photo of Ogden, UT

McKay-Dee PGY1 Pharmacy Residency

Residents at McKay-Dee Hospital work directly with clinical services, strive to provide excellent customer service and ensure patient safety. 

Residency manual
female pharmacist

About our program

The McKay-Dee Hospital PGY1 pharmacy residency program was created in 2003 and is an ASHP-accredited program focused on training residents to become competent, confident practitioners of direct patient care. The 12-month program will also help to prepare residents for a PGY2 specialty practice residency, an adjunctive pharmacy faculty position and/or employment as a clinical pharmacist within a health system.

Pharmacy Services

Our primary goal is to provide excellent customer service while ensuring patient safety. The pharmacy has experienced growth in services during the past few years and now has 36 full-time pharmacists and 24 full-time technicians. It is a decentralized model with direct clinical services with formal rounds occurring on the critical care units and in behavioral health.

Clinical Pharmacy Service Areas

  • Ambulatory Care
  • Behavioral Health
  • Cardiology
  • Critical Care
  • Emergency Medicine
  • General Medicine
  • Infectious Disease
  • Intermediate Care
  • Neonatal ICU
  • Oncology
  • Hospital Pharmacy Practice Management
  • Surgical Services

Pharmacy staff members serve on various hospital committees such as medication safety, infection control, patient care management and quality assurance.

Amongst our pharmacy staff, 22 are board certified, 20 have completed PGY1s, 2 have completed PGY2s, and 4 have advanced degrees beyond pharmacy. All but one of our residency preceptors are board certified pharmacists.

Program contact

Have questions? Reach out to our program director, Bryce Bitton, PharmD, BCPS.

801-387-6007Email us
McKay-Dee hospital

Where we train

McKay-Dee Hospital is a 319-bed community hospital that offers nationally ranked programs, including the Heart and Vascular Institute and newborn ICU. Some of our other programs of excellence include:

  • Huntsman-Intermountain Cancer Center
  • Emergency Services and Level II Trauma Care
  • Stewart Rehabilitation Center
  • Women and Children’s Services
  • The Community Health Information Center
More about our hospital

Program details

Everything you need to know about our program and what to expect.

Core rotations

  • Ambulatory care (4 weeks)
  • Central operations / Compounding (1 week)
  • Critical care (4 weeks)
  • Internal medicine (4 weeks)
  • Pharmacy practice management (4 weeks, completed at home facility)

Electives (5 rotations)

  • Over 100 rotations across the enterprise
  • Opportunities to complete rotations outside of home facility

Rotations

Application Deadline

  • All application information must be received in PhORCAS prior to 10 pm MST on January 2nd, 2025

Applicants must submit the following information through the PhORCAS system:

  • PhORCAS standard residency application
  • Expected to obtain Pharmacist licensure within the first 90 days in the state of the residency program
  • Current curriculum vitae
  • Three letters of reference using the ASHP standard form (ideally including one from a work supervisor, if available)
  • Letter of intent
  • College of pharmacy transcripts; if no GPA is provided on your transcripts, then follow the instructions below:
    • If graduating from a school that uses a pass / fail grading system, please submit your class rank to Elizabeth Sebranek (if applying to multiple programs, only 1 letter is required).
    • This is currently done outside of the PhORCAS system due to FERPA rules.
  • Supplemental Essay - Choose one of the two questions below to answer in 250 words or less
    • Tell us about a mistake that you learned from. What did you learn?
    • If you were stranded on a desert island and could only bring two drugs, which drugs would you bring and why?

Residents are required to staff 32 hours per month. Residents are generally scheduled every other weekend and work a mix of 12-hour shifts in the central pharmacy/IV room and 8-hour clinical shifts in direct patient care areas, typically starting with our General Medicine and Behavioral Health floors. Once residents successfully complete an onsite clinical rotation, they will be eligible to staff on that floor for their clinical shift. In general, this leads to more staffing in the central pharmacy shifts during the first half of the year and clinical shifts during the second half. During orientation, we focus the training on the central pharmacy, IV room, General Medicine, and Behavioral Health. There will be additional training in the OR, Surgical, and the NICU to further understand the roles of each pharmacist.

Candidates selected to the pharmacy residency program are paid a competitive resident salary and receive a complete benefits package.

Resident Salary

  • Approximate PGY1 stipend: $61,000 per year

Pharmacy Resident Benefits

  • Classified as full-time employees of Intermountain Health
  • Paid a competitive resident salary
  • Eligible to receive a complete benefits package including retirement, health, dental, vision and life insurance
  • Allowed 15 days of vacation and / or sick leave
  • 8 paid holidays
  • Access to other employee benefits such as the employee wellness program, Employee Assistance Program (EAP) support, and the employee discount program.

Professional Development

  • Intermountain Health will provide travel support for one professional conference. Options may include ASHP Midyear Clinical Meeting or Pharmacy Futures Meeting, Pediatric Pharmacy Association (PPA) Annual Meeting, or other specialty conference such as Society of Critical Care Medicine (SCCM)
  • In addition, internal CE and other professional development opportunities are offered on a regular basis.

Research

Complete one longitudinal research project suitable for publication during the residency year. Successful completion incorporates the following elements:

  • Identify research topic
  • Formulate study design and data collection form
  • Submit project for Institutional Review Board approval
  • Complete data collection and analysis
  • Write manuscript
  • Poster presentation
  • Podium presentation

Teaching Opportunities (Teaching Certificate Offered)

  • Prepare and present a 1-hour seminar at home facility for pharmacists
  • Prepare and present a 1-hour, system-wide broadcasted ACPE-accredited presentation for pharmacists and technicians
  • Develop and deliver one platform presentation and one poster presentation at a regional, state, national or other approved conference meeting
  • Serve as the primary preceptor of a learner on rotation
  • Optional academic teaching certificate requirements:
    • Develop a personal, written teaching philosophy
    • Design and maintain a teaching portfolio
    • Observe at least 2 different didactic lectures at their assigned school of pharmacy
    • Develop and deliver a lecture at college of pharmacy to students
    • Lead/facilitate at least one recitation, simulation lab or other similar activity at a college of pharmacy
    • Attend at least 2 committee or faculty meetings at a college of pharmacy
    • Deliver at least 1 in-service presentation to clinical staff (nursing, pharmacists, etc.) while on a clinical rotation
    • Submit at least 1 manuscript for publication to a peer reviewed journal
    • Participate in academia/education-focused discussions throughout the year

Longitudinal Didactic Education (Core Curriculum)

Residents attend regular education sessions to support their growth as a pharmacy practitioner, develop "soft skills," promote resident collaboration, and enhance overall wellness. Example training domains include the following:

  • Clinical skills and pearls
  • Leadership skills
  • Professional skills
  • Research skills
  • Teaching skills
  • Wellness skills

Our preceptors and residents

Meet our team of talented preceptors and our current classes of residents

Meet our preceptors Meet our residents
pharmacist with inventory smiling
photo of historic downtown Ogden, UT

Living in Ogden

Ogden is a great place for residents to live. It offers all the benefits of urban life, along with incredible access to the outdoors. Ogden residents enjoy a very high quality of life and low cost of living. Ogden offers the benefits of both a city and a mountain town – without the high costs of either.

Explore Ogden