the process,” he says. “The physician prescribes the drug, the pharmacist sends the drug, and the nurse gives the drug to the patient. But who’s looking over the whole system to see if it works? Pharmacists are now saying, ‘We want to do that. We can help the physician pick the best drug. We can help the physician and nurse find the best way to get the drug into the patient. We can help everybody monitor the patient. We can get the patient out of here on the right drug.’
“If you want to train a health-system pharmacy leader of tomorrow, the MS program, combined with a residency, is the way to go.”