Professionalism the theme of the White Coat Ceremony

Eight-five first-year pharmacy students passed the Light of Knowledge and recited the Pharmacy Oath at Binghamton University’s second White Coat Ceremony, held Saturday, Aug. 25, in the Anderson Center’s Osterhout Concert Theater.

President Harvey Stenger spoke of his pledge to establish a new School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences that would include the best talent possible, as well as a facility with technology that outpaces most pharmacy schools.

“We want our students to be trained by the best faculty in the best building in the United States,” he said, as he equated the rebuilding of downtown Binghamton through the presence of the University Downtown Center with the impact the pharmacy school will have on Johnson City.

“Johnson City was the center of a huge amount of industrial activity two centuries ago,” said Stenger. “That’s all gone now, but we remember that legacy and are pledging ourselves to rebuild downtown Johnson City, just as we did in Binghamton, what is now considered one of the best college towns in America.

“The impact will be twice as big on an area half the size,” Stenger said. “It will be transformative.

“Your education will be different as well,” Stenger told the students. “It will emphasize research and many of you will work at teaching hospitals or in research or industrial labs, or in retail, but you will also be trained in state-of-the-art robotics. Our goal is to have great patient outcomes, lower costs and breakthroughs that save lives. Good luck on your journey.”

“You are a very special class and enjoy what many in very established schools don’t have,” said Dr. Charles Aswad, MD, executive vice president emeritus of the Medical Society of the State of New York and chair of the pharmacy school’s advisory council.

“You have the opportunity to be trained in one of the highest levels of pharmacy training available in this country,” he said. “We’re told that we have an opportunity to be the best we can be in our chosen professions, but do not always have the opportunity to build a school and you have an opportunity to build a school. As you build your careers, you will build the reputation of the school. It’s an awesome responsibility. Regardless of what phase of pharmacy you ultimately enter, you have the opportunity to be among the first classes that attended what we believe will be the finest pharmacy school on the planet.”

The keynote address, given by Rear Admiral Pamela Schweitzer, who is the assistant surgeon general and chief professional office for pharmacy for the U.S. Public Health Service, focused on what it means to be a professional pharmacist.

Schweitzer said most of her talk came to her as she hiked without her cell phone and thought about life and what makes things tick.

“I’m sharing tidbits of this information and hope it resonates with you and you take it to heart in your career as you learn what it really means to be a professional in the field of pharmacy,” she said.

“You’re starting a journey today of gaining knowledge and learning what it means to be a professional. That’s what the white coat represents,” she said.

“Not only today, but any time you put that white coat on it will inspire trust and confidence in your patients. You’ll stand straighter and walk differently,” she said. “When I put on the uniform, I’m a different person. I don’t put my feet on the table, I don’t jaywalk. And you’ll act differently in the white coat because it represents an important step in humanism. It represents respectful and compassionate relationships between your patients and other members of the healthcare team.”

Her talk unfolded through stories from her past and her passion for public health.

The first was about three friends having lunch by a river. Someone was drowning so the first friend saved him, but more people started to drown so the second friend got a raft and started to help. As the two friends became tired, the third friend went upstream to find out why people were falling in the river to solve the problem at its origin. “That’s what public health is,” said Schweitzer, explaining her role. “It’s how to solve the problem at the front end for issues including tobacco cessation, diet policy, the opioid crisis, all the areas that impact people.

“I found a passion and each one of you will find that passion along the way,” she said.

Story number two came from when she was working on an Indian reservation, hired to ensure better care in the tribe’s hospital. Even though she was able to improve wait times, have better outcomes and hire the best people, the tribe was unhappy. At a tribal meeting, an elderly, respected woman stood up and spoke in her native language. Her message? “She said she wants people who are caring and who care about the families, not just those who are checking off that it’s done. She wants people who do not talk down to them or make them feel like they did something wrong. She wants someone who generally cares.

“What she said made a profound effect,” Schweitzer said. “That’s actually the secret sauce and it will take a class like you to actually change this. It will make a world of difference.”

Becoming a professional means being committed to excellence, Schweitzer said. “A professional can be taught and nurtured over time. It’s about being humble and realizing you don’t know everything. Professionalism is something you learn from your patients and your peers throughout your career.”

Professionalism is also tone of voice and body language, Schweitzer added. “I once was working in a busy pharmacy where we were supposed to counsel everyone, but when it got busy it was easy to take shortcuts. If a patient sees you’re busy and you say, ‘Do you have any questions?’, they’ll say no. But if I took them into a room where they didn’t see how busy we were, 100 percent of the time they had questions. We need to make sure when we’re busy that we take people to a room because they do have questions. It’s not just checking the box.”

Referencing the Dr. Seuss book, All the Places You’ll Go, Schweitzer told the students that they can steer themselves in any direction they choose. There are an infinite number of opportunities to demonstrate professionalism in your careers, she said, including learning how to get through the medical care system, and perhaps making the system easier to navigate.

Another lesson she learned came from her final story of the day. She said that once she was on rounds with a physician and medical students, dealing with infectious diseases. The attending physician often asked the medical students about the drugs patients were taking, and they often couldn’t answer the questions, but Schweitzer and her pharmacy colleagues could. “So we got together with the medical students and taught them the answers ahead of time,” she said. “It’s about being a team and working together. That’s professionalism — performing to best of our ability and not taking shortcuts.

“You want to be the one to do it the right way and encourage others to do it the right way,” she said. “With all of this new technology and science, you’re right on the cusp of everything changing in the healthcare system. You’re coming in at the right time. Focus on the mission by stepping back and looking at the big picture and always bringing out the patient. What about the patient? How will this impact the patient?”

Other professionalism tips Schweitzer passed along included:

• Giving your full attention and listening to the patients. “Appreciate and understand their personal and cultural point of view. Don’t underestimate the value of common sense and learn how to apply it.”

• Doing more than expected and developing relationships. “We’re partners with the community and will have opportunities to do that. They will expect you to be involved in your community.”

• Building a foundation of knowledge. “You will learn all these topics and be exposed by top-notch faculty to all these different topics. No more will you say ‘I will never use that again.’ There’s not one class that I haven’t had to apply at some point. Learn everything that you can because it will come back.

Remember what the white coat represents, Schweitzer said. “A sense of duty and selflessness in serving the patient. I challenge you to give back and accept the responsibility. I know you will own your talents and skills and knowledge in becoming a respected member of this profession.

The White Coat Ceremony was enabled due to the generosity of:

Innovation; Anonymous; CVS; John Darcy, PhD, Founders Society member; Naima Kradjian, Founders Society member; and Walgreens.