Peter A. Kreckel, BSPharm

New Year’s Day is a just one of 365 days on the calendar, but I think most of us look forward to getting the previous year behind us and to begin anew.

My most memorable New Year’s Eve was 1980. At my instruction, Denise sat in her Dad’s rocking chair. I got down on one knee, opened a small box and asked “Denise Marie Kubitsky, will you marry me?” 

The next day began 1981, the year we graduated pharmacy school, got married on July 4, and changed jobs a couple times. By November we had embarked on a 25-year career in independent community pharmacy, working for an eight-store chain near Altoona, PA. Never did I imagine the impact that Dec. 31, 1980, would have on most of my life.

On New Year’s Eve 1997, we made plans to join three families to ring in the New Year in a cabin at a local state park. We went to Headache Hill for an afternoon of sled riding. We loaded up our new toboggan and shoved off. We flew down the hill. Unfortunately we hit a ditch, and everyone flew off the sled. My 10-year-old son landed on my left tibia and I heard a loud snap. I lay there in the snow, and they loaded all 300 pounds of me onto a pickup truck and hauled me down to an ambulance waiting on the road. I arrived at the hospital around 4 p.m. Dr. Charles Harvey, the orthopedic surgeon came to the ER dressed in a tuxedo, ready for a wonderful evening. He looked at my X-ray and told the nurse, “Call my wife. I’ll be in surgery tonight.”  I’ll never forget this man sacrificing an elegant evening with his wife to tend to my needs.

I was off work for six months and worked on weight reduction and physical therapy. Denise went back to work full-time to help cover my schedule. The people in my community sent dinner so often, we never turned on the stove for six weeks. I lost 80 pounds, and my patients thought I had cancer. New Year’s Eve 1997 was a life-changer.

As a patient, I saw the difference compassion can make; the caring attitude of my orthopedic surgeon, nurses, physical therapists, occupational therapists and of course my family, got me through this most difficult year.

It also taught me a life lesson on how just a kind word, a pleasant smile, or making an enormous sacrifice as my orthopedic surgeon did, can make such a difference in a patient’s life.

There are a lot of resolutions that we make at the end of a calendar year. I promote this flip of the calendar to all my patients in the clinic as an opportunity to set a “quit date” to stop smoking. What better day to commit to a life-changing practice than to quit smoking? 

Virtually every year my resolution is to lose weight. The average American gains at least six pounds over the holiday. What better way to end “eating season” than to commit oneself to a healthier lifestyle?

My hope for 2019 is that changes be made in this profession. Like a broken tibia, it might be painful at first, but the long-term rewards will be of great benefit. I’d like to see employers provide more staff and tools so we foot soldiers can do our job with a lot less stress. I’d like to see the PBMs go away and reroute some of their extreme profits into the cash registers of the pharmacies that do all the work.

My biggest hope is for me and you to be able to enjoy this amazing profession, all along providing our patients with the care they so desperately need and deserve.

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One of our columnists recounts his major New Years moments and offers 2019 hopes for the pharmacy profession. 

A Pharmacist's New Year's Resolutions

We all have that uncle, the one who most consider the “black sheep” of the family. Back when I was a teenager, my parents loaded us teen-aged kids into the 1969 Ford Galaxie 500 to visit my uncle in his rundown apartment, about an hour away from our home. We walked into his place and there he sat on a case of beer, with his artificial leg sitting in the corner. His wife was stirring a pot of soup on the stove, and his kids were running around the house.

He said to my Dad, “You know our brothers-the pipefitter always shows us his big union paycheck, the other brags about his boat at the lake-well, I’ve got it pretty good, too. I have all this, and my kids like me.” It struck me as kind of strange that he was perfectly content, even though he had so little com- pared to all of us.

This Thanksgiving I’ll be sitting down with my family at my daughter Elizabeth’s house. In attendance will be four pharmacists: my wife Denise who works at an underserved clinic in State College, PA; my other daughter Gretchen and her husband Mark, who are assistant professors at West Virginia University School of Pharmacy; and me.

Elizabeth is a bilingual middle school teacher who teaches English as a second language. She works with displaced kids from Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, and Cuba. Her language skills allow her to communicate with parents who bring their kids here for a shot at a better life. The parents are relieved when Miss Kreckel can communicate with them at parent-teacher conferences. 

My son Phil will also be joining us for Thanksgiving. He is a data scientist at a major bank where he develops algorithms to prevent check fraud.

So, with a teacher, a data scientist, and four pharmacists, what will the conversation be like?

Certainly, we can’t discuss the benefits of tenofovir alafenamide versus tenofovir disoproxil fumarate!

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Like every other family gathered that day we will discuss our family and friends, which for my family, includes sharing cute stories about our grandchildren. I’m sure I’ll be reminiscing about the Thanksgivings at my home as a kid. Like my Grandpa Joe, I seem to be the story teller. I’m sure I’ll talk about how my Dad worked every Thanksgiving because he got paid “time plus time and one-half,” and would never miss an opportunity to work 8 hours and get paid for 20. I’ve never worked a Thanksgiving in my career; my Dad never had a Thanksgiving off.

One might think pharmacy conversation will dominate the dinner. Whenever pharmacists gather, there is usually a sprinkle of negativity, often with good reason- understaffing, DIR fees, audits, regulations, gag clauses, and PBMs. I often attend meetings and hear frequently the negative discussions with respect to our profession, some with good reason indeed. 

But this Thanksgiving, let’s try to keep things in perspective. Most of us as individuals make at least twice the average household medium income of $61,372.

When I drive to my daughter’s house about three hours away to spend this day of thanks, I’ll be thinking how blessed I am to be a pharmacist, how every day I get to help a lot of people who are indeed thankful for all that I can provide them. Whether it is a hug for a widow who just lost her spouse or providing a Narcan kit to hopefully prevent the death of a loved one. Most of our patients are indeed very grateful for our efforts.

Most importantly, I’ll look around the crammed table at my three kids, two in-laws, three beautiful grand- children, and a wonderful wife, and I’ll think of my uncle’s wise words: “I have all this, and my kids like me!”

How one Pharmacist's Thanksgiving reflections have reinvigorated his sense of purpose. 

Author | Peter A. Kreckel, BSPharm

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