The AHEC Instructor of the Year Award is designed to recognize an outstanding faculty member who has had a positive impact on students’ advanced practice experience. Students from the class of 2006 selected Dee Melnyk, PharmD, to receive this prestigious award for her proven exemplary teaching and mentorship skills. 

Melnyk is the clinical pharmacy specialist in ambulatory care at the Durham VA Medical Center and specializes in the management of hyperlipidemia and diabetes. She received her PharmD degree from UNC-Chapel Hill in 1999, and completed a pharmacy practice residency at UNC Hospitals in 2000 and an ambulatory care/academic residency at the Durham VA Medical Center and the UNC School of Pharmacy in 2001. After completing residency training, she joined the UNC community-based faculty and the Durham VA Medical Center where she has precepted over 40 pharmacy students.

Below is an excerpt from one of Melnyk's nomination letters:

Dee Melnyk epitomizes the AHEC Instructor of the Year. She is an amazing teacher, clinician, mentor, and researcher. She not only taught me and other students about pharmacy but also about involvement, research, and life.

Having the chance to work with her at her practice site at the VA was a real career changing rotation. She has been able to gain the respect of the doctors, nurses, and patients through her hard work and knowledge. The patients and doctors have learned to value her opinion. She has a unique site in which she has prescribing rights and she realizes the importance and reality of that right. She always acts in the patients’ best interests and goes above and beyond what is required of her. When she has students at her site, she is always willing to put the students’ education at the top of her list of responsibilities. Regardless of how busy she may be, she takes the time and interest to make sure the student is getting the most out of the rotation and is learning and understanding. Dr. Melnyk has a way of allowing students to realize their potential and how much they know and understand. She constantly challenges students to excel and helps them along the way.

Preceptors of the Year
Randall K. Absher, PharmD
Wesley Long Community Hospital
Greensboro

Lori W. Cahall, PharmD
Walgreens
Wilson

The Preceptor of the Year Award is designed to recognize outstanding preceptors who have had a positive impact on students’ experiential education. This year the School of Pharmacy recognizes two outstanding preceptors, Randall K. Absher and Lori W. Cahall.

Absher is a graduate of the UNC School of Pharmacy were he received a bachelor of science in pharmacy in 1982 followed by a doctorate in pharmacy in 1998. He joined the pharmacy staff at Wesley Long Community Hospital in Greensboro 1982 where he is currently the pharmacy clinical coordinator. Absher began precepting UNC pharmacy students in 1997 and has precepted a total of 32 students to date. He provides an inpatient medicine advanced practice rotation.

Below is an excerpt from one of Absher's nomination letters:

My first rotation during my PY4 year was Inpatient Medicine and I was more or less terrified.  I was terrified that I knew nothing, that I wouldn’t remember anything from my pharmacotherapeutic classes, and terrified that I would make a complete fool of myself in front of Dr. Absher. 

But Dr. Absher guided me well during that first month so that by the month’s end, my initial worries seemed unnecessarily silly. Dr. Absher gently encouraged my learning through his effective question-asking style. I truly appreciated his patience and the fact that he never rushed me or made me feel inept as a student. While he could recite almost every word that he had ever read in a study, he was very humble about it and never looked down on me or the other pharmacists. 

Cahall graduated from the UNC School of Pharmacy with a PharmD in 2001. She started working for Walgreens in October of 2001 and her current practice site is a Walgreens in Wilson. Cahall started precepting UNC pharmacy students in 2003 and currently lives in Kenly, North Carolina with her husband Rob and their one-and-a-half-year-old daughter Emma.

Below is an excerpt from one of Cahall's nomination letters:

Dr. Cahall is a very caring and compassionate preceptor. She took advantage of every opportunity for me to improve my patient counseling skills and OTC recommendations. She also allowed me to foster my independence throughout the rotation. I was very impressed with her eagerness to come in early, on her time off, and go over drug products with me. I have yet to have a preceptor who constantly gives positive and constructive feedback throughout the rotation. Dr. Cahall is an excellent community pharmacy role model in the way she interacts with her patients and coworker.

If you have news of an award or special recognition that you would like featured in the next issue of Preceptor Today, please send an e-mail to preceptor@unc.edu.