Jessica Pyhtila

Jessica’s Story

Dr. Pyhtila received her Pharm.D. from the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy (Geriatric and Palliative Care Pathway) in 2014, and completed a PGY1 Pharmacy Practice Residency at the VA Maryland Health Care System in 2015. She became a Board Certified Geriatric Pharmacist (CGP) in July 2015 and is currently completing a PGY2 Ambulatory Care Residency at the VA Maryland Health Care System. At the national level, Dr. Pyhtila is a member of ASHP’s Section of Ambulatory Care Practitioners’ Advisory Group on Medication Therapy Management in the Community. At the local level, she is a member of the Publications Committee for the Maryland Society of Health-System Pharmacists.

Significant Projects

Dr. Pyhtila is currently involved in a service implementation project to facilitate optimal medication/nutrient prescribing in status-post bariatric surgery patients. She is also involved in a project to evaluate interdisciplinary trainee pre- and post-training knowledge, skills, and attitudes on teamwork in an interprofessional dementia clinic.

Advice for Someone New to Specialty Area

“I would advise the person to try to become involved in as many clinically relevant projects as possible - they are great learning experiences, and help to improve patient care.”

Involvement in ASHP

“I became involved to help promote clinical pharmacy practice, and to make sure I remained involved with organizations during my residency.”

ASHP's Value to Members

“ASHP provides multiple opportunities to be involved in the support of clinical pharmacy practice at both the local and national level. In addition, ASHP provides many opportunities for continuing education credits and board exam review. It is by far the organization I believe I get the most value from!”

“ASHP is valuable for the profession of pharmacy because of the emphasis on promoting and coordinating clinical pharmacy practice at the national level.”