White Coat Ceremony welcomes PharmD Class of 2027

The UCSF doctor of pharmacy (PharmD) Class of 2027 officially entered the profession on July 19 at the 23rd annual White Coat Ceremony.

Led by Dean Kathy Giacomini, PhD, BSPharm, the event at San Francisco’s Herbst Theatre welcomed first-year learners with a meaningful tradition in which they were presented with white coats, the symbol of clinical service and care, and recited in unison the Oath of the Pharmacist.

“Today, you become partners in pursuit of the shared mission of providing safe and effective therapies to all patients,” Giacomini said in her opening remarks. “The white coat represents your official transition from layperson to student pharmacist.”

Maurice Ramirez

Scientific leadership and innovation

Giacomini spoke about the UCSF School of Pharmacy’s global recognition as a scientific institution, leading all U.S. schools of pharmacy in NIH funding for 44 consecutive years.

“Here at UCSF, in the heart of the Bay Area, you have access to the most cutting-edge bioscience, as well as to the brightest minds in the tech, biotech, and pharmaceutical industries,” she said. “You are poised to build new bridges between science, industry, regulatory agencies, and patient care that will improve the lives of many, for generations to come.”

The school celebrates entrepreneurship, Giacomini said, and its legacy of companies founded by faculty members include those that developed the first drug to treat sickle cell disease in children, novel drugs in clinical trials to treat pulmonary and liver fibrosis, and gene therapy to treat neglected and rare diseases.

She also noted a new pharmacogenomics testing service at UCSF Health that allows pharmacists and other clinicians to use genetic information to prescribe the correct drugs and doses for patients. “Our service is the first in a California health care system, and indeed is the first west of the Mississippi,” Giacomini said. “From clinical pharmacy to pharmacogenomics, the world turns to us for leadership in ideation, methods, and discoveries.”

Maurice Ramirez

Embracing differences as a core value

Most of the incoming class hails from California, while 11 percent come from elsewhere in the United States and abroad, and almost 30% were born outside the United States, with classmates from China, India, Ghana, Vietnam, and many other nations. Most learners majored in biology, chemistry, or pharmaceutical sciences, she added, but several came from non-traditional areas of study, including animal science, anthropology, psychology, and sociology.

“At UCSF, we embrace differences—in backgrounds, gender, race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, lifestyles, and perspectives,” Giacomini said. “You are joining a vibrant university community where diversity in all ways is a core value.”

Impacting patient care

Maurice Ramirez

Keynote speaker Michael L. Lim, PharmD ’99, MBA, who has more than 20 years of experience in the pharmaceutical industry that includes leadership roles at GlaxoSmithKline, Kite Pharma, and Gilead Sciences, said every moment of a pharmacist’s training and career is a learning journey.

“You will find satisfaction at every step of the journey by staying challenged and stimulated,” Lim said. “Sometimes this may mean taking risks and going into areas that you don’t know about or that you might even be scared of. Trust yourself. Trust the training you received from UCSF.”

While doing his PGY2 HIV residency at San Francisco General Hospital, Lim said he saw firsthand the need for new therapeutics, the power of investigational drugs, and the potential that clinical trials could have for patients. He chose to pursue a career in industry to make an impact on bringing new medicines to patients.

“Many of you will chase your dreams and find roles in research, in health policy or administration, health economics, government, academic, or pharmaceutical industry,”

Lim said. “You may not wear a white coat, and you may not be working directly with patients. But regardless of where you work, you will still be rooted as a clinical pharmacist, and the patient will be at the core of how you operate.”

“If you are nervous, it means you care.”

Associated Students of the School of Pharmacy (ASSP) President Jeanne Le, a P3 pharmacy student who came to UCSF with a double major in biomedical engineering and business administration from Georgia Institute of Technology, offered words of advice for incoming students who she said might be experiencing a lot of mixed feelings, including excitement, happiness, and nervousness.

“Remember that the patient deserves a provider like you,” said Le, who worked as a pharmacy intern at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford, as well as at Kaiser. “The patient deserves a provider who cares. If you feel joy, or even sad or angry, it means you care. Don’t forget to care.”

Maurice Ramirez

Maurice Ramirez

Maurice Ramirez