The rise of team-based care: A conversation with Susan Cornell, PharmD
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At the ADCES22 annual meeting, the Association of Diabetes Care & Education Specialists honored Susan Cornell, PharmD, CDCES, FAPhA, FADCES, with the Allene Van Son Distinguished Service Award.
In 2011, Cornell served as president of the Illinois Pharmacists Association. She currently educates and supervises students from the colleges of medicine, pharmacy, dental and health sciences at Bolingbrook Christian Health Center, and is an active member of the American Diabetes Association.
Healio spoke with Cornell about what led her to work with people with diabetes, her role as a pharmacist on the diabetes care team and her advice to students.
Healio: What was the defining moment that led you to pursue a career in your field?
Cornell: I’ve been a practicing pharmacist for several years. I have a bachelor’s degree and a doctorate degree, both in pharmacy. For my bachelor’s degree, I worked with an endocrinologist during one of my clinical rotations, which was eye-opening, but probably not truly the defining moment.
Then as I was practicing in community pharmacy, I started to notice more and more people with diabetes. But most importantly, my mom was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. This was in the early ‘90s, before many of the landmark clinical trials were published. When my mom was diagnosed, I realized the quality of the care she was receiving was OK, but it could be better.
That’s when I became interested in diabetes, which sent me back to the endocrinologist I worked with in my pharmacy hospital rotation. From there, I connected with other people and started to pursue what back then was called the Certified Diabetes Educator credential and is now, of course, the Certified Diabetes Care and Education Specialist credential. The credential has evolved over the years, but it was at that point I realized, “OK, Mom’s not getting the quality of care that she should get as a person with diabetes.” I also realized many other people were not getting quality care. It’s not that I’m blaming anybody, it’s just the health care system. A lot has to do with people’s beliefs, their motivations, etc. But I learned over the years how to talk to people with diabetes, how to work with them, how to help them and guide them through change processes. And now here we are 30 years later.
Healio: What advice would you offer students entering your field today?
Cornell: When I attend meetings, especially the ADCES annual meeting, for the past 20 years now I’ve been bringing students with me. I joke that I have my little entourage. This year, I’ll have three students with me. One of the things that I always advise them is if they’re interested in diabetes, try on different experiences. Talk to different people, network with practitioners in different fields, so you can learn truly about team-based care.
As pharmacists, we tend to be a minority in the field of diabetes. We probably make up about 10% of membership within ADCES and even less than that within the ADA. Oftentimes, there are other health care professionals who ask, “What is a pharmacist doing here?”
My advice to students is step outside of your comfort zone, and step outside of the silo of pharmacy and work in a field of team-based care. Get to know what other members of the team bring to the table. What does the physician bring, the nurse practitioner, the physician assistant, the dietitian, nurse, audiologist, podiatrist, behavioral health specialist, dentist? I can go on and on. The bottom line is we’re all in this together and getting to know what everybody does in their role and responsibilities, that’s one of the things that I like to encourage students to do.
The other thing — more life than career-based advice — but the best advice given to me once was, whenever you’re choosing a job, or project or even marriage, always find the bad you can live with. There’s good in everything, but there’s bad in everything, too. Find the bad you can live with, because that’s what you’ll have to deal with. What is the negative in that position that you can deal with on a day-by-day basis? Because if you can’t deal with it, you’re going to be miserable in what you do. Life is too short to be miserable in what we do.
Healio: Have you ever witnessed or been part of health care history in the making?
Cornell: Yes, looking from when I graduated with my bachelor’s degree, a very long time ago, it was unheard of that pharmacists would give immunizations. Today, everybody goes to the pharmacy to get their flu shot, COVID shot, shingles, travel vaccines, etc. We’re seeing pharmacists step up and become part of the health care team. In my current practice, I work side-by-side with a physician assistant and a nurse practitioner. We discuss patient cases, we discuss therapy. This collaborative team-based approach is truly history in the making. I see it growing every day, and I’m actually proud to be a part of it. I’m eager to see what the next 10 years brings.
Healio: What’s coming up next for you?
Cornell: I don’t know what the road holds ahead. I’m always interested in new projects, depending on time and what my current project load is. One of the biggest projects right now is I am one of the associate editors for the ADCES Diabetes Desk Reference, and we are currently working on the sixth edition. I’m looking forward to that. Then from a student perspective, the clinic where I work has many students that rotate through. It’s a very competitive position, so probably within the next month, we’re going to get new recruits through the application and interview process for students that are interested in providing diabetes care and education in an underserved population.
Healio: Is there anything else you’d like to add?
Cornell: One of the biggest things is we all have to remember why we’re doing this, and it’s to help people. Oftentimes, we get so hung up in the reimbursement and in the provider status, and whose role is it to do what, that we forget the person being impacted is the patient. That’s what we should be worrying about, what is best for that person. We need to put egos aside, myself included, and we have to address the patient and what we can do to help them. I’ve worked with people over the years that say, “Oh, some patients don’t want to be helped.” I’m going to disagree with that. I think some people do not know better. How you approach and communicate with people can have a positive impact and outcome. Once again, going back to that team-based care, if we work together, we can really make changes and influence the lives of people with diabetes.
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