COMBINING CONVENIENCE WITH SAFETY

Jack Simityan, PharmD ’11, is chief operations officer of SortPak, a pharmacy delivery service committed to improving medication adherence. He established the company with Chief Executive Officer Raymond Shirvanyan in 2018. The idea grew out of their experience at a previous company started by Shirvanyan, TNH Advanced Specialty Pharmacy, which focused on drugs for cancer.

“At TNH we noticed a lot of patients were not following a proper medication regimen and would experience side effects,” Simityan recalls. “As pharmacists, we would step in and help develop medication plans for them. This inspired us to start SortPak and work with a broader population beyond oncology.”

SortPak delivers packages to its members that include all their medications with instructions and schedules for proper use. “We also have an online portal, AlignRx, that allows us to have an updated list of medications for each patient,” Simityan says. SortPak partners with numerous health plans so members can receive a 90- to 100-day supply of medications and cut down on their pharmacy visits.

“Members can chat with a pharmacist and get recommendations on over-thecounter medications based on symptoms they are experiencing,” Simityan says.

The entrepreneurs ultimately plan to augment their delivery service with brick-and-mortar locations in every state so members can enjoy the option of an accessible pharmacy.

Simityan credits the USC Mann School for helping instill big ambitions and the skills to achieve them. “When I was an undergraduate, I worked closely with Clay Wang, chair and professor of pharmacology and pharmaceutical sciences,” Simityan recalls. “He inspired me because he did research on therapeutics that could help astronauts deal with the side effects of space travel. That’s something that not a lot of people think about and execute! Working with him showed me that there is more to pharmacy than just dispensing medication.”

In addition, he says, “USC also sets up its students for success, and being a part of the Trojan Family has opened so many doors for me.”

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1970 s

Jerry Boden , PharmD ’75 , retired from St. Francis Medical Center in Lynwood, Calif., in 2021. Last fall, he began mentoring PharmD students as part of the USC Mann studentalumni mentoring program.

Rita Shane , PharmD ’78 , chief pharmacy officer at Cedars-Sinai, received an honorable mention in the 2022 Innovative Pharmacy Practice Awards from the California Society of Health-System Pharmacists (CSHP). She was recognized for the Grandparents Project, a pilot program that teaches high school students how to ensure that their parents and grandparents are taking medications correctly.

Paula Stewart Kreder, PharmD ’79 , co-owned Nudo’s Pharmacy in El Cajon, Calif., for 34 years. She sold it in 2021 and is now happily retired.

1980 s

Gary M. Besinque , PharmD ’82 , was elected president of the CSHP Board of Directors.

Charles W. Stark , BA ’79, PharmD ’82 , received the Research Achievement Award at the 2023 USC Mann Alumni Awards Gala. He is senior vice president of research and development at Emmaus

Medical Inc., an assistant professor at the USC Mann School and, since 1991, an advanced pharmacy practice experience preceptor.

Arthur Dominguez , PharmD ’84 , retired from Kaiser Permanente, where he was a clinical pharmacy director.

1990 s

Hector Delgado, PharmD ’93 , was elected to the CSHP Board of Directors.

Robert Popovian , PharmD ’93 , MS Pharmaceutical Economics and Policy ’97, co-authored a January 2023 article in The Hill, “Getting Vaccinated at Pharmacies Works: It Could Soon Disappear.”

2000 s

Sharon Jhawar, PharmD ’01 , is chief pharmacy officer at SCAN Health Plan, one of the nation’s largest notfor-profit Medicare Advantage plans.

Ken Thai , PharmD ’02 , CEO and co-founder of 986 Pharmacy, received the 2022 National Community Pharmacists Association Willard B. Simmons Independent Pharmacist of the Year award.

Jay Yamamoto, PharmD ’03 , recently became senior director, commercial strategy and account management, at Apotheco Pharmacy Group.

Komal Patel , PharmD ’04 , has a new role as senior product manager, clinical, at Interwell Health.

Lindsey Valenzuela , PharmD ’06 , was elected a member of the CSHP Board of Directors.

