BUIES CREEK – Harnett Health System CEO and President Kenneth Bryan told more than 600 students at Campbell University’s College of Pharmacy & Health Sciences that they are in the middle of growth, at a university that is on the move.
Speaking at the College’s opening Convocation Ceremony Friday morning, he shared that Harnett County is the fastest growing micropolitan area in the United States.
“Hopefully by the time you graduate, Campbell University and Harnett Health will be far down the road in creating over 2,000 new jobs, one of which you may seek to fill,” said Bryan, who also serves as senior vice president of WakeMed Health and Hospitals.
Bryan stated this growth is marked by the expansion of Harnett Health’s new hospital in Lillington, Campbell’s growth of health care education programs, the Wake County population moving south on the northern tier of Harnett county and Ft. Liberty now becoming the largest Army base in the world just below the county to the southwest.
He commented on the new path of health care, moving from a structure that waits until patients are sick to a system that works diligently to keep individuals healthy, and the period of transforming change students will face over the next five to 10 years.
But despite the new jobs in Harnett County and tremendous changes in the profession, he focused on the importance of the health care industry providing “great care, delivered in a compassionate and human caring way.”
“What you need to challenge yourself with is whether you have effectively thought through your ability to engage each and every day with people, whether in health care or not, in a way that values them and cares for them.”
Through personal struggles, Bryan understands that health care needs to be more about people than just a job. He urged students to look at their chose profession and work differently by engaging in their patients’ lives.
“Seek to serve rather than to be served,” he said. “Make a choice to care and to learn to the best of your ability so that you can serve your best.”
QUOTABLE
“At Campbell University College of Pharmacy & Health Sciences, excellence is what we repeatedly do; it is our habit. As you proceed with your education here, remember that you are being trained at a University where excellence is what and who we are.”
– Paige Brown, PharmD ’06, president-elect, CPHS Alumni Association Board of Directors and assistant professor of pharmacy practice, one of the featured speakers at Convocation.
Words of encouragement, after referencing all four pharmacy classes and the faculty with a metaphor to classic cartoons: earth (P1), water (P2), fire (P3), wind (P4) and heart (faculty). “And through our powers combined we all can become captains of pharmacy. I encourage you to take these fundamental elements that were provided by this great institution and become leaders, no captains of our profession. Remember the power is yours.”
– Keeli Michael, 2014 student pharmacist, president, Pharmacy Student Executive Board, speaking on behalf of the pharmacy student body.
Closing her greetings with words of advice for the physician assistant class of 2014, “For those days when you just feel like you can’t absorb anymore…we can order scans, we can read x-rays, we can write you a script, that will take the pain away, because we are bringing the best, each day of the week, we are Campbell PAs, down in Buies Creek.”
– Ashley Green, 2013 physician assistant practice and MSCR candidate, president, Wallace Student Society, representing the PA Program during the event.
Story by Andrea Pratt
Photo by Bennett Scarborough
Pictured: Kenneth Bryan, CEO and president of Harnett Health System and senior vice president of WakeMed Health and Hospitals, presents the keynote address during Campbell University’s College of Pharmacy & Health Sciences’ Convocation Ceremony.