Alyssa Meester, PharmD, BCCCP, is a pharmacist at OhioHealth Riverside Methodist Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, USA. She joined the Society of Critical Care Medicine (SCCM) in 2020, and is the membership committee chair for the Ohio Chapter of SCCM. When outside the ICU, she enjoys traveling and crocheting. Her clinical interests include cardiovascular, pulmonary, and shock. Get to know Dr. Meester and her love of all things critical care including SCCM.
Why do you love being in critical care?
As an ICU pharmacist, I love that my role gets to be so involved at the bedside and that I get to work closely with our ICU teams to navigate complex clinical decisions related to pharmacotherapy. I enjoy the acuity and complexity of this patient population, and it is extra rewarding to see firsthand the positive impact that our team's decision-making has on our patients.
What advice do you have for those starting their critical care careers?
Be curious and engage with all of your team members! I have learned as much if not more from nurses, physicians, advanced practice providers, and respiratory therapists as from my fellow pharmacists. The better we understand each other's roles and capabilities, the better care we are able to provide for our patients.
What is your biggest professional achievement?
As our health system expanded services to offer mechanical circulatory support (MCS), two ICU pharmacist colleagues and I recognized a need to bridge gaps in clinical pharmacy coverage because many of our team members had not had prior experience caring for this patient population. We created a 24/7 on-call MCS pharmacist service that has enabled us to expand the multidisciplinary team's access to an MCS-trained ICU pharmacist at any time. I am proud of how our on-call team has evolved to help manage anticoagulation, hemostasis, hemodynamics, sedation, and more—not just on the unit, but also as an engaged team member at cannulations. I believe our work has made a positive difference in patient care at our institution and I am excited to continue caring for this niche population.
What do you love about SCCM membership?
I love that SCCM is inclusive of so many different professions within the critical care space. It has been incredibly rewarding to get to learn from a diverse group of critical care professionals and it has inspired me to continually evaluate and improve my own practices.
Connect with @Alyssa Meester on SCCM Connect or X!