Yekaterina (Kate) Opsha, PharmD, BCPS-AQ Cardiology, AACC, FHFSA

Clinical Associate Professor, Ernest Mario School of Pharmacy, Rutgers University

Dr. Yekaterina (Kate) Opsha is a Clinical Associate Professor at the Ernest Mario School of Pharmacy (EMSOP) involved in teaching, service, and scholarship.  She is also a clinical pharmacy specialist in the area of cardiovascular medicine at Cooperman Barnabas Medical Center (CBMC) in Livingston, NJ where she trains pharmacy students and residents.   Dr. Opsha received her Board Certification in Pharmacotherapy in 2014 and added qualifications in cardiology in 2015.

Dr. Opsha is actively involved in several national interprofessional organizations. She is an active member of the American College of Cardiology and has received the designation of Associate within the college (AACC) in 2018.  Since 2019, she is also the cardiovascular team chapter representative for the NJ-ACC chapter.   That same year, she was the recipient of the New Jersey Society of Health-System Pharmacists (NJSHP) Preceptor of the year award.  She has been an active member of the national interprofessional Heart Failure Society of America (HFSA) since 2014.  She served as a member of the Advocacy Committee within HFSA (2017-2019) and currently serves as the only pharmacist on the interprofessional heart failure certification council.  In 2020, she was awarded the designation of a fellow of the Heart Failure Society of America (FHFSA).

As faculty and a clinical pharmacist, she and her learners work with providers in interprofessional cardiac ICU and cardiac step-down settings.  They work alongside various disciplines including cardiology attending, medical residents and nurse practitioners in providing optimal medication therapy for all of their patients.  In addition to her teaching responsibilities at EMSOP and CBMC, she has been a member of the PharmD/MD integration committee since 2013.  This is a unique dual degree program that pairs a PharmD with a second advanced degree (MD) at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School (RWJMS) after graduation.

Since 2016, Dr. Opsha has been serving as a co-chair of the Interprofessional Education (IPE) committee at EMSOP.  This committee oversees all the IPE events for pharmacy students in their entire curriculum (P1-P4 years).  In this role, some of her responsibilities include creating, assessing, and facilitating several programs throughout the academic year.  Additionally, she is involved in engaging faculty in various IPE initiatives to ensure that all pharmacy students receive a robust IPE experience and are prepared to practice on an interprofessional team. She is the lead facilitator for the Medication Errors IPE event which includes several other disciplines and is the largest EMSOP led IPE event each year. To date, she has facilitated over 20 IPE events throughout RBHS and works closely with other discipline-leads to create new opportunities for her students to work with and learn from and about each other.  She enjoys this role and looks forward to future opportunities to collaborate with other disciplines on new IPE initiatives.