Pharmacy & Therapeutics

Winning Team of Local AMCP P&T Competition Awaits Word on Invitation to Nationals

After winning the local Pharmacy & Therapeutics Competition hosted by the UH College of Pharmacy Chapter of the Academy of Managed Care Pharmacy (AMCP), four UH Pharm.D. students are eagerly awaiting news of whether they will be invited to compete in the national competition in March 27-30 in Denver. The winners were announced at the AMCP UHCOP Chapter's 2nd Annual Roundtable Event Jan. 20 at the UH Alumni Center.

In the P&T Competition, teams of pharmacy students must make the case for a drug being considered for inclusion on the drug formulary for a managed-care insurance plan or healthcare institution. The competition includes a 25-minute oral presentation and slideshow as well as the submission of a drug monograph of less than 25 pages.

Reviewed and evaluated by a panel of judges, the oral and written presentations must address a variety of factors as part of the argument for including the drug in the formulary, including the medication's safety profile as well as impacted patient populations. The drugs selected for the competition are based on a list provided by the national AMCP organization. 

Following the local competition, the team sends in a submission, which includes the drug monograph, slideshow presentation and drug dossier.

First year Pharm.D. student Kim Dinh, a member of the first-place team, saw the competition as an opportunity to learn more about different parts of the pharmacy profession.

"I had never heard about managed care, so being in this competition opened my eyes to another side of pharmacy," Dinh said. "Pharmacy is so much more than the clinical (direct patient care) side."

With Dinh being so early in her Pharm.D. studies, she looked at this competition as an opportunity to jump ahead.

"Usually you don't get to see the economic side of it until your P3 year," Dinh said. 

Taking home first place was a huge surprise to Dinh and her teammate and second year Pharm.D. student Sean Liang, especially as there weren’t any third or fourth-year student participants in his group.

“(We) put in a lot of work during winter break, meeting up on multiple occasions, so I’m really proud of our win,” Liang said.

Other members of the winning team were first-year Pharm.D. students Elissa Chin and Minthong Le.

The second-place team included Sumaira Khan, Truong Anthony Do, Arlene Thomas, Craig Whitaker and Van Nguyen. 

If the local winners are selected for the national competition, they will be one of eight teams from across the country to go against each other in the 2017 Annual National Student P&T Committee Competition the AMCP Managed Care & Specialty Pharmacy Annual Meeting in March.

-- by Ameena Rasheed