Division of Pharmacotherapy
The mission of the Division of Pharmacotherapy is to train and educate student pharmacists, graduate students, and postdoctoral fellows to provide specialty pharmacotherapeutic services, including acute and primary care, and to conduct translational, transdisciplinary, and other types of innovative research.
The Division also holds with equal value its efforts in the areas of teaching, service, and scholarship.
Research Areas of Excellence
Faculty, students, and fellows pursue clinical and translational research to help solve some of today’s greatest pharmacotherapeutic challenges. Areas of research excellence include infectious diseases and cancer research.
Mission
To educate and train the future leaders of pharmacy, engage in innovative research, and provide exemplary patient care.
Vision
To be a leader in practice-related education, clinical and translational research, and professional service.
Motto
Embracing Excellence. Inspiring Innovation. Improving Lives.
Recent Announcements
UT College of Pharmacy Continues Partnership with UT Health San Antonio to Help Win $46 Million in New NIH Grants
UT Health San Antonio and seven regional partners and collaborators, including The University of Texas at Austin College of Pharmacy, will leverage $46 million from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) over the next five to seven years to translate scientific discoveries into therapeutic benefits for human health and well-being. The funding is being provided through NIH's National Center for Advancing Translational Science (NCATS).
Training Programs
Graduate Degree Programs
Pharmacotherapy division graduate degree programs:
- Master of Science in Pharmaceutical Science
- Doctor of Philosophy in Pharmaceutical Science
- Doctor of Philosophy in Translational Science
These programs prepare the student for the numerous opportunities in advanced practice and research.
Residencies and Fellowships
The division is the home base for many students engaged in either a one- or two-year specialty practice residency program or a two- or three-year clinical science fellowship.
Pharmacotherapy Rounds
The mission of this program is to provide pharmacists and other health care providers in South-Central Texas with evidence-based and patient-centered instruction they can use to prevent disease and improve the care they deliver to their individual patients, families and communities.
Pharmacotherapy Division History
The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin) College of Pharmacy founded the Pharmacotherapy Division on the campus of the University of Texas Health San Antonio (UT Health San Antonio) in 1973. The first Doctor of Pharmacy class entered in 1974. The Program was originally placed in the Department of Pharmacology and administered through the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences through an agreement with Dean James Dolusio and Dr. Arthur Briggs. Since that time, the UT Austin and the UT Health San Antonio have partnered to offer degree programs.
The Pharmacotherapy Division was the original home for the college’s Doctor of Pharmacy “graduate” degree program; a program for those pharmacists who had already earned their pharmacy Bachelor’s degrees, but sought additional clinical research training. Several of these Pharm.D. graduates have become national academic leaders, including at least four college of pharmacy deans and numerous department chairs.
In 1999, the national accreditation council for colleges and schools of pharmacy mandated that all pharmacy programs in the nation offer the Pharm.D. degree as the entry-level degree for practicing pharmacists; therefore, the Pharm.D. degree became a “professional” degree instead of a “graduate” degree. The curriculum was revised accordingly; clinical research training was replaced with greater training on patient assessment, therapeutics, and clinical decision-making.
Recognizing the continuing need for advanced research training for pharmacists, the Pharmacotherapy Division developed new Masters and Ph.D. graduate programs in 2001 to provide this type of training for those pharmacists who had already earned their Pharm.D. degrees.
In 2006, the Pharmacotherapy Division was formally recognized as the Pharmacotherapy Education and Research Center (PERC) within the UT Health San Antonio’s Long School of Medicine. Dr. Christopher R. Frei, Pharm.D., M.S., serves as the PERC Director and Pharmacotherapy Division Head. The PERC’s mission is to train and educate pharmacists and pharmaceutical scientists to provide specialty pharmacotherapeutic services, including acute and primary care, and to conduct innovative translational and transdisciplinary research. In keeping with its mission, the Program partnered with three other universities in San Antonio, including the UT Health San Antonio, and the UT San Antonio, to develop a new Translational Science Ph.D. Program in 2011. Collectively, the San Antonio pharmacy programs consist of 13 full-time faculty and nearly 200 adjunct/adjoint faculty, who train nearly 80 student pharmacists, 25 graduate students, and 25 pharmacy residents annually.
The UT Austin College of Pharmacy is currently ranked among the top in the nation.