Achtung: APhA-ASP Student Members

[Sparda29]

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For you guys in APhA-ASP at an established program, I have a question. Does your school participate in Operation Heart/Operation Diabetes,etc?

Being that we just opened up our chapter here at Touro NY, and we have nothing happening ATM, I wanna spearhead one of these programs but I have no idea where/how to start (already looked at the APhA website, found some materials and whatnot to use at the events).

What I'm trying to figure out if these are merely programs that work in a "Health Fair" setting once a month or so, or if I can integrate these programs into the IPPEs/APPEs getting my old preceptors, doctors I worked with, etc involved?

So for example if I wanna spearhead Operation Diabetes. After getting through all the paperwork and whatnot, I contact my preceptors at North Shore Hospital, CVS Pharmacy, NYC Department of Health, etc and set up a program where basically every student that goes to that site also participates in that program, collecting data and whatnot?

 

[bacillus1]

It really is what you want it to be. Our Operation Heart won an award this year because we're in the process of establishing a smoking cessation program on campus. We participate in all the "operations", except project CHANCE. For diabetes, we used to do a lot of screenings, not sure if we do any now. I believe the license for students to test blood glucose is super-expensive. For immunization, we helped out with the H1N1 clinic on campus last year. We also promote travel vaccines and whatnot. Mostly it really is a bunch of screenings and information sessions. We participate in a lot of health fairs. If you work something into an IPPE program, that would be cool I think.

 

[Sparda29]

It really is what you want it to be. Our Operation Heart won an award this year because we're in the process of establishing a smoking cessation program on campus. We participate in all the "operations", except project CHANCE. For diabetes, we used to do a lot of screenings, not sure if we do any now. I believe the license for students to test blood glucose is super-expensive. For immunization, we helped out with the H1N1 clinic on campus last year. We also promote travel vaccines and whatnot. Mostly it really is a bunch of screenings and information sessions. We participate in a lot of health fairs. If you work something into an IPPE program, that would be cool I think.

Yeah, basically like for the diabetes thing for example. I'd get in contact with my preceptor at the hospital I did my internal med rotation at, as well as the attending physician I rounded with and set-up a program for newly diagnosed diabetes patients as well as those who come in for exacerbations/complications. And basically each student who goes to that site for the month would be working on this as well as the normal stuff.

 

[bacillus1]

Yeah, basically like for the diabetes thing for example. I'd get in contact with my preceptor at the hospital I did my internal med rotation at, as well as the attending physician I rounded with and set-up a program for newly diagnosed diabetes patients as well as those who come in for exacerbations/complications. And basically each student who goes to that site for the month would be working on this as well as the normal stuff.

The sole problem I see with this is that you don't involve too many students while doing this. If you set up a diabetes project at a rotation site, that's 1 student doing this for every 5 weeks or however long the rotation site takes. That's less than 10 students participating per year. You should really try to have events that maximize student participation. Maybe set up a longitudinal diabetes clinic where students could volunteer at? I know this is easier said than done, but if you claim that you can set up stuff on rotations, maybe you could pull that off.

I mean if you have the rotation site, that's good too, as long as you have more projects that involve more students.

 

[Sparda29]

The sole problem I see with this is that you don't involve too many students while doing this. If you set up a diabetes project at a rotation site, that's 1 student doing this for every 5 weeks or however long the rotation site takes. That's less than 10 students participating per year. You should really try to have events that maximize student participation. Maybe set up a longitudinal diabetes clinic where students could volunteer at? I know this is easier said than done, but if you claim that you can set up stuff on rotations, maybe you could pull that off.

I mean if you have the rotation site, that's good too, as long as you have more projects that involve more students.

We have 2 students at each rotation site for APPEs usually. Putting it at a rotation site would have the advantage of long term clinical viability (whatever that means, rofl). And with clinical data and whatnot, some of these programs can be used as means of setting up each student's Capstone project in their P4 year.

 

[Farmercyst]

For us we have several things going on at any given time. Our ASP coordinates the materials and reporting, but the projects are primarily spear-headed by the other campus organizations. A fraternity does cholesterol screenings, another does immunizations, NCPA runs the body fat analysis, AMCP does the asthma awareness, we have two cultural organizations that setup large healthfairs (500+participants) each year. The ASP is in charge of cancer awareness, heartburn awareness, and a few other projects. But the distribution of organizing each of these booths really helps the logistics. Each group has a representative on the ASP board to report back to the sponsoring organization. It's really quite efficient.

 

[Sparda29]

For us we have several things going on at any given time. Our ASP coordinates the materials and reporting, but the projects are primarily spear-headed by the other campus organizations. A fraternity does cholesterol screenings, another does immunizations, NCPA runs the body fat analysis, AMCP does the asthma awareness, we have two cultural organizations that setup large healthfairs (500+participants) each year. The ASP is in charge of cancer awareness, heartburn awareness, and a few other projects. But the distribution of organizing each of these booths really helps the logistics. Each group has a representative on the ASP board to report back to the sponsoring organization. It's really quite efficient.

