Intern Perspectives: Jonathan Luong, AMCP Foundation/Pfizer Managed Care Internship

During the past summer, I had the opportunity to participate in the AMCP Foundation/Pfizer, Inc. Managed Care Internship with Cigna Healthcare as my host site. This experience was a truly unique privilege and I am grateful to be able to collaborate with some exceptional preceptors and mentors. Prior to this internship, my exposure to the field of managed care had been primarily limited to elective coursework and the AMCP Foundation P&T competition. This internship provided me an opportunity to apply managed care concepts that I had learned about in the classroom in a real-world setting. Over the course of ten weeks, I gained hands-on experience working both independently and collaboratively on several projects. After completing this internship, I have grown immensely in communication and research skills and have a much stronger understanding of the many pharmacist roles in the industry.

Throughout this internship, I worked with teams in both Cigna Medicare and Commercial lines of business, under the guidance of my primary preceptor, Dr. Annie Schuster. I am appreciative of her investment in my progress and overall experience during the internship. During our weekly check-ins, we would not only provide updates, but would also discuss relevant topics and current events in the managed care space. While working alongside the Medicare teams, I led a collaborative research project and provided support for clinical pharmacy programs. In the commercial line of business, I worked closely with Dr. Nicole Caffiero, assisting with projects such as monthly newsletters focused on FDA-approved pipeline drugs and a pipeline presentation on respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) vaccines. Nicole’s infectious enthusiasm and constructive feedback for me were a great resource.

Dr. Eric Millheim and Dr. Vijaya Henry, my preceptors at Pfizer, served as mentors during the internship as well. Along with other colleagues at Pfizer, they provided weekly educational sessions for interns in learning about the various aspects of the pharmaceutical industry. During our weekly meetings, they not only catered discussion to what was relevant and important to me, but also facilitated connections for me with other team members working across other therapeutic and functional areas. This not only provided me with unique networking opportunities, but also allowed me to truly appreciate the collaborative aspect of work in the pharmaceutical industry.

The research project I worked on with Dr. Chris Powers was centered on demographic and social determinants of health (SDOH) variables in type 2 diabetes medication prescribing. This was a valuable opportunity in developing research skills as we collaboratively worked through the process including topic selection, study design, data acquisition, and model interpretation. I would like to thank not only Chris but also extend my gratitude to co-authors Dr. Annie Schuster, Dr. Tara Esse, and Dr. Lee Parks, for their invaluable contributions as well.

Lastly, I would like to thank the AMCP Foundation, Pfizer Inc., and Ebony Clay for facilitating this phenomenal internship experience. I am looking forward to presenting my research project at AMCP Nexus 2023 in Orland, Florida as the culmination of my time at Cigna.

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