Stephen F. Eckel, Pharm.D., M.H.A., received the Milton W. Skolaut Leadership Award from the Duke University Department of Pharmacy on June 29.
The award is given annually to a past resident of the Duke University Hospital Pharmacy Residency Program in recognition of outstanding leadership and contributions to the profession of pharmacy. The Duke residency program has graduated 240 residents as of 2018.
Eckel is the interim chair of the Division of Practice Advancement and Clinical Education and the associate dean for global engagement at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy. He is a 1998 Duke pharmacy residency graduate. He was presented with the award at Duke’s pharmacy residency certificate ceremony where he also gave a lecture entitled “P5 – The Compound Interest Formula for the Pharmacy Profession.”
Eckel is a clinical associate professor in PACE and is the associate director of pharmacy at UNC Hospitals. He is also involved with the hospital’s pharmacy residency programs. He is a past-president of the North Carolina Association of Pharmacists and is a 2015 recipient of ASHP Foundation’s Pharmacy Residency Excellence Preceptor Award.
Milton W. Skolaut was the director of pharmacy at Duke Hospital for 17 years until his retirement in 1987. Before that, he served as director of pharmacy services at the National Institutes of Health Clinical Center, where he established the pharmacy as the central supply point for drug distribution — a novel concept at the time that soon became standard hospital practice. Skolaut was a leader of the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists, serving as president, vice president and treasurer. He died in 2005.