Sharks RX Spring 2015 Magazine

COLLEGE OF PHARMACY r 5 ehul Patel was born and raised in Limbe, Malawi, a small country in central Africa. When he was 18, he moved to South Africa to complete his bachelor’s degree in pharmacy at the NelsonMandelaMetropolitan University in Port Elizabeth, South Africa. This year, Patel, who has been a member of the Dean’s Ambassador Program for two years, will join 220 graduates as part of NSU’s College of Pharmacy 2015 Pharm.D. graduating class. He and his colleagues will enter an entirely different era as practitioners than when NSU’s College of Pharmacy (COP) admitted its first class in 1987. The pharmacist’s role has evolved during the past decade “from a profession that dispenses pharmaceutical products to one that helps patients make the best use of medications,” according to a statement from the American Society of Health-SystemPharmacists (ASHP). “Research demonstrates that the inclusion of a pharmacist on a patient care team reduces medication-related errors, decreases overall health care costs, and improves the quality of care a patient receives,” stated the society in one of its Issue Papers. For Patel, who comes from a family of doc- tors, entering the medical profession was a “must” because of his background. Pharmacy satisfied his desire for a career that involved m