Is it possible for one person to run all the projects like Operation Diabetes/Heart/Immunization? Or when I bring it up at the next meeting, should I let people know that I'm looking for people to head up each project?

 

[bacillus1]

Is it possible for one person to run all the projects like Operation Diabetes/Heart/Immunization? Or when I bring it up at the next meeting, should I let people know that I'm looking for people to head up each project?

Look for people to head each project. Does your chapter have a board? If so, have each project coordinator be on board. You'll go crazy if you head all of them.

 

[Sparda29]

Look for people to head each project. Does your chapter have a board? If so, have each project coordinator be on board. You'll go crazy if you head all of them.

Yeah, I was looking on UMaryland's website and it looks like they have different chairs for each project.

I'll bring it up at the 1st meeting, which is next week. I'm not an officer though. So like, I'm thinking about heading either the Diabetes or Immunization project. And I'd have to find people who'd be interested in doing the same for the other projects.

 

[UES Girl]

Yes we do, we have over 11 projects I believe so. I lead one of them, it's Women's health but it's reminiscent of project heart that other schools have since we focus mainly on heart disease - annually we throw the Red Dress fashion show to raise thousands for charitable causes including american heart association.

I'll update you if you wish later, operation diabetes is one of the most popular and lively projects we have, of course not as awesome as mine.

 

[UES Girl]

Is it possible for one person to run all the projects like Operation Diabetes/Heart/Immunization? Or when I bring it up at the next meeting, should I let people know that I'm looking for people to head up each project?

Depends on what you want to do and time comittment per week: in our school we go with quality over quantity. For example:

one project would attend let's say on average 3 health fairs per quarters - imagine going to 2 different health fairs for 8 hours if you lead different projects, obviously that's not possible right ? Plus, there is a TON of paperwork you have to fill out, pre and post event forms, tallying up attendance, reports, articles to the student newspaper and etc and etc.

So on top of that you have frequent meetings - about 1-3 hrs per week, meetings with your project preceptors, fundraisers you are planning, this kind of thing adds up. We calculated our time comittment for our project and at some point in time this winter it was like 15-20 hrs per week. And there were 3 of us ! So obviously one person leading several projects would be impossible.

In our school we typically have 3-4 people leading 1 project, time comittment ends up being per person 3-5 hrs per week on average.

 

[Sparda29]

Depends on what you want to do and time comittment per week: in our school we go with quality over quantity. For example:

one project would attend let's say on average 3 health fairs per quarters - imagine going to 2 different health fairs for 8 hours if you lead different projects, obviously that's not possible right ? Plus, there is a TON of paperwork you have to fill out, pre and post event forms, tallying up attendance, reports, articles to the student newspaper and etc and etc.

So on top of that you have frequent meetings - about 1-3 hrs per week, meetings with your project preceptors, fundraisers you are planning, this kind of thing adds up. We calculated our time comittment for our project and at some point in time this winter it was like 15-20 hrs per week. And there were 3 of us ! So obviously one person leading several projects would be impossible.

In our school we typically have 3-4 people leading 1 project, time comittment ends up being per person 3-5 hrs per week on average.

Based on that info, it's gonna be hard to even run one of them since I'm on rotations. I'm gonna have 3 months off this summer other than an elective (for the first time in 7 years), so I should be able to get a lot of the framework done.

 

[UES Girl]

Based on that info, it's gonna be hard to even run one of them since I'm on rotations. I'm gonna have 3 months off this summer other than an elective (for the first time in 7 years), so I should be able to get a lot of the framework done.

Yep, thats why at our school only second years run them, third and fourth year students dont because of rotations. You can get a lot done during the summer though so good luck, make posters for the projects so you can have something to attend health fairs with, get free educational materials from local non propfit orgs like pamphlets, handouts to raise awareness, maybe if your project is a screening project school will allow you to use some sort of screening equipment, like bone density machines to measure osteoporosis risk or do blood pressure screenings, whenever our screening projects do that at health fairs - there is akways a line of 40-50 people waiting to get their free bp check for example. Seniors love these type of things.

 

[Sparda29]

Yep, thats why at our school only second years run them, third and fourth year students dont because of rotations. You can get a lot done during the summer though so good luck, make posters for the projects so you can have something to attend health fairs with, get free educational materials from local non propfit orgs like pamphlets, handouts to raise awareness, maybe if your project is a screening project school will allow you to use some sort of screening equipment, like bone density machines to measure osteoporosis risk or do blood pressure screenings, whenever our screening projects do that at health fairs - there is akways a line of 40-50 people waiting to get their free bp check for example. Seniors love these type of things.

I have to do something anyway to improve the CV. That's why I would like to integrate rotations into this, because then you can do some of this stuff at the rotation sites and possibly get more financial help with supplies and whatnot.

 

[rxlea]

Our school is doing a bunch of stuff for generationRx, heart health and diabetes. There is a chair for each category though. We don't currently have an immunization one because we just got the law passed but I am sure we will have one next year.