Kent Bridgeman

Kent's Story

Dr. Bridgeman received his Pharm.D. from the University of Minnesota. During this time he also obtained a master’s in health informatics and a certificate in public health informatics. After completion of his Pharm.D., he pursued a PGY-1 residency at Unity/Mercy Hospital in Coon Rapids MN. He is a Certified Associate in Healthcare Information and Management Systems and currently works as an Informatics Pharmacists for Allina Health.

Facility/Health System

Allina Health is a 13 hospital health system with over 90 clinics located in central Minnesota and western Wisconsin. There are 15 retails pharmacy with additional services in specialty pharmacy and home infusion. The health system includes both teaching and critical access hospitals. In 2017 Allina had 109,722 inpatient hospital admissions and 1.5 million outpatient visits. The retail pharmacies filled 955,845 prescriptions. These patient care activities are provided by Allina’s 29,077 employees.

Significant Projects

Many of the projects Dr. Bridgeman has been involved with center on data analytics. He has assessed and made impactful changes to the systems potassium replacement protocols, formulary review process, specialty pharmacy, drug purchasing, inventory management and drug billing through improved insight from data captured with health information technology.

Advice for Someone New to Your Specialty Area

“Identify projects that you can do to build/demonstrate technical skills in informatics/IT. These will be invaluable as you start a path towards an informatics focused role. If you feel your skills are not where they need to be then improve them by taking online courses or gaining vendor certifications. Learn as much about pharmacy as you can, focusing on processes and workflows, as these drive the design of technology.”

Initial Involvement in ASHP

“I got involved in ASHP when I was still in pharmacy school, and continued that involvement as a resident and now as a practicing pharmacist. During pharmacy school ASHP was a great place to network and learn about different specialty areas. As a practicing pharmacist ASHP provides excellent career development and networking opportunities.”

Value of ASHP

“ASHP offers a plethora of different learning materials and opportunities. These can be used to get into a new specialty area or keep up with the newest trends of a specialty practice. ASHP is a great way to network and collaborate with other driven pharmacists.”

“ASHP creates momentum and drives the profession forward. It offers avenues where likeminded professional can collaborate, share, and generate ideas to lead the profession of pharmacy in making improvements to the health care system and patient care.”