ACCP members Taylor D. Steuber, Erin R. Weeda, and Justin R. Arnall were selected by the 2022 ACCP Awards Committee to receive the College’s prestigious 2022 New Educator, New Investigator, and New Clinical Practitioner awards, respectively. The awards will be presented in San Francisco, California, on Sunday, October 16, 2022, during the Awards and Recognition Ceremony of the 2022 ACCP Global Conference on Clinical Pharmacy.
Steuber
The ACCP New Educator Award recognizes and honors a new educator for outstanding contributions to the discipline of teaching and to the education of health care practitioners. The awardee must have been a Full Member of ACCP at the time of nomination and a member at any level for a minimum of 3 years; in addition, the awardee must have completed their terminal training or degree less than 6 years previously. Taylor D. Steuber, Pharm.D., BCPS, is an associate clinical professor and assistant director of the professional program at Auburn University Harrison School of Pharmacy and internal medicine clinical pharmacist at Huntsville Hospital with the UAB Division of Internal Medicine. Steuber received his Pharm.D. degree from the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Pharmacy.
Miranda Andrus, Pharm.D., FCCP, BCPS, clinical professor of pharmacy practice at Auburn University Harrison School of Pharmacy, wrote in her nomination letter:
Dr. Steuber is a creative, visionary, and innovative teacher; and has carried a very heavy teaching load throughout his tenure at HSOP. He often volunteers to take on extra teaching, approaches his coursework with enthusiasm, and continually takes a scholarly approach to sharing his ideas and successes with the greater pharmacy academy. He recently stepped into an academic leadership role of coordinating the P2 Spring semester courses. He also co-produces a podcast on post-graduate residency training, which has been very well received by our students, and reaches a large audience all over the country. He co-coordinates a post-graduate elective course that is very interactive, and I have heard outstanding praise for it from students. Dr. Steuber helped design and precept a novel drug information evidence-based medicine rotation that was developed to help address the APPE instructional needs of the school due to COVID-19 restrictions. He also developed an elective course on wellbeing, in which students track their wellbeing in five areas weekly and develop a final presentation…. His other teaching innovations include using games in the classroom, EHR-based cases that emphasize the pharmacist patient care process, a simulated call to a physician, and progressive cases. His student evaluations have highlighted his ability to take complex concepts and break them down so that they can be easily understood.
Sarah A. Nisly, Pharm.D., FCCP, BCPS, vice president, outcomes & clinical impact at Continuing Education Alliance, added in her letter of support:
Dr. Steuber has displayed a keen interest in academia and educational leadership from our first encounter. While most students enter residency with a focus to improve clinical knowledge, Dr. Steuber sought to help others understand the roles a pharmacist could play in direct patient care. He sought opportunities for precepting, classroom teaching, course creation, and academic-focused research. While there are several opportunities to highlight during Dr. Steuber’s residency training, I would like to focus on one longitudinal research thread that started in residency and has continued to yield fruitful collaboration. In preparation for his PGY2 longitudinal research project, Dr. Steuber began identifying possible academic research opportunities. Ultimately, we identified an opportunity to study students’ self-reflection after each verbal case presentation in our Drug-Induced Diseases professional elective. Dr. Steuber researched student metacognition, implemented a research project in our course, and successfully published his findings in the American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education. This project blossomed into a larger focus to design opportunities to improve student metacognition and has yielded a book chapter and sparked a multisite collaborative project and publication evaluating metacognition in experiential education. This single example is just one of many themes Dr. Steuber cultivated during residency that have helped shape the academician he is today.
Steuber has received HSOP Faculty Recognition for Collaboration and Integration as well as Innovation and received the Auburn University Research Excellence Award. He currently serves as chair of the ACCP Education and Training PRN and is an active member of the Adult Medicine PRN. Steuber is host of The Post-Graduate Pharmacist, a podcast that focuses on postgraduate residency training with more than 2100 original downloads as of January 2022.
Weeda
The New Investigator Award recognizes an ACCP member who has made a significant impact on an aspect of clinical pharmaceutical science. The awardee must have been a member of ACCP for more than 3 years, must have completed their terminal training or degree less than 6 years previously, and must have a research program with a substantial publication record that includes a programmatic theme or an especially noteworthy single publication. Erin R. Weeda, Pharm.D., BCPS, is an assistant professor in the Department of Clinical Pharmacy & Outcomes Sciences at the Medical University of South Carolina College of Pharmacy and a research health scientist at the Ralph H. Johnson Veterans Affairs Medical Center. She received her Pharm.D. degree from the University of New Mexico College of Pharmacy and completed a health economics and outcomes research fellowship at the University of Connecticut. Weeda’s research is focused on health outcomes. At the time of her nomination, she had published 76 peer-reviewed manuscripts, of which over 90% are original research manuscripts. Her work has been published in high-impact journals such as the Journal of the American Medical Association, the American Journal of Emergency Medicine, and the American Journal of Cardiology.
William Baker, Pharm.D., FCCP, FACC, FAHA, FHFSA, associate professor of pharmacy practice at the University of Connecticut School of Pharmacy, commented on Weeda’s qualifications for the New Investigator Award in his letter of support:
Her scholarly accomplishments are truly remarkable. To date, she has published 74 manuscripts in peer-reviewed journals, a federal report with the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, and 2 book chapters. Her work has been published in numerous high-quality journals, including JAMA, JAMA Surgery, American Journal of Emergency Medicine, and Diabetes, Obesity and Metabolism. She has been involved with securing six extramural grants totaling $1,284,000 in funding, two as Principal Investigator totaling $166,000. This includes sources such as the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, the NIH, the Duke Endowment Award, and the Veterans Affairs. Her most recent grant as PI is a VISN7 Research Development Award from the VA ($140,000) looking at improving medication safety and reduction fragmentation related to medication management. Taken together, her publication record and ability to secure extramural funding shows not only her tremendous capability and talent, but also the upward trend of her output. The sky is the limit with Erin, and it is truly exciting to watch.
