2024 Awardees 

Distinguished Young Pharmacist Award (Sponsored by: Pharmacist Mutual Companies)

The Bowl of Hygeia Award is sponsored by American Pharmacists Association Foundation and the National Alliance of State Pharmacy Associations and is presented to a state association member in honor of their considerable contributions in terms of community service which may include involvement in governmental activities separate from, or in addition to, his or her job. The recipient must be a member of HPhA, has not previously received this award, not currently serving nor has served within the immediate past two years as an officer of HPhA in other than an ex-officio capacity and has compiled an outstanding record of community service, which apart from their specific identification as a pharmacist, reflects well on the profession. 

Dr. Cory Lehano, PharmD, CDCES, CEO, owner and CEO or Mauliola Pharmacy, has been an incredible leader and team player, especially during the chaos after the Lahaina, Maui wildfires. As both a pharmacist and community member, he has gone above and beyond for his community, organizing and mobilizing pharmacy services to ground zero immediately after the wildfire devastation. He was instrumental in rallying his team at Mauliola Pharmacy and coordinating efforts to make sure patients got the medications they needed without hesitation. In addition to mobilizing personnel and resources to ensure that wildfire victims were appropriately cared for with the warmth and aloha that we all deserve, he helped key stakeholders across the state mobilize and appropriately organize for continued relief efforts. His dedication, compassion, and hard work make him truly deserving of this award.

Pharmacist of the Year (Sponsored by: Hawaii Pharmacists Association)
The Pharmacist of the Year Award recognizes and honor a qualified pharmacist who has demonstrated significant service and contribution to pharmacy programs, teamwork within the healthcare systems, and service to the community of Hawaii.

Dr. Ross Takara, PharmD, BCACP is the Executive Director of Pharmacy for Kaiser Permanente Hawaii. Ross has led the Kaiser Permanente pharmacy department for the past 10 years including 330 employees from the inpatient, outpatient, and ambulatory care clinical pharmacy operations, and pharmacy administration including pharmacy benefits, compliance, finance, formulary management, informatics & analytics, medication safety, supply chain, and quality. In addition to growing the pharmacy department, Ross has expanded clinical pharmacy practice across all operational lines. Examples include establishing antimicrobial stewardship in the inpatient setting, outpatient pharmacy clinical services to improve adherence and the renal dose monitoring program in the outpatient setting and doubling the number of programs and overall size of the ambulatory care clinical pharmacy team. Under Ross’ leadership, the pharmacy department has achieved various accolades at the national level for high performance in quality (e.g., Pharmacy Quality Alliance Excellence in Quality Award for achieving 5 Stars on all Medicare Stars pharmacy measures and top 10 performance on numerous HEDIS measures driven by pharmacy) and customer service (e.g., top performance on JD Powers Survey for outpatient pharmacy experience). Ross’ servant leadership philosophy, strong collaboration with leaders/teams/departments at the state & national level, and engaging, kind, and down-to-earth leadership style have contributed to his success. Ross’ passion for patient care is only exceeded by his desire to serve the community. Ross ensured that the pharmacy department provided timely and optimal care throughout the COVID-19 pandemic and most recently, the Lahaina wildfire tragedy. He has previously served on the Hawaii Pharmacists Association’s Board of Directors, and actively supports pharmacy student, intern, and residency programs. In Ross’ free time, he served as a Cub Master for the Scouts of America.

Pharmacy Technician of the Year (Sponsored by: Hawaii Pharmacists Association)

Recipient must be an HPhA member and pharmacy technician employed in the State of Hawaii who has serviced the profession with contribution to pharmacy programs, teamwork with healthcare teams, and service to the community.

Tori Ching, CPhT, COO has been an incredible leader and team player, especially during the chaos after the Maui wildfires. She’s gone above and beyond for her community, organizing and mobilizing pharmacy services to ground zero immediately after the Lahaina devastation. Rallying her team at Mauliola Pharmacy and coordinating efforts to make sure patients got the medications they needed without hesitation. Her dedication, compassion, and hard work make her truly deserving of this award. She is proving that technicians can be in higher level leadership positions and make just as big an impact.

