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Advocacy and Service Programs

Practice Experience is Integrated into our Curriculum

The D’Youville School of Pharmacy embraces and lives the “Grey Nun Creed” of never refusing to serve.  It does so through its didactic and experiential curriculum through service, learning, and purposeful clinical rotations.

The Office of Experiential Education coordinates and manages all aspects of experiential education for the School of Pharmacy once students begin their graduate studies. From introductory rotations to advanced experiences with innovative and progressive pharmacy practices, the Office of Experiential Education works with students, preceptors, and faculty to ensure a highly successful learning experience that benefits both its students and their patients.

The Office of Experiential Education places students in rotations in Pharmacies anywhere within the U.S. and Internationally with a focus on service. Some International opportunities include Haiti, Uganda, Ecuador, Turks and Caicos, London, and China.  For more information, please contact Dr. Mario Beccari, Director of Experiential Education at 716-829-8318 or email: beccarim@dyc.edu.

AUSTRALIA (EXCHANGE APPE ROTATION WITH JAMES COOK UNIVERSITY)

In 2016, D'Youville's School of Pharmacy partnered with James Cook University (JCU) to create a student exchange rotation. Located in North Queensland, Australia, JCU offers lush landscapes, abundant wildlife, and modern amenities in a tropical climate.

Each year, D’Youville’s School of Pharmacy sends two, fourth-year students for a six-week elective international rotation and in return, takes two students from the James Cook's Pharmacy Program.

For the first three weeks, students are placed at the Mt Isa Health Service District, an advanced practice rural clinic covering the Australian outback. Students experience a diverse range of health services including community pharmacy, hospital pharmacy, and outreach/remote pharmacy within an indigenous community.

When students return to JCU’s campus in Townsville, Australia’s largest tropical city, they are placed at the Townsville Hospital, a tertiary care hospital, servicing patients from a geographic area that is two and a half times the size of France. This engaging and rewarding experience highlights the international relationships encouraged and fostered at D’Youville.

MEDICAL SERVICE BRIGADE TO ECUADOR (TIMMY GLOBAL HEALTH)

The D’Youville School of Pharmacy Timmy Global Health Chapter was founded in 2012 and has since enabled dozens of students and faculty members to travel to various parts of Ecuador over the course of 10-day trips. These trips include clinical work as well as the opportunity to discover the beauty of their surroundings.

As part of their experience in a Medical Service Brigade, Pharmacy students rotate through various clinic stations such as triage, lab, provider care, and pharmacy consulting. Pharmacy students earn clinical practice credits (IPPE and APPE) for their participation.

The D’Youville Chapter executes the vision and mission of the Timmy Global Health Foundation to help foster a passion for global health and provide students with unique interprofessional service-learning opportunities.

TURKS AND CAICOS (FIELD RESEARCH, MEDICINAL PLANT IDENTIFICATION, AND DISCOVERY APPE)

The TCI (Turks and Caicos) Field Research, Medicinal Plant Identification, and Discovery APPE is designed to expose the Fourth Year Pharmacy student to processes necessary to identify medicinal plants in the field as well as introduce the student to the laboratory methods utilized to identify active ingredients derived from these plants.

The field research component of the APPE is accomplished through a seven to 14-day faculty-led experience on a sparsely populated island in the TCI Archipelago with the assistance of a botanist member of the Department of Environment and Coastal Resources (DECR), TCI. The student is expected to demonstrate the knowledge and ability to identify specific medicinal plants in the field, and communicate the specific activities of these medicinal plants/plant parts, preparation techniques, and active ingredient extraction methods.

The botanist-assisted portion of the field tour exposes the student to differences in plant appearance and methods to visually differentiate the specific medicinal plants from similarly appearing non-medicinal plants. The laboratory component of the APPE is accomplished in the D'Youville School of Pharmacy laboratory where students are exposed to laboratory techniques used to demonstrate specific pharmacologic activity and active ingredient identification.

GUATEMALA (APPE ELECTIVE)

Guatemala is an elective APPE for Fourth Year Pharmacy students. The rotation involves two weeks in Antigua, Guatemala at the Francisco Maroquin Language School, a one-week medical mission in the villages surrounding Quetzelnango (Xela), Guatemala with the Timmy Global Health Organization, and three weeks in Quetzelnango (Xela), Guatemala at the Pop Wuj Language School/Clinic learning medical Spanish.

Prerequisite: PMD 898 Spanish for Pharmacy Practitioners offered in the Spring Semester.

Service Learning in Student Organizations

Giving back to the community is part of the D'Youville University way of life. The D’Youville School of Pharmacy's mission emphasizes social responsibility and contributing to the health and well being well-being of the community through advocacy and service.

The School of Pharmacy's students and faculty are involved in a variety of service programs to improve the lives and people at home and across the globe including participation in fundraising walks to support research and programs for breast cancer, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, diabetes, and asthma.

APHA-ASP & GENERATION RX

Starting in their first year of the professional program (P1), all pharmacy students join the Student Chapter of the American Pharmacists Association Academy of Student Pharmacists (APhA-ASP).

Generation Rx is an educational program that increases public awareness of the dangers of misusing prescription medications. As part of its Generation Rx initiative, D'Youville student pharmacists have visited middle and high schools and made presentations to teens and adults. Members of the chapter have also participated in prescription drug "take-back" days at sites across Western New York.

In 2012, D'Youville’s APhA-ASP chapter was awarded first place for their Generation Rx project, placing first among 55 entries at the 2012 APhA Annual Meeting and Exposition.

OTHER COMMUNITY OUTREACH PROJECTS

D'Youville Pharmacy students take part in community outreach projects throughout Western New York to educate grade school students about asthma, adults and children about poisonings and poisonous plants, middle and high school students about the hazards of prescription drug abuse, and minority students about careers in Pharmacy.

DRUG TAKE BACK DRIVES

Drug Take Back Drives bring in thousands of pounds of pills, capsules, and tablets that otherwise might wind up in landfills, waterways, or most worrisome of all, the wrong hands. D'Youville pharmacy students, at all levels, help in these collection events.

HEARTBURN AWARENESS

At the National Buffalo Chicken Wing Festival, D'Youville Pharmacy students have set up a table and offered presentations to help the public recognize, treat, and control heartburn.

HEALTHY BUFFALO

Healthy Buffalo focuses on providing blood pressure and glucose tests to the community at Western New York events and community centers including the Elmwood Bidwell Farmers’ Market and West Side Community Services.

MEDICINAL GARDENS EXHIBIT AT BUFFALO BOTANICAL GARDENS

In 2011, D’Youville’s School of Pharmacy created a Medicinal Garden Exhibit in conjunction with Mercy Hospital at the Buffalo & Erie County Botanical Gardens. The exhibit featured several plants used in medicine and educated the public about the value of these plants in the medical field.