Palliative Care Pharmacist Discusses How Building Relationships with Patients Leads to Rewarding Career

Madison Irwin, PharmD, BCPS, a clinical pharmacist specialist in palliative care at University of Michigan Health and a clinical assistant professor at University of Michigan College of Pharmacy, never intended to go into a career in pharmacy. She initially had her heart set on pursuing a PhD in neuroscience, but an undergraduate organic chemistry class made her think twice about her decision. A friend recommended that Irwin look into pharmacy, and after she did, everything followed from there.

“I liked with pharmacy that there is so many things you can do,” Irwin said. “There is such a wide range of settings that you can work in as a pharmacist. I knew at the time that I probably wanted to work in a hospital in the inpatient setting, so after I graduated, I went to Ohio State for pharmacy school. After that, I matched here at Michigan….and the rest is kind of history.”

Irwin currently works as a clinical pharmacist specialist in palliative care in both inpatient and outpatient settings. She supports a palliative care consult team and outpatient palliative care clinics by seeing patients who are transitioning out of the hospital or patients who have more complex medication management needs. Although there are plenty of challenges that she faces in her practice, Irwin said that really getting to know patients through her work is extremely rewarding.

In a conversation with Drug Topics, Irwin discussed how her career has unfolded, a program that she worked on that exemplifies the value of pharmacists in patient care, opportunities out there for pharmacists to expand their role, and how high rates of chronic pain will impact the pharmacy profession in the coming years.

Our coverage of American Pharmacists Month continues all October. To view all of our interviews, visit our American Pharmacists Month landing resource center.