Excellence in Innovation Award (Sponsored by: Upsher-Smith Laboratories, LLC)
The Excellence in Innovation Award is a national award coordinated by the National Alliance of State Pharmacy Associations, and generously sponsored by Upsher-Smith Laboratories, LLC to recognize and honor a qualified pharmacist who has demonstrated significant innovation in their respective practice, method or service directly or indirectly resulting in improved patient care and/or advancement of the profession of pharmacy. The tradition of designing innovative pharmaceuticals has been the commitment of Upsher-Smith Laboratories and is driven by the ever-changing needs of patients, physicians, pharmacists, and healthcare organizations. Their perspective is not “more products,” but the right products that make people’s lives better. At every level of their business, they are driven to be the best.

Dr. Garret Hino, PharmD, BCIDP received the Excellence in Innovation Award for his trailblazing career path and innovative pharmacy practice leading to improved infectious disease management in the State of Hawai'i. Dr. Hino is a graduate of the Daniel K. Inouye College of Pharmacy (DKICP) and one of few board certified infectious disease pharmacists in Hawaii. After completing a PGY1 pharmacy residency with DKICP/Hawai'i Pacific Health and a two-year infectious disease fellowship at Loma Linda University Medical Center in California, Dr. Hino started a newly developed position at the Hawai'i State Department of Health (DOH) as their first public health pharmacist in 2022. He has since successfully established the role of a pharmacist in the public health sector and offers subject matter expertise in antimicrobial stewardship (ASP) and antimicrobial resistance (AR) with the Healthcare Associated Infections (HAI) team under the DOH Disease Outbreak Control Division. Currently, he serves as the interim HAI/AR Program Manager – managing a team of epidemiologists, epidemiological specialists, infection preventionists, and other support staff. Dr. Hino has worked in partnership with many entities, including the DKICP to offer education on antimicrobial stewardship topics to all the healthcare settings in Hawaii. Dr. Hino not only shows innovation in his work towards optimizing antimicrobial stewardship programs, monitoring and responding to antimicrobial resistance, and providing education, he also shows innovation in being a pharmacist leader at Hawai'i DOH. 

Lily Van, PharmD, BCACP, CDCES, recipient of the DYP award, is a passionate clinical pharmacist and pharmacy leader in the State of Hawaii. Lily has established a thriving Ambulatory Care Clinical Pharmacy practice at Queen’s Clinical Integrated Physician Network. For the past four years, Lily has provided chronic disease management for her patients at the Queen’s Kahala Clinic and takes pride in helping her patients achieve optimal health outcomes. Lily has also established the PGY-1 Community Based Pharmacy Residency Program at Queen’s Health System, serving as the Residency Program Director since the program’s inception in 2020. Lily is passionate about coaching and mentoring pharmacy residents & students and believes that the future success of the pharmacy profession depends on developing strong and enthusiastic clinical pharmacist leaders. In addition to developing pharmacy residents within our state, she also spends time precepting APPE students for UH Hilo DKICP and the University of Mississippi School of Pharmacy. Recently, the Queen’s Health System has recognized Lily’s accomplishments by awarding her and her team the Quarter 4 Po’okela Award in 2024, and Preceptor of the Year for the PGY-1 Pharmacy Residency Program in 2023. In addition to her contributions to the Queen’s Health System, Lily is a member of the Hawaii Pharmacists Association’s Board of Directors where she supports state-wide pharmacist initiatives and legislation. Lily has also served a member of the Resident Advancement Advisory Group and the Membership and Outreach Advisory Group for the ASHP New Practitioners Forum. Prior to returning to the islands, Lily was an active member of the Mississippi Society of Health-System Pharmacists. Lily’s passion for community service is not limited to pharmacy practice. For the past several years, she has served on the Board of Directors for the Hawaii H.O.M.E. Project leading fundraising efforts for medical care for Hawaii’s houseless population. Not only is Lily an exemplary clinical pharmacist, mentor, and leader, but she also has a way of bringing people together with her caring, down-to-earth, and vivacious personality. 

Past Awardees

2023 Awardees 

Pharmacist of the Year (Sponsored by: Hawaii Pharmacists Association)
The Pharmacist of the Year Award recognizes and honor a qualified pharmacist who has demonstrated significant service and contribution to pharmacy programs, teamwork within the healthcare systems, and service to the community of Hawaii.

