Glen Stimmel, a national leader in clinical pharmacy practice and a USC faculty member since 1974, is the new interim dean of the USC School of Pharmacy, effective July 1.
“I’m looking forward to working with the excellent faculty, staff, students, alumni and supporters of our School of Pharmacy,” Stimmel said. “Our school is on an amazing trajectory that promises to help innovate pharmacy practice, research and education. I’m honored to play a role in this important mission.”
Stimmel is a professor of clinical pharmacy, psychiatry and the behavioral sciences in the School of Pharmacy and the Keck School of Medicine of USC. As interim dean, he will hold the John Stauffer Dean’s Chair in Pharmaceutical Sciences.
Stimmel has long been a national voice in expanding the scope of practice for pharmacists, including advocacy for pharmacist prescriptive authority. He led a pivotal pilot project in the late 1970s that was one of only two funded statewide to examine the safety and efficacy of pharmacists serving as prescribers. That study and others conducted at USC led to passage of legislation in California allowing pharmacists to initiate and modify drug treatment, order lab tests, perform physical assessments and administer drugs under physician authority. The law set the stage for further expansion of pharmacist authority passed in California in 1983 and, ultimately, 2013’s Senate Bill 493, which recognizes pharmacists as health care providers.
“Dr. Stimmel’s work was foundational to today’s efforts to continue to expand the role of the pharmacist on the health care team,” outgoing Dean R. Pete Vanderveen said. “We are very fortunate to have a leader of Dr. Stimmel’s reputation and caliber to lead our school at this auspicious time when we are building on the passage of Senate Bill 493.”
Over the decades leading to that law, Stimmel published numerous studies and opinion pieces in a range of journals supporting this expanded practice role for pharmacists. Meanwhile, his clinical work has focused on psychiatric pharmacy, as well as maintaining a longstanding practice in geriatrics and rheumatology at the LAC+USC Primary Care Clinics.
Stimmel has been a prolific scholar in the field; in the memo announcing the appointment, Provost Michael Quick noted Stimmel as author of more than 230 articles and textbook chapters.
“He has pioneered efforts in developing psychiatric pharmacy practice, education and residency programs,” Quick wrote.
Stimmel earned his Doctor of Pharmacy degree from the University of California, San Francisco, after which he completed a pharmacy residency in psychiatry at the Langley Porter Neuropsychiatric Institute of the UCSF Hospitals and Clinics in San Francisco. Before joining USC, he was an assistant professor at UCSF and served as the first clinical pharmacist for the District V Mental Health Center in San Francisco, where he helped define the pharmacist’s role on the health care team in a mental health setting.
Stimmel is a founding member and past president of the College of Psychiatric and Neurologic Pharmacists and of the American College of Clinical Pharmacy, where he is also an elected fellow. He is an original member and past chair of the Board of Pharmaceutical Specialties Council on Psychiatric Pharmacy Practice, a past board member of the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy and a past vice chair of the American Association of Health-system Pharmacists Commission on Therapeutics. He is also an elected member of the World Association for Sexual Health and of the Sexual Medicine Society of North America.
A full professor since 1984, Stimmel has served in various administrative posts at the school, including as chair of the its clinical department, the strategic planning and strategic implementation committees, and the curriculum committee. He has also lectured internationally on pharmacy practice, notably as the keynote speaker at the Asian Conference on Clinical Pharmacy in Hong Kong in 2012, which was attended by more than 1,000 pharmacy professionals from 23 countries.
— Kukla Vera