JOHNSON CITY — East Tennessee State University Bill Gatton College of Pharmacy’s student organizations continue to take home honors for their service to patients in the region.

In October at the American Pharmacists Association Academy of Student Pharmacists (APhA-ASP) Midyear Regional Meeting for Region 3 in Atlanta, the college’s APhA-ASP chapter earned two regional awards for patient care activities related to two national patient care projects:

• 2018-2019 Region 3 Award for Generation Rx, an educational program that increases public awareness of prescription medication misuse and encourages health care providers, community leaders, parents, teens and college students to actively work to prevent misuse and development of substance use disorders.

• 2018-2019 Region 3 Award for Operation Diabetes, which seeks to help pharmacists and student pharmacists identify individuals in the community with previously undiagnosed diabetes and those who are at risk for developing the disease.

This is the first time the chapter’s Operation Diabetes committee has been recognized and the seventh consecutive year the chapter’s Generation Rx committee has received either national or regional recognition. For the past six years in a row, Generation Rx has been named No. 1 or No. 2 in the country.

Since 2015, Gatton’s APhA-ASP chapter has served over 21,000 patients and members of the community, as well as over 600 service hours. Megan Ferry (’20) from Denver, N.C., chaired the Generation Rx committee over the course of the 2018-19 awards cycle. The committee gave 23 presentations on prescription medication misuse to over 3,000 individuals. From all of the committee’s events, they educated over 5,000 individuals.

Operation Diabetes was chaired by Payton Tipton (’20) from Kingsport, and conducted 17 events and screened nearly 90 individuals for blood glucose or A1C levels, as well as evaluated over 50 individuals using the American Diabetes Association Risk Assessment.

“Operation Diabetes has done so much outreach around the Tri Cities in community blood glucose monitoring, raising money for the charitable pharmacy to purchase testing supplies and collaborating with the Kingsport Diabetes Association for patient education,” said Miranda Green (’21), of Northport, Ala., vice president of patient care for ETSU APhAASP. “Generation Rx is amazing in the sheer number of outreach events it does throughout the school year. Getting medication education in the minds and naloxone in the hands of anyone we can reach out to is a way of life for this committee. APhA does a great job of mirroring the mission of Gatton College of Pharmacy, to serve the rural and underserved, by pushing student pharmacists to the forefront of hands-on patient care and making a difference.”

APhA-ASP’s Region 3 consists of the southeastern states, including Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and Florida, as well as Puerto Rico. Top chapters are recognized at both the regional and national levels (National Award Winner, National First Runner Up, National Second Runner Up, and Regional Award Winners from each of the eight APhA-ASP regions).