Corrie Sanders, PharmD, BCACP, CPGx
The recipient of this award has worked during this last year to move legislation for reimbursement of pharmacy services in the state of Hawaii.  She has advocated for our profession on both a state and national level and was recognized as the 2023 APhA Good Government Pharmacist of the Year award in April. With her leadership, passion and commitment to our profession, the HPhA was able to push legislation for pharmacist provider status in our state further than ever before.

Excellence in Innovation Award (Sponsored by: Upsher-Smith Laboratories, LLC)
The Excellence in Innovation Award is a national award coordinated by the National Alliance of State Pharmacy Associations, and generously sponsored by Upsher-Smith Laboratories, LLC to recognize and honor a qualified pharmacist who has demonstrated significant innovation in their respective practice, method or service directly or indirectly resulting in improved patient care and/or advancement of the profession of pharmacy. The tradition of designing innovative pharmaceuticals has been the commitment of Upsher-Smith Laboratories and is driven by the ever-changing needs of patients, physicians, pharmacists, and healthcare organizations. Their perspective is not “more products,” but the right products that make people’s lives better. At every level of their business, they are driven to be the best.

Crystal TK Tsuda, PharmD, BCACP, CPHQ
The recipient of this year's Excellence in Innovation award has led her pharmacy team in accomplishing many initiatives and strategies to improve the quality and safety of care at Kaiser Permanente. She has developed the medication safety minded culture across Kaiser Permanente Hawaii, focused on process improvement and working with a multi-disciplinary team to implement high leverage strategies in systems to prevent medication errors. This past year, she led her team to an innovative approach to utilize order panels in the electronic medical record in the ambulatory/outpatient setting to support safer medication prescribing.  The order panels focused on specific medications that require renal adjustment serving as a one stop shop for prescription ordering; displaying the patient’s most recent renal function and drug dose selections based on renal dosing guidelines. Thus, it served to provide information and guidance at the earliest point of clinical decision making for ordering providers. Prior to the order panel implementation, the electronic medical record had best practice alerts (BPAs) in place that would pop up after the medication and dose was selected and prior to signing. A retrospective analysis showed that order panels were significantly more effective than BPAs in ensuring that these medications were properly prescribed with the correct dosing recommendations. The clinical significance of utilizing order panels versus BPAs is immense for promoting safer prescribing of medications requiring renal dose adjustment in the ambulatory setting. The KP team is exploring expansion of this strategy to more medications and sharing this best practice with other Kaiser Permanente markets across the U.S. This work was recently recognized as a 2024 Lawrence Patient Safety Award finalist across the Kaiser Permanente enterprise with the winner to be announced in early 2024.

Distinguished Young Pharmacist Award (Sponsored by: Pharmacist Mutual Companies)
The Distinguished Young Pharmacist award was created in 1987 to encourage newer pharmacists to become involved in association activities and community service.  This award recognizes one pharmacist in each state for individual excellence and outstanding contributions. The prestigious award is presented by Pharmacists Mutual Insurance Company, nationally recognized as a leader in providing insurance products and risk management solutions to Pharmacy professionals. 
 

Kelli Aoki, PharmD, BCPS
The 2023 Hawaii Pharmacists Association recipient was selected by a committee of his/her peers as this pharmacist exemplifies and exceeds the criteria required. The recipient of this year’s award joined the KP Hawaii Formulary Management and Drug Initiative Team as a pharmacist specialist in 2020. Since joining Kaiser, she has made notable contributions during her short time in this role. Highlights include transforming the Formulary Management process in KP Hawaii to align with KP Southern California; developing & implementing drug initiatives in the inpatient pharmacy setting resulting in over $100,000 in savings in 2022; developing & implementing a medication safety initiative to minimize abuse/diversion of promethazine with codeine; and further developing the Formulary Management Learning Experience for the KP Hawaii PGY-1 program. Outside of her work at Kaiser, this recipient mentors student pharmacists and contributes to the Hawaii Pharmacists Association as former Board Secretary and as a member of the Membership Committee and Programs Committee. Her performance, contribution, and virtues are an inspiration to everyone she encounters. In conclusion, the Hawaii Pharmacists Association recipient embodies all the qualities one looks for when evaluating individuals for this award.  I am very pleased to make this presentation.  Please share my pleasure in presenting Pharmacists Mutual’s Distinguished Young Pharmacist Award to Kelli Aoki.

2022 Awardees

2021 Awardees (no nominations received)

2020 Awardees