The 2014 UPhA Annual Convention & Expo recently concluded and if you missed this 122nd annual event, you missed great education, exhibitors, entertainment and networking opportunities. This year brought our most education offering ever from the annual meeting with fifteen hours of continuing education with topics ranging from legislative updates from the 2014 Legislative Session, COPD, MTM, Customer Service, Diabetes, Prescription Synchronization and much more.

Our event kick off was Thursday March 27th with our annual golf event. The day was beautiful and the sun was shining at Sunbrook Golf Course. The course provided 18 holes of Championship Golf and this year we were able to knock the price down under a $100 a player. We hope to continue this in the future and get more golfers out each year. Prizes were provided for both low scores and high score, so if your not golfer know that its about having a great time with your pharmacy colleagues.

Education began on Thursday afternoon with our COPD update from Dr David Young. We appreciate Dr Young taking the time out of his busy schedule to come and participate and share his expertise on this subject. The day’s education continued with education from DOPL and the Controlled Substance Database from Tom Harper. New legislation this year will allow for Technicians to have access to the database. This was a great refresher for those familiar with the system and for those that are new to the database system, Tom was able to show just how easy it is to use the system and use it right.

The Annual Awards dinner was our signature event for Thursday with a great networking dinner and the awarding of this year’s Annual Bowl of Hygeia award winner. This year’s recipient was Brent Olsen from Harmon’s. Brent has been in the profession for over 35 years and his expertise and service are two big contributing factors to receiving this year’s Bowl of Hygeia Award. Congratulations again Brent on this fantastic accomplishment and welcome to the family of Bowl of Hygeia winners. The Annual Awards Dinner concluded with the induction of our 2014-2015 Board of Trustees. Returning board members this year included Shane Jensen and Larry Fannin and our newest board member, Beth Young. For a list of all our current Board Members, visit the UPhA website at www.UPhA.com.

Friday was our biggest day of education with seven and a half hours of education available. We kicked off Friday and Saturday with our legislative sessions with discussion from Wayne Jones, our government relations officer, on the results and effects of the 2014 Legislative Session which concluded just last month. Michael Wright provided a great session on Customer Service in your pharmacy, that we hope everyone was able to gain some valuable insight and ideas for their own pharmacy. Also Thursday morning was our Townhall Meeting conducted by our new President, Greg Myers and Past President Paige Patterick. This session included discussion of how the Utah Pharmacy Association can better serve the profession, Star Ratings and how they could impact community pharmacy, provider status and the effects locally and nationally, as well as how pharmacist can increase involvement in Medical Homes. Most importantly was discussion about how you can become more involved in the profession of pharmacy through the association. The afternoon sessions included Compounding Updates from Dean Jolley, a member of the Utah Compounding Task Force and a great session on being an effective Pharmacy Technician from Roger Fitzpatrick.

We were joined by Representative Brad Last at our Friday lunch as we presented Representative Last with our Advocate of the Year Award. Representative Last was instrumental in helping the Association with our PBM bill this year. The new bill gives new reporting requirements to PBM’s for MAC pricing. We are excited about this first step we have been able to take on this very important issue.

The day ended with our Keynote Speaker, DJ Herrington and his spectacular “I-Can” attitude and concluded with our Wholesalers Dinner and entertainment. This year’s event was proudly sponsored by AmeriSource Bergen, Cardinal Health, and McKesson. Thank you so much to these sponsors that contribute so much to the success of the Association each year. Our entertainment this year was local country music star, Eric Dodge. His performance ended the night on a event high, making sure everyone went away refreshed and excited for our final day of the convention.

Saturday was our concluding day with four and a half hours of education. We were excited for the return of the OTC Jeopardy Challenge, where the students from Roseman University came away with their first ever OTC Challenge victory. Other education from the day included a Compliance Update from former DOPL investigator Jacob Corsi. The session provided great insight as to the role of DOPL, and many of the issues that are seen as hot buttons with DOPL each year.

Thank you again for all those that came out and supported the event this year. We continue to build the event into a top-notch education event for all pharmacists and technicians in the state of Utah. Assessments of the education were emailed out to all attendees following the event. If you haven’t take the time to complete your assessments yet, please do so in the next 30 days. We will be submitting them to the ACPE and NABP and want to be sure your education credit has been properly credited to your account. If you have any questions regarding education credits, please give us a call at 801.566.5620 or email us at upha@upha.com. Your feedback and assessment is crucial to our continued success and your continued success.