KCHP members, colleagues, and friends,

Happy holiday season! I hope this letter finds you well! In the spirit of Thanksgiving and gratitude, I’m reminded how grateful I am to be a part of this profession, this organization, and most of all for you! If you’re reading this, my guess is you’re engaged and contributing to the mission and vision of KCHP. Thank you!

One very successful undertaking this year was changing our executive management company to KAOM (Kansas Association of Osteopathic Medicine). This transition could not have been possible without the work of many KCHP members and leaders. We are truly grateful for the time and effort put forward! There are some more exciting changes on the horizon for the new year so stay tuned!

In addition to the above, I wanted to share with you some of the great things our board of directors has been working on this year!

Advocacy – We have been collaborating with the Kansas Hospital Association (KHA) on issues such as whitebagging, 340B, drug shortages, and opioid use disorder. We’ve signed onto letters to state legislatures and congress that we feel advocate for what is best for our patients and our profession.

Organization – We worked to make the transition to KAOM and get them up to speed. We made difficult decisions such as dissolving KPRC and deciding to host our 2024 annual spring meeting independently this year instead of jointly with MSHP. These decisions were multifactorial and made in the best interest of KCHP at this time. We’ve been excited to bring back the Technician Spotlight in an effort to grow technician membership and recognize their importance. We partnered with GKCSHP for our annual Resident Research Day and Welcome Event, held a Residency Club with KU students, and have grown our pharmacy mentorship program Kannected. We collaborated with KU School of Pharmacy and KPHA on a project to help promote the advancement of pharmacy practice. There will be more to come on this.

Members – We have a newly formed Membership Relations Workgroup to try and improve our connection and communication to members. We want to provide the value you wish to see as a member! We voted to make a small but meaningful bylaw change to be more inclusive of pharmacy technician members and their voting rights. We continue to build our committees and sections (Rural Health, Ambulatory Care) and plan on working toward more opportunities for new practitioners.

Much of our focus now is on our upcoming programs, which look to be amazing! Visit our events page of our website. This is a great way to get involved and share your passion and expertise by presenting a poster or platform presentation. We are planning some fun new events at our annual spring meeting – think puppies and selfie-stations.

In closing, thank you again for this opportunity to serve you! I and the dedicated volunteer board are committed to making KCHP an organization that serves you, promotes public health and pharmacy, and serves our patients. I encourage you to get involved and to let me or anyone on the board know what we can do to meet your needs and expectations!

Sincerely,

Katie Wilson

Katie Wilson, PharmD, BCACP

KCHP President