FOR SOMEONE WHO DOESN’T KNOW YOU, HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE YOUR ROLE AND CONTRIBUTION TO HEALTH?

My role and contribution is really to be an innovator. To lead transformational change. To help people think differently about health care. To help people think differently about the role of pharmacy. We really haven’t undergone the type of disruption I think we should have over the past twenty or thirty years and I think we’re here to make that happen. I want to be a key component of making sure that does happen.

WHAT CHALLENGES HAVE YOU FACED ON THE ROAD TO YOUR PRESENT CAREER?

A lack of vision and adoption by an entire health care system, by policy makers, by an enormous amount of people that don’t intuitively understand the true role of what pharmacy is about. Our role really never was to put a pill in a bottle. Our role is to know what the pill in the bottle will do when it gets into your body and to really optimize that and make sure that we are giving you the right medication. Making sure that all these constituent groups really begin to hone in on what the new role of pharmacy will be and that’s an uphill battle. I’m very ready for that battle.

WHAT ADVICE WOULD YOU GIVE TO A YOUNG PHARMACY STUDENT OR YOUR YOUNGER SELF?

Be visionary. Be bold. Be collaborative. Just really strive to create true, patient-centered care. We talk about the term, “patient-centered care,” but that really does mean putting the patient in the center and having everybody join hands around the patient. We have to be a little bit more bold in our approach to become the medication expert on that team and make sure that everybody is achieving the health outcome that’s best for that patient or for an entire community.

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Perspectives: Erol Belli, MD

Cardiothoracic Surgeon, USF Health

 

Obtaining the title of a Cardiothoracic Surgeon brought me more joy than anything. I really enjoy my job and working with patients."

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