SHARKS RX Spring 2016 Magazine

NOVA SOUTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY 14 L arisa Odessky’s postgraduate fellowship is out of this world—literally. Since re- ceiving her Pharm.D. from NSU’s College of Pharmacy in 2014, Odessky has been immersed in a virtual world dedicated to interprofessional collaboration. As a fellow with the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy (AACP), she has been a writer, content developer, and lead researcher with Professions Quest—the company created by the AACP to develop and market its groundbreaking video game, Mimycx. Odessky was graduating and looking for a nontraditional fellowship just as the AACP was launching its effort to create this online educational resource for students from every health care field to help reinforce the core competencies they all share. “I knew that traditional fellowships weren’t for me, and this gives me freedom of creativity,” said Odessky. “The game is designed for all 16 health professions, and everyone can play. It’s not testing clinical knowledge; it’s testing their team- working ability.” Take any of four domains—values and ethics, for exam- ple—and Odessky creates characters and scenarios and puts a team of students in the middle of the story. If play- ers try to navigate the twists and turns of the plot alone, they’ll lose. But once they learn to collaborate—virtually, in this case—they answer questions, solve the mystery, and move to the next level. Alumna Helps Develop CollaborativeVideo Game for the Health Professions By Arnie Rosenberg In the process, they’re validating and reinforcing lessons learned in their classrooms in far-flung corners of the country and around the world. “It’s a Sherlock Holmes type of investigation,” Odessky explained. “You cannot proceed without being an active participant. And the team cannot proceed from one scene to the next without all members completing their task of being collaborative together.” For pharmacy education, Mimycx couldn’t have come along at a better time. Beginning this year, interprofessional collaboration and education become a requirement for pharmacy schools’ accreditation. Odessky’s unconventional fellowship shouldn’t be surprising given her unconventional path to pharmacy school. She came to the United States from Odessa, now Ukraine, at age 11. As she was earning her health sciences degree from Florida International University, she also owned and managed a nail salon. All that helped her land the AACP’s first Professions Quest fellowship. “What Larisa brings to the table is that she had some life experiences,” said Ruth Nemire, Pharm.D., Ed.D., AACP associate executive vice president and Odessky’s fellowship supervisor. “She had the vision that this is what students would want to help health education change, and she could write the stories that could be created into a game. Her willingness to be adaptable and flexible, and embrace every- body in the organization, is what makes her special for us.” Nontraditional FellowshipTouts Teamwork