Wow, “Ami,” it sounds like you had quite a humbling experience, and just at the start of rotations. I know it can be terrifying to be on a new rotation as a student pharmacist, especially in an unfamiliar setting. Often you are given very little guidance as you begin patient care in a new setting. Some preceptors are more apt to give you detailed instructions while others hope you will pick up the day-to-day expectations on your own.

As a student, it is very easy to observe the actions of your preceptor and mimic them, but if every student pharmacist only mimicked their preceptors, innovation in pharmacy practice would be limited. The pharmacist’s role on the health care team has expanded tremendously in recent years not due to imitated behavior, but rather to pharmacy innovators. I wish I had been in the room during the first conversation where a pharmacist provided an antibiotic recommendation or when a pharmacist noticed a high serum creatinine on a patient and suggested a dose adjustment to the team. 

When you begin your term as an officer for your APhA–ASP Chapter, the big question is: where do you start? By beginning with a leadership retreat, you can establish goals, schedules, expectations, accountability, communication, and most importantly, team bonding.

At the University of Toledo College of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, we have dedicated the past 2 years on improving, and eventually perfecting, the leadership retreat. We would like to share with you our journey on creating a leadership retreat that took an unexpected turn that resulted in a “flood” of ideas. If you are holding a retreat or a leadership event in the near future, our experiences may come in handy … for several reasons.

Can y’all believe this is my last installment of “On Rotation Diary”? We have spent a whole year together and I feel like we should be besties at this point! So no longer will I hide my identity from you. Though I have gone by “Alison” these past 12 months, my real name is Natalie Tucker. I am a recent PharmD graduate from the Washington State University College of Pharmacy.