2017 retreat has special meaning for pharmacy faculty

• By Mark Hendricks
• June 1, 2017

In what has become somewhat of a tradition, faculty members from each of the School of Pharmacy’s four campuses remained in Amarillo following graduation to participate in the school’s annual faculty retreat May 20-21.

As is generally the case, the retreat involved group discussions and exercises related to topics like active learning, curricular transformation and serial assignments as a teaching and learning technique. However, the 2017 retreat also gave faculty members a chance to honor four of their own who have recently retired or will be retiring in the near future. The quartet includes Cynthia Raehl, Pharm.D.; Roland Patry, Dr. PH; Richard Leff, Pharm.D.; and Harold Miller, Ph.D.

Raehl arrived at TTUHSC in 1996 as founding chair for the Department of Pharmacy Practice and served as regional dean for the School of Pharmacy campus in Abilene since July 2013. Prior to coming to TTUHSC, she was a professor for the University of Wisconsin School of Pharmacy in Madison for 16 years.

During her career, Raehl served on the FDA advisory committee for Cardiovascular and Renal Drugs and the United States Pharmacopeia Expert Committee on Cardiovascular and Renal Drugs. She has also served as president for the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy and the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists (ASHP).

Raehl and her late husband, Dr. C.A. Bond, are internationally recognized for health services research focused on the outcomes associated with hospital-affiliated clinical pharmacy services. Their 20-year study of more than 1,000 U.S. hospitals demonstrated the impact clinical pharmacists could have in reducing mortality rates, total cost of care, lengths of stay, drugs costs and medication errors. They are eight-time recipients of an ASHP Research and Education Foundation Research Award.

Patry, also a founding faculty member for the School of Pharmacy, has served as regional dean for the School of Pharmacy campus in Dallas since July 2013. While based in Amarillo, Patry worked with Texas Tech University’s Rawls College of Business to establish the Pharm.D./MBA dual degree program at the School of Pharmacy.

During his career at TTUHSC, Patry was named a University Distinguished Professor in 2015, and in 2005 and 2012, the Texas Society of Health-Systems Pharmacists (TSHP) awarded him a TSHP Research & Education Foundation Research Award.

Leff is a professor for the school’s Department of Pharmacy Practice in Dallas and senior associate dean for the School of Pharmacy’s clinical and translational research. He came to TTUHSC in 2002 as regional dean for the Dallas/Fort Worth campus, a position he held until 2013 when he was named to his current position. In his current role, Leff is responsible for strengthening the clinical research infrastructure among the School of Pharmacy regional campuses and promoting institutional collaborations to facilitate faculty scholarship. He is also the founding director of the Clinical Pharmacology & Experimental Therapeutics Center, a designated Center for Research Excellence at the School of Pharmacy.

Leff is internationally recognized for his experience with drug and medical device development in infants and children. He was awarded the James A. ‘Buddy’ Davidson Endowed Professorship in Pediatric Pharmacology in 2012, and in 2017 he received the Chancellor’s Council Distinguished Faculty Award, the Texas Tech University System’s highest faculty honor.

Miller served as interim chair for the Department of Immunotherapeutics and Biotechnology in Abilene during 2016-2017. During his career at TTUHSC, he also served as an assistant professor for the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences at the Abilene campus.

During his years at the Abilene campus, Miller received numerous teaching awards, including a TTUHSC President’s Award for Interprofessional Teamwork in 2014. In addition, the School of Pharmacy Classes of 2014, 2016 and 2017 selected him to receive their Most Influential Professor Award. The TTUHSC Student Government Association also named Miller an outstanding School of Pharmacy faculty member in 2014; the TTUHSC Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences selected him for the same honor in 2015.