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To help support education and awareness of community drug disposal programs, non-profit organizations...are invited to apply for grant funding from the Cardinal Health Foundation...The Generation Rx Medication Disposal Grant Program helps support our communities...The grant program is intended to reduce the misuse of prescription medications through properly disposing of expired or unused medications by supporting new or existing initiatives that seek to:

• Increase awareness of the disposal program and increase participation of community members in the program;
• Increase awareness of how to prevent prescription medication misuse, and the importance of disposing of unused/expired medications in preventing misuse; and
• Involve both youth and pharmacists or student pharmacists in the disposal program.

Interested applicants can find complete grant program criteria, as well as apply for grant funding on the Generation Rx page. The deadline for applications is Jan. 22, 2016

Partners represent more than 38,000 pharmacies across the country...Department of Health & Human Services announced that it is partnering with pharmacies across the United States in an effort to sign up more individuals for ObamaCare health coverage for 2016 as the deadline fast approaches...Participating pharmacies, including CVS Health, Good Neighbor Pharmacy, Thrifty White, Rite Aid, and Walgreens, will make people aware of health insurance options through the online health insurance marketplace...Participating pharmacies will have trained enrollment personnel available to work directly with consumers in the stores. Pharmacies will also host local enrollment events and distribute educational resources about their health insurance options through the online marketplace...

…the question of whether students should obtain a bachelor’s degree as a prerequisite to pharmacy school…Kristopher Harrell, PharmD, from the University of Mississippi School of Pharmacy argues that it would be beneficial…now is not the time for us to reduce pre-professional requirements, but instead to augment them…4 reasons for this:

1. Earning a bachelor’s degree is predictive of academic success in pharmacy school.
2. The change would allow pharmacy students to be held to the same standards as other health care professions.
3. The move would allow for new standards in pharmacy education related to enhanced personal and professional development skills.
4. There would be more uniformity, which would mean less competition for admissions.

Despite all these reasons for requiring a bachelor’s degree, Dr. Harrell did recognize that “academic fatigue” and tuition costs were areas of concern for students…“Our profession needs more grit, and we need to strengthen and maintain a reputation of training that aligns with other health care professions,”…

...I discovered, it was also unlikely I'd learn something particularly useful, or "actionable," as geneticists describe it, a dominant mutation that would predispose me to a treatable cancer or heart disease, for example...I learned, because we're still very much in the early days of interpreting our own genetic information...There is a great deal of debate about whether this is worth sequencing...because it hasn't been proven that you can change something and change their outcome…Our understanding of all the implications of our genetics hasn't caught up yet to the power of sequencing technology...I only had one result under "clinically significant findings" in the report...I carry one copy of a mutation called Factor V Leiden...your blood actually clots a little bit faster than people who do not have this mutation...my results included a pharmacogenomics report analyzing how my genes indicate I may react to 12 different drugs, from blood thinners like warfarin and Plavix to the cholesterol-lowering medication Zocor...Many believe this will be among the nearest-term applications of genome sequencing in medicine, using our genetic signatures to improve how we match the right drugs to the right patients...within eight to 10 years, it will be routine for healthy people to have their genome sequenced, and for that information to be a regular part of every medical encounter. Between now and then, costs are expected to continue to come down, reimbursement by insurers is expected to gain more clarity, and more proof is expected about how useful personal genome sequencing can be…For most of us, genes aren't our destiny. They're a blueprint for how we start out, and then life plays a major role.

A new study examined the economic value of a pharmacy education and career, and the results were promising for students pursuing pharmacy...They found that pharmacy students earn $5.66 million to $6.29 million over their careers. This is about 3.15 times more than high school graduates, and around 1.6 times more than students who just receive a bachelor’s degree in biology or chemistry...“[N]et career earnings is only one factor to consider when selecting an occupation, or even when selecting a specific practice setting within pharmacy,” the researchers stated. “Thus, selecting a career path should be driven by one’s passion, skill sets, competencies, and recognition of what choice will result in general life and work satisfaction.”...The Pharmacist Aggregate Demand Index also suggests a favorable future for new pharmacists...“Nevertheless, the findings demonstrate investment in a pharmacy education yields favorable financial return,” the study authors concluded.

Victor Hurtado, 21, of Albuquerque, N.M., was sentenced...in federal court to 141 months in federal prison for his conviction...arising out of a pharmacy robbery...Hurtado will be on supervised release for five years after completing his prison sentence...The indictment...alleged...

• violated the Hobbs Act by interfering with interstate commerce by robbery and violence;
• brandished a firearm during a crime of violence;
• violated the Controlled Substance Registrant Act by robbery involving controlled substance;
• violated the Safe Doses Act by theft of medical products; and
• possessed Oxycodone with intent to distribute.

The charges...arose from...armed robbery of the Smith’s Pharmacy...Albuquerque...Hurtado...jumped over the counter while brandishing a firearm, and ordered the pharmacist to open the safe where controlled substances were kept...admitted pointing the firearm at the pharmacy employees to gain their compliance, and stealing bottles of Oxycodone and other drugs from the pharmacy’s inventory.

The female shooter in the San Bernardino killings held a pharmacy degree from Pakistan, but wasn’t practicing in the United States at the time of the terrorist attack…Before coming to America, Tashfeen Malik studied pharmacy at Bahauddin Zakariya University in Multan, southern Punjab, her uncle told The Wall Street Journal. However, she didn’t appear to be working as a pharmacist in the United States, and the California State Board of Pharmacy said she isn’t licensed as a pharmacist in the state.

The FDA is warning compounders to be on the alert for batches of baclofen APIs manufactured at the Taizhou Xinyou Pharmaceutical and Chemical plant in China because of the risk of contamination with particulates...The FDA MedWatch alert said the products shouldn't be used to compound sterile injectable drugs and asks that health professionals in the fields of anesthesiology, pain management, neurology and pharmacy to be on the alert for any such batches made at the plant based in Taishou City, Zhejiang Province...last month, it was reported the FDA cited a Pfizer plant in China while U.K. regulators recently found shortcomings at a GlaxoSmithKline plant there. About 40 facilities in China are currently on the regulatory agency's import ban list.

Over the past seven years, Celgene has emerged as one of the most active and creative deal-makers in the biopharma industry...The Boston Consulting Group’s Biopharma Partnering Survey and Benchmarking analysis examines BD activity and perceptions across the industry...Celgene scored as the best partner on 78% of the partnering and culture metrics (7/9), as perceived by the sell-side biotechs...here are the “seven habits”, or more aptly just attributes, of Celgene’s...successful external R&D strategy, spanning their...leadership context and...culture:

1. Exhibiting more David, less Goliath.
2. Starting with a clean sheet of paper.
3. Embracing risk, empowerment, and trust.
4. Governing with unconventional out-of-the-box leadership.
5. Inverting and resizing the talent model.
6. Learning at every opportunity.
7. Living better through (personal) chemistry.

Liz Tiefenthaler, president of Pharm Fresh Media, talks about some ways a pharmacy can differentiate itself from its competition.