Member Spotlight: Bill Altland, R.Ph

Bill Altland, R.Ph. Retired Craig, Alaska

Pharmacy/academic practice: Co-founder (with Pharmacist wife Sarah) of Whale Tail Pharmacy, the first and only retail community pharmacy on Prince of Wales Island, Alaska

Pharmacy school and graduation year: UAMS Class of 1980

Years in business/years teaching: We owned our pharmacy business in Alaska for 14 years. But we were also pharmacist missionaries in Zaire (now called the Democratic Republic of Congo) for 4 years, as well as at a mission hospital in Haiti for 6 months.

Favorite part of the job and why: Helping our friends and neighbors in rural remote Southeast Alaska as well as in Congo and Haiti.

Least favorite part of the job and why: Time spent dealing with insurance companies when we should have been using that time helping our friends & neighbors.

What do you think will be the biggest challenges for pharmacists in the next five years? In a pharmacy business: Having enough time to adequately help pharmacy patrons due to time restraints caused by the time spent dealing with all the details necessary to process insurance claims and insurance boondoggles.

Oddest request from a patient/customer: A request by a customer for a 20cc syringe, a large gauge needle and a bottle of formaldehyde. He was a local commercial fisherman who wanted to preserve the exoskeleton of an Alaska king crab - that he had caught off Kodiak Island, Alaska.

Bill Altland and his wife Sarah

Recent books read: “My Utmost for His Highest” by Oswald Chambers

Favorite activities/hobbies: Taking LONG motorcycle road trips. Once rode a moto solo on a 5 month trip from Alaska to the southern tip of South America.

Ideal dinner guests: Abraham Lincoln And Winston Churchill

If not a pharmacist then…: I just can’t think of anything I’d rather do than be a small town pharmacy business owner.

Why should a pharmacist or student in Arkansas be an active member of the Arkansas Pharmacists Association?

To be part of the “action” of our profession, not just a spectator. And to meet colleagues who have the same interests & challenges as you do.

*Bill is an Arkansas native who regularly returns to Arkansas for the APA Annual Convention. He was scheduled to be a featured speaker at the 2020 Annual Convention prior to the pandemic.