David Truong , PharmD ’07, MS Regulatory Science ’07, received the Distinguished Alumni Award at the USC Mann Alumni Awards Gala 2023. He is director of global regulatory affairs at Jazz Pharmaceuticals in San Diego. Truong has precepted and mentored students and serves as an adjunct faculty member at the USC Mann School. He also is a trustee of the California Pharmacists Association and a board member of USC’s QSAD Centurion.

Danielle Colayco, PharmD ’08 , MS Pharmaceutical Economics and Policy ’10, was featured in the September 15, 2022, episode of the Pharmacy Times: Public Health Matters podcast, discussing migrant health.

Jackie Jaskowiak , PharmD ’08 , was named Inpatient Pharmacist of the Year at UC San Diego Health. She recently presented continuing pharmacy education programming on sterile compounding and the operating room at the 2022 CSHP Seminar in Anaheim, Calif.

Christopher Waldapfel , PharmD ’09 , is owner of Red Thread Communications LLC. 2010 s

Duane Mauzey, Doctor of Regulatory Science ’12 , received the Innovation in Regulatory Science Award at the USC Mann Alumni Awards Gala 2023. He is director of regulatory affairs for CMC at Glaukos Inc., where he oversees quality of clinical and marketing applications for novel pharmaceuticals that treat chronic eye diseases. He also is an adjunct assistant professor at the USC Mann School.

Lilia Xu , PharmD ’12 , received the Young Alumni Award at the 2023 USC Mann Alumni Awards Gala. She is vice president of business development for 986 Degrees Corporation, which operates several pharmacies in the San Gabriel Valley and has provided more than 40,000 COVID-19 vaccinations to the community. Xu is a member of the boards of the San Gabriel Valley Pharmacists Association and QSAD Centurion at the USC Mann School.

Richard Dang, PharmD ’13 , received the Dean’s Medallion Award at the 2023 USC Mann Alumni Awards Gala 2023. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Dang was a leading voice for testing and vaccination, notably heading the Los Angeles COVID-19 program that resulted in well over 1 million vaccines administered across the city.

Jessica Lin , PharmD ’13 , a clinical pharmacist at LAC+USC Medical Center, has joined the USC Mann Alumni Engagement Board.

Vincent Capati , PharmD, MS Regulatory Science ’14 , an associate at Nixon Peabody LLP, has joined the USC Mann Alumni Engagement Board.

Beatrice Chiang, PharmD ’18 , is director of Clinical Safety Science at ALX Oncology.

Christian Khoury, PharmD ’18 , started a new position as district leader, Rx, at CVS Health.

Victor J. Gangi , DRSc ’21 , is vice president, regulatory affairs, at Zenas BioPharma in Waltham, Mass.

Angela Arutyunyan , MS Biopharmaceutical Marketing ’22 , is a project manager at Kaiser Permanente in the department of National Consumer Sales in Los Angeles.

Evan Makhani , BS Pharmacology and Drug Development ’22 , is a first-year student in the PharmD program at USC Mann.

Amy Tran-Guzman , MS Regulatory Science ’17, PhD Molecular Pharmacology and Toxicology ’22 , is a scientist at Bristol Myers Squibb working on in vitro model development to support toxicology programs. She also is a member of the USC Mann Alumni Engagement Board.

In Memoriam

Dennis Hayes , PharmD ’63 , died September 12, 2022. For more than 25 years, he owned a pharmacy in Glendale, Calif. He later worked as a compounding pharmacist after moving from Thousand Oaks to Palm Desert, Calif. He also served as an adjunct professor at the USC Mann School and stayed connected with the USC community throughout his life.

Ralph Bennett Jr., PharmD ’70, died March 5, 2022.

Leslie (Wenzhe) Feng, MS Healthcare Decision Analysis ’21 , is a business system data analyst at Abbvie.

Robert Stein , PharmD ’78 , JD, died December 28, 2022. He was a founding faculty member of the Keck Graduate Institute’s School of Pharmacy and Health Sciences and pioneered a unique program in law and ethics education.