Katherine Chessman, Pharm.D., FCCP, FPPA, BCPS, BCNSP, professor and chair, Department of Clinical Pharmacy & Outcomes Sciences at the Medical University of South Carolina College of Pharmacy, added in her letter of nomination:
I would be remiss if I did not mention that in addition to being an outstanding researcher, Dr. Weeda is instilling in our students and residents the knowledge and attitudes necessary to both conduct research and evaluate the medical literature. Dr. Weeda imparts her knowledge in outcomes and assessment to her students in a manner such that they not only learn but enjoy it! Her Outcomes Design and Assessment course is so highly rated by the students that it was the highest-rated course in the College of Pharmacy in 2020 (score 4.86/5). Her students benefit from her ability to make difficult concepts easy to understand. In March 2019, only 2 years after joining the faculty, she was chosen as the MUSC College of Pharmacy Overall Teacher of the Year, the P2 Teacher of the Year, and the Outstanding Mentor of the Year. She received the P2 Teacher of the Year award also in 2021. Dr. Weeda received the MUSC Foundations Developing Teacher Award in 2021. She is a dedicated teacher and much loved by her students.
Also, in line with this award, Dr. Weeda coordinates a Research Certificate Program for the MUSC Medical Center Pharmacy Residency Program. She offers didactic sessions for the residents as well as individual help with their research projects. She provides timely assistance to residents and their project preceptors, teaching them the correct way to design and evaluate research data. Her efforts are very well received by the residents and her colleagues.
Weeda will deliver the annual New Investigator Award lecture during the October 16 Awards and Recognition Ceremony.
Arnall
The New Clinical Practitioner Award honors a new clinical practitioner who has made outstanding contributions to the health of patients and/or the practice of clinical pharmacy. The awardee must have been a Full Member of ACCP at the time of nomination, as well as a member at any level for a minimum of 3 years; in addition, the awardee must have completed their terminal training or degree less than 6 years previously. Justin R. Arnall, Pharm.D., BCOP, serves as a clinical coordinator, hematology for Atrium Health Specialty Pharmacy Service.
Katie Gatwood, Pharm.D., BCOP, clinical pharmacist specialist, stem cell transplant and cellular therapy, and director of the PGY2 oncology residency program at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, wrote in her letter of support:
Dr. Arnall is incredibly dedicated to the advancement of clinical pharmacy practice. At his own institution, he has showcased the value of pharmacist services in both the hemophilia treatment centers and to hematology providers across the Atrium Health Care System. He regularly leads discussion on protocols and treatment pathway development for hematologic conditions, weighing in on discussions where there was no pharmacist insight provided previously. He is a strong advocate of outpatient administration of complex chemotherapy regimens for hematologic malignancies; and he has authored an article reviewing and offering guidance on these practices for multiple regimens based on his experience implementing their administration in his own practice. Additionally, his impact on practice is most notably exemplified in his receipt of the ASTCT New Investigator Award grant to initiate a pharmacist-driven precision medicine service using pharmacogenetics to improve the supportive care management of adult patients undergoing hematopoietic cell transplantation. In this project, he has overseen the launch of a program where pharmacists are directly responsible for study patient recruitment, medication review/scheduled reconciliation, and pharmacogenomic recommendation operationalization – establishing and utilizing a novel collaboration between cancer center–based clinical pharmacists and specialty pharmacy pharmacists to optimize supportive care. The overall goal of this study is to evaluate the impact of a precision-based approach to supportive care in stem cell transplant patients, but it is apparent that this program will demonstrate the value [that] pharmacists in a variety of settings can bring to implement genomic-based care.
Marco Martino, Pharm.D., MBA, BCPS, BCOP, medical science liaison at EMD Serono, commented in his letter of support:
Dr. Arnall has also demonstrated unparalleled excellence in his care of patients, and as mentioned prior, he has shared this excellence all over the world. Dr. Arnall is well-published and well-spoken. Despite all of his publications, one of the most impressive pieces that he authored was in the PSAP book on immunotherapies in 2020. He wanted to be sure that everyone had the ability to care for patients on immunotherapies and thus authored an excellent chapter on immunotherapies…. It goes without being said that Dr. Arnall’s commitment to patient care has shone brightly in ACCP, his institution, his state, our country, and even throughout the world, which I have never before said about any pharmacist that I have ever known. It would be difficult to find someone who fulfills the requirements for the ACCP New Clinical Practitioner Award better than Dr. Arnall.
Arnall is actively involved in ACCP and engaged in scholarship. At the time of his nomination, he had published over 40 peer-reviewed manuscripts, two ACCP book chapters, and numerous national presentations, including those at ACCP, the 17th International Myeloma Workshop, the American Society of Hematology Annual Meeting & Exposition, and the HOPA Annual Meeting.
Members of the 2022 ACCP Awards Committee were Kristi Kelley (chair), Nancy Shapiro (vice chair), Ty Kiser (secretary), Jacquelyn Bainbridge, Alexandre Chan, Lingtak-Neander Chan, Melanie Claborn, Jeannine Conway, Patrick Dougherty, Paul Gubbins, Cynthia Nguyen, Golden Peters, Mate Soric, Paul Stranges, Stephanie Tchen, Emma Tillman, and Melissa Young.