Speedie to receive APhA’s Remington Honor Medal

Marilyn K. Speedie, BSPharm, PhD, one of the leaders of the Minnesota fight to pass legislation that allows pharmacists to administer immunizations and be recognized as healthcare providers, will receive the American Pharmacists Association’s (APhA) 2014 Remington Honor Medal.

The award, the highest granted by APhA, will be presented to Speedie during the APhA Annual Meeting and Exposition in Orlando, March 28-31, 2014.

“Marilyn’s influence is derived from her total understanding of the needs for and of pharmacists,” stated a colleague’s nomination letter. “During her leadership as President of the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy (AACP), a single, powerful sentence was added to the association’s mission statement that has affected the way in which faculties in all the AACP colleges of pharmacy view their relationships with the profession: ‘AACP shares responsibility with the profession for advancing the practice of pharmacy.’”

According to APhA, Speedie’s accomplishments include helping pharmacists get compensated for providing medication therapy management (MTM) services; implementing the University of Minnesota’s entry-level PharmD program and initiating a web-based PharmD program; and helping to get the National Institutes of Health to recognize PharmD’s as principal investigators.

Since 1996, Speedie has been Dean of the University of Minnesota College of Pharmacy. She served a three-year presidential term for the AACP from 2005-2008, is a member of the board of directors for the National Institute for Pharmaceutical Technology and Education (NIPTE) and of the board of trustees for the U.S. Pharmacopeia.

“Many have served as deans of pharmacy schools, but Marilyn Speedie is among the very few who have leveraged that position to have a profound and broad influence on the direction and advancement of pharmacy as a profession that benefits society,” wrote one of the people who nominated Speedie. “Dean Speedie has shaped, directed, and transformed the pharmacy program into one where Minnesota’s pharmacist graduates are well prepared, not only for practice, but also for shaping and leading change in the practice of pharmacy in the future.”

The Remington Honor Medal, established in 1918, is named for community pharmacist, manufacturer, and educator Joseph P. Remington.