On Saturday, March 10, approximately 150 students, residents and pharmacists from across the Southeast attended the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy’s Fourth Annual Asheville Summit at the Mountain Area Health Education Center in Asheville, North Carolina.
The Asheville Summit is a one-day conference planned by students at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy with the majority of the planning done at the School’s Asheville campus. This year’s topic was population health. In the past, the summit has covered provider status, innovation within pharmacy practice, and the importance of interprofessional care. Pharmacy students from Auburn University, High Point University, Mercer University, Medical University of South Carolina, Samford University, South Carolina University and Wingate University attended.
Kelly Epplen, Pharm.D., an associate professor at the University of Cincinnati’s James L. Winkle College of Pharmacy, was the keynote speaker. She introduced population health and gave a primer on the theme before attendees delved into more specific areas throughout the rest of the day.
A panel discussion devoted to the opioid epidemic followed the keynote and was led by Assistant Professor of Clinical Education Courtenay Wilson, Pharm.D., and Jon Easter, director of the UNC Center for Medication Optimization through Practice and Policy.
At the end of the day, one participant said, “I think my favorite talk was definitely the one about the opioid epidemic because that is a very difficult situation to deal with. Many of us are currently working as interns and are exposed to chronic users on a daily basis at work.”
The goal of the conference was to highlight patient populations that are seen clinically but not always discussed in the classroom. Topics covered ranged from caring for the aging population, harm reduction via needle exchange programs, providing care to the underserved, pulmonary rehabilitation for patients with COPD, bridging cultural and linguistic divides to better serve the Latino community and promoting better outcomes for patients with types I and II diabetes mellitus.
During breaks, participants networked or visited booths with offerings like code-cart medication education, pharmacy trivia and naloxone training. Participants earned raffle tickets by visiting the booths, which could be used to enter a drawing for a variety of prizes.
Anne Lake, D.N.P., a nurse practitioner and a nationally recognized bone specialist from Wake Forest Baptist Health in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, gave a plenary discussion on bone health and fracture prevention. Finally, Dawn Pettus, Pharm.D., assistant director of pharmacotherapy, education and research at Greensboro AHEC, and her current resident, Kelsey Combs, ended the day by talking about interventions they have made with Triad Healthcare Network.
At the conclusion of the event, the organizers gauged participants’ experience of the day by asking them to share their feedback on index cards. Representative comments included, “Thank you so much for putting together an amazing conference! I feel that I have a better understanding of population health and some of the most overlooked disease states,” and “I enjoyed the choice in speakers and topics. I feel like every speaker was relevant and applicable to current pharmacy issues.”
Summit organizers are considering women’s health and leadership as the theme for The Asheville Summit in 2019. Check http://ashevillesummit.web.unc.edu/ to stay up to date on the Asheville Summit.