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Pharmacy Residency Podcast


Jul 12, 2018

Clay Sprouse Director of the Piedmont Technical College Program gives us insights into his program and why he comes back to PTEC every couple years. 

Full transcript:

welcome to the pharmacy leaders podcast
with your host Tony Guerra the pharmacy
leaders podcast is a member of the
pharmacy podcast network with interviews
and advice from building your
professional network brand and a
purposeful second income from students
residents and innovative professionals
alright welcome back to the pharmacy
leaders podcast I'm here p-tech 2018 in
Indianapolis Indiana and I have clay
Strauss who is the director of the
pharmacy technician program at Pina
Piedmont Technical College he is a big
South Carolina Gamecocks fan booster and
all that good stuff so we'll have some
interesting conversation there but
welcome to the pharmacy leaders podcast
okay all right well let's get started
and kind of talk about p-tech what makes
you come back every year we met I think
a couple years ago back in Charlotte so
that was a not much of a dry for you but
they made it all the way out to Indy so
what do you come back for every year
well it's once every couple of years but
in order to get the funding and all
those kind of good things but Pete acts
as an organization it fascinates me to
be able to meet I was when I came to the
first PTA
conference I was just absolutely blown
away I've I've gotten to do a lot of
other conferences like a sh yeah yeah I
got to do nice ID which is a Community
College Conference out in Austin Texas
it's got to do a lot of different things
but p-tech just blow them all away from
me because of what we yeah so it's you
know you there's the expression you get
rich in a niche in terms of you know
making sure that you talk to your
audience but in this case we have just
about a hundred and fifty people here
but we all do the exact same thing and
and it was just kind of nice to have
like these are my people the people that
you know I can learn from and work with
and so forth so tell me a little bit
about Piedmont technical
what you guys do over there sure so
Piedmont Technical College is located in
Greenwood South Carolina now most people
have not heard of green again most
people for the Greenville but we are
right smack dab between Greenville and
Columbia so we're in the Upstate South
Carolina we're one of 16 technical
colleges in South Carolina and we serve
the largest land area of any of the
technical colleges we serve seven
counties and we have a ton of different
programs ranging just to anything that
you would a normal Community College
would have Piedmont Tech is just we play
a huge role in the community as far as
training and just education and and I
really enjoy being a part of that family
so tell me a little bit about how you
got started as an educator what were you
doing beforehand and how did you get to
where you are today when I was in
college at the University of South
Carolina I started working for CBS for
some reason I'm not good at a lot of
things but I was kind of good after I
graduated from college and I couldn't
really find work I graduated with a
degree in political science and he was
thinking Columbia something in
government but um anyway CBS gave me
just kept giving me good opportunities
and so I kept working working and
eventually worked my way up and so in
2011 this position came open at Piedmont
Tech in my hometown and that's kind of
just it kind of everything fell into
place at right time sometimes you're
kind of deceptive now since I have come
on board if he might attack out back and
got my masters
in education okay and so something that
just kind of came naturally to me okay
well pharmacy technician educators we do
it for a couple years maybe five ten
years do you have anything that you're
looking forward to maybe an
administrative position maybe a
physician in leadership something like
that
using your political science degree
maybe I don't know that I'll put that
degree but I'm actually running for our
school board okay I'm doing it because I
care about the students in Greenwood
County but um yeah I mean I would like
to be an administrator how would you
like to be an administrative role at
some point you know being 37 38 years
old wherever I am at this point
I think that I probably still have some
room to grow and some room to learn
things but yeah an administrative role
at some point down the road would
probably be my biggest goal okay and
staying in the Piedmont tech family okay
all right so in terms of content
what kind of which ones are you gonna go
to in terms of the sessions what are you
looking for specifically there's some
that are always here each year but what
are you looking for specifically out of
this year to improve your programs well
you know on July 10th CAS HP released
their new standards yeah um so I'm
looking forward to hearing from them
this afternoon I always like to hear
what's going on with the PTC B we know
how important and critical that exam is
to our profession and and then just kind
of hearing I love just hearing other
educators and what they're doing in the
classroom and how they're working to
improve or innovate it's always good to
come here and steal ideas okay and you
were talking actually about a SHP this
summer session what would you be doing
they're up in Boston I think it was for
2019 yeah well I think that sometimes in
those in those environments what I'm
really looking forward to is networking
finding out what direction the
profession in general is going in you
know you know in this p tech bubble
we're on the education part
but a SHP obviously offers you an
insight into how the whole profession is
doing and what direction it's going in
and you know a SHP is very very powerful
on Capitol Hill I love to hear what it's
going on legislatively and I think
ultimately that will affect what
pharmacy technicians yeah provider
status all of a sudden passes all of a
sudden the roles are completely changed
and now the technicians are going to be
asked to do even more in terms of
supporting their roles and things like
that what have you seen in South
Carolina as far as technicians
supporting pharmacists and their
clinical roles well you know South
Carolina is South Carolina is ahead of
the ball as far as technician roles are
concern we've always been advanced in
and what we're looking for in our
technicians we specify state certified
versus just registered okay the ratio
has just recently changed it has
increased whereas now for technicians
can work under a single pharmacist but
two of those four must be state
certified okay so I'm still that state
certification piece is the big piece and
that's what I sell to my students that
this is where you're gonna go in the
profession if you want to be successful
I feel like that we are continuing to to
turn out the best technicians possible
and really I think the key is listening
to our preceptors listening to the
pharmacies in the area and see what they
need okay and I understand Piedmont
Technical put some money into the
program in terms of infrastructure you
got some new things to work with what do
you get working with now so a SHP came
and did their reread addition does it in
January and overall I think we did
pretty good but um you know every every
one can use a little constructive
criticism and then in one of our areas
that we were lacking was our lab not
only from a
from a teaching standpoint but also from
an equipment okay I was a big place
where we were we invested a lot of money
and new equipment we got some new
automated dispensing cabinets we
received a cart a rolling cart that are
also have automated doors
everything's touchscreen so that was the
really big thing there we installed a
drive-through window they know it is
pretty awesome it has an intercom and
people can do they make it staticky so
you can only hear handle situations
maybe bang over glass we are we
installed a film master okay
before that we were manually
reconstituting medications so having a
film master in there we put in an
incubator so that we can start doing on
fingertip testing and things like okay
we have we have a six new simulated IV
boots in addition to the two big ideas
that we already have we added a
refrigerator
we had a new encounter a drop-off
counter with a cash register so did you
get a pharmacy license for this and they
needed you're close to it well we have
to operate either a non drug dispensing
and we have to do inspections and the
board of pharmacies actually will be
coming in December to inspect our
facility and I would imagine they're
gonna be a little frayed but you know
big thing let me just say this in case
anyone in Piemonte ever listens to this
our facility sputters fantastic they
they we gave them the ideas and they ran
with very thankful to the team we have
well I've asked you a bunch of questions
if somebody wanted to get a hold of you
what's the best way for them to get in
touch with you so they can reach me
through my email address which is my
last name Sprouse SP r us e dot c-- at
ptc.edu near my office telephone numbers
eight six four nine four one eight five
two seven they can find me on Facebook
it's hard enough or maybe they can find
my band's name Jackson station there you
go yeah yeah I got a plug the band so
the boys are always playing a little bit
of music so they can they can find me
and I look forward to talking to anyone
in the profession anywhere I'm always
interested in interning here you're such
a major player in this in this thing and
I just well thanks for being in the
pharmacy leaders podcast all right thank
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