Program overview
Required core learning experiences
Most of these Pharmacy Residency learning experiences are one month long, but duration could be modified based on your interests and preceptor availability.
- Orientation
- Internal medicine
- Antimicrobial stewardship
- Emergency medicine
- Critical care
- Internal medicine 2
- Cardiology
- Clinical pharmacy practice and precepting
Required longitudinal learning experiences
- Drug information and health care education: 11-month experience
- Major research project: 12-month experience
- Pharmacy administration and medication safety: 11-month experience
- Inpatient pharmacy staffing: 11-month experience
Elective learning experiences
Most of these experiences are also one month long. But, like required core experiences, these can also be changed depending on your interests. That, in turn, could change the number of electives you can select. Our goal is to provide you with a pharmacy residency that’s tailored to your interests and goals.
- Pharmacy leadership
- Infectious diseases
- Emergency medicine 2
- Trauma Services
- Critical Care 2
- Palliative and pain management
Department of Pharmacy
The Geisinger Community Medical Center Department of Pharmacy’s practice model involves integration of distribution and clinical activities at the patient care level supported by centralized distribution, support functions and management systems.
You’ll work with pharmacists practicing in:
- Internal medicine
- Critical care medicine
- Antimicrobial stewardship
- Emergency medicine
- Cardiology
- Trauma services
- Pharmacy administration
- Outpatient oncology
- Operating room services
Our pharmacists are involved in:
- Drug therapy management
- Multidisciplinary patient care
- Decentralized pharmacy practice
- Pharmacokinetic consultations
- Anticoagulation consultations
- Adult and pediatric code response
- Medication utilization and outcome evaluation
- Medical, nursing and pharmacy staff education programs
Pharmacy students from regional schools of pharmacy rotate through our hospital and clinics as part of their core hospital pharmacy, clinical pharmacy and ambulatory care rotations.
In other words, you’ll be exposed to a tremendous variety of experiences and potential career paths.
Learning experiences
Orientation
Your four-week orientation introduces you to the staff and duties of the central inpatient pharmacy, as well as the cancer center and operating room (OR) satellites. While preparing for and completing the North American Pharmacist Licensure Examination (NAPLEX) and Multistate Pharmacy Jurisprudence Examination (MPJE), you’ll also complete computer training; IV room training and competencies; Basic Life Support (BLS), Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS) and Pediatric Advanced Life Support (PALS) certifications; departmental anticoagulation, pharmacokinetics, antimicrobial stewardship and code certifications; and Collaborative Institutional Training Initiative (CITI) training.
Longitudinal staffing experience
This experience takes place in the central pharmacy department. You’ll gain experience in medication order verification, drug information, pharmacokinetic consults and follow-up dosing, anticoagulation consults and follow-up dosing, checking of the pharmaceutical product and working as a team with other pharmacists and technicians. And you’ll gain practical experience by providing pharmaceutical care to a patient population that ranges from birth to 100+ years of age.
Drug information and healthcare education
The drug information rotation is a required, longitudinal rotation during which you’ll work with preceptors to identify drug information questions/requests. The goal is to hone your skills in providing pharmaceutical and drug information to the hospital’s pharmacy, nursing, medical staff and patients. One of your primary responsibilities will be to provide concise, applicable and timely responses to our staff and to work with them to resolve problems related to drug therapy.
Internal medicine
The internal medicine learning experience will help you learn to effectively and efficiently collect pertinent patient information from a variety of sources. You’ll be able to identify and resolve medication-related problems, generate a problem list and create a plan of care with appropriate monitoring for outcomes and adverse effects. A strong emphasis will be placed on physiology, pathophysiology and pharmacology.
Antimicrobial stewardship (AMS)
This experience will teach you the rationale and execution of an antimicrobial stewardship program in a health system. You’ll team up with the infectious diseases pharmacists and physicians to optimize pharmacotherapy outcomes as related to AMS/infectious diseases (ID). The experience incorporates elements of ID, AMS, infection control, pharmacokinetic management of antimicrobials, transitions of care and outpatient antimicrobial management.
Infectious diseases (ID)
During this elective, you’ll use patient-specific data, antimicrobial pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic principles, microbiological culture and sensitivity results to optimize antimicrobial drug therapy regimens for patients on the ID consult service. You’ll round with the ID physicians, be responsible for monitoring patients on the ID consult service and have designated time with the microbiology lab and infection control departments.
Cardiology
This rotation is focused on optimizing medication therapy in cardiovascular medicine. You’ll work closely with cardiologists, nursing and other providers. The emphasis is on management of drug therapy in hospitalized cardiac patients in a cardiac step-down care setting, a cardiac procedure unit including cardiac catheterization and electrophysiology labs, and cardiovascular arrest and emergencies.
Emergency medicine
Geisinger Community Medical Center is a Level II trauma center. During this rotation, you’ll participate in bedside medication selection and dosing for procedural sedation, rapid sequence induction (RSI), pediatric/adult codes and pediatric/adult alerts (Level I and II traumas, sepsis, ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI), pulmonary embolism response team (PERT) alerts and stroke alerts) alongside emergency medicine (EM) team. You’ll also procure and compound emergency medications for critically ill patients at bedside.
Critical care
You’ll complete patient profile reviews and prepare therapy recommendations as you participate in bedside rounding as part of an interdisciplinary team of physicians, residents, PA-Cs, nursing and other specialties. You’ll engage in core topic discussions with your preceptor and colleagues and develop skills needed to provide pharmacy services as part of the critical care team.
Advanced critical care
You’ll continue to build on the skills you learned in your first critical care experience. You and your preceptor will emphasize the development of resident independence during interdisciplinary rounds and management of day-to-day pharmacist responsibilities such as order verification, emergency response and drug information questions.
Trauma services
This four-week learning experience is centered at Geisinger Community Medical Center’s Level II trauma center. Some of the core discussion topics include anticoagulation reversal, multi modal pain management in the trauma patient, hemorrhagic, distributive and neurogenic shock, traumatic brain injury (management of cerebral perfusion pressure, paroxysmal sympathetic hyperactivity), craniofacial trauma, open orthopedic and penetrating injury of the extremities and penetrating abdominal injury. Your experience is designed to mirror the pharmacist’s role, responsibilities and spectrum of pharmaceutical care services in this environment.