Pharm. D. Associates
Dr. Timothy Atkinson
Pharm.D., BCPS, CPE
Timothy is a Clinical Pharmacy Pain Specialist and federal employee in a regional referral pain clinic near Nashville, Tennessee. Dr. Atkinson specializes in complex and high-risk pain medication management through direct patient care and electronic consult services. He is a Residency Director for a PGY-2 Pain and Palliative Care Pharmacy Residency program and strong advocate for expansion of clinical pharmacists with expertise in collaborative drug therapy management (CDTM) specific to pain management. Dr. Atkinson is the Executive Director for the PROMPT Education Foundation which is a non-profit dedicated to restoring balance to pain and opioid education. He is also the owner of Vanguard Pain Management Consulting where he advises clients in managed care and the pharmaceutical industry His research interests include opioid equivalencies, serum level monitoring, pain management in specialty disease states, and the elderly.
Dr. Jeffrey J. Bettinger
Pharm.D.
Dr. Jeffrey J. Bettinger, PharmD, is the Senior Strategy Consultant and Therapeutics Associate for Remitigate, LLC, and is a Pain Management Pharmacist Specialist at Saratoga Hospital in Saratoga, NY.
Dr. Bettinger has worked for Remitigate for 3 years and has been integral in its development and expansion over that time. He oversees review of various medical documents for plaintiff or defense, including but not limited to insurance claims and litigation. He also continues to work closely with Remitigate’s CEO, Dr. Jeff Fudin in the ongoing evolution of Remitigate as the company sets to build upon its prior success and flourish in the clinical realm.
Dr. Bettinger earned his PharmD from Albany College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences in 2017 with a concentration in nephrology. Following his doctoral training, he completed a PGY1 general practice residency at the Stratton VA Medical Center in Albany, NY. Immediately following his general practice residency, he trained with Drs. Fudin and Wegrzyn and completed a PGY2 Pain and Palliative Care residency at the same institution. He continues to have a strong academic background publishing in peer-reviewed journals, presenting at regional and national meetings, and teaching various classes at different colleges of pharmacy. He also mentors students and residents at his clinical sites of practice and plans on continuing this mentorship as he transitions to Saratoga Hospital.
Dr. Jacqueline Cleary
Pharm.D., BCACP
Dr. Cleary graduated from Furman University with a bachelor’s Degree of Biochemistry in 2010 and received her Pharm.D. in 2014 from the South Carolina College of Pharmacy, MUSC campus. She completed her post-graduate year one general pharmacy residency training with Sentara Medical System in Norfolk, VA and then completed her post-graduate year two pain and palliative care residency training at the Albany Stratton VA Medical center in Albany, NY. She is also board certified in ambulatory care pharmacy.
Dr. Cleary is currently an Assistant Professor at the Albany College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences in the Department of Pharmacy Practice. Her current practice site is Saratoga Hospital Medical Group Community Health Center in Saratoga Springs, NY. Dr. Cleary serves as clinical pharmacist specializing in primary care with a focus in pain management. She is also an Adjunct Professor at SAGE Graduate School of Nursing and serves as the pharmacology course coordinator. Recent national attention to the opioid epidemic has been an increasing subject of interest for Dr. Cleary. She has numerous posters, publications and has presented both locally and nationally on the topics of pain management, pharmacogenetics, naloxone, and risk mitigation strategies to reduce opioid abuse and misuse.
Dr. Lisa Dragic
Pharm.D., BCPS.
Lisa Dragic serves as a clinical pharmacy specialist in pain management at the Central Arkansas Veterans Healthcare System (CAVHS). Dr. Dragic specializes in complex and high-risk pain medication management through direct patient care and electronic consult services. She is co-RPD for the PGY2 Pain Management and Palliative Care Pharmacy Residency at CAVHS. She obtained her doctorate from Temple University School of Pharmacy in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She completed her PGY-1 Pharmacy Practice Residency at the Albany Stratton VA Medical Center and her PGY-2 Pain and Palliative Care Pharmacy Residency at the Central Arkansas Veterans Healthcare System. Her research interests include substance use disorder, buprenorphine and other unique opioids as an alternative to traditional opioids, impacts of opioid tapering relating to suicidality, pharmacogenomics, and psychopharmacology.
Dr. Sooyeon Kwon
Pharm.D., Ph.D
Dr. Sooyeon Kwon is a clinical pharmacy specialist and researcher dedicated to the field of rheumatology. Currently working at Stratton VA Medical Center in Albany, New York. Her clinical service includes high risk medication management including biologic DMARDs, through direct patient care in her clinic. Sooyeon provides consulting services for rheumatology pharmacotherapy topics such as drug information, treatment options for rare rheumatologic conditions, and literature review for off-label insurance authorization.
Previously worked as a research health scientist in Veteran’s Health Administration in health/ pharmaceutical outcomes research, Sooyeon also provides consulting services in the areas of study design, data analysis plan, report, and publication.
Sooyeon advocates patient centered clinical practice in rheumatology care, and actively incorporates patient’s experience using Patient Reported Outcome measures (PRO) for disease monitoring and assessment in her routine clinical practice. She believes education empowers patients to take initiative in their care that she supports rheumatology patient group activities through medication education and counseling.
Dr. Amelia Persico
Pharm.D., MBA
Dr. Persico graduated from Union Graduate College with an MBA in healthcare management in 2016 and Albany College of Pharmacy & Health Sciences with a Doctor of Pharmacy in 2017. She completed a PGY-1 general practice pharmacy residency at the Stratton VA Medical Center in Albany NY in 2019 and a PGY-2 in Pain Management and Palliative Care at the same institution in 2020. Dr. Persico is a clinical pharmacy specialist at a community based outpatient clinic where she uses her expertise in pain management and pharmacotherapy to provide disease state management in the primary care setting.
Dr. Thien Pham
Pharm.D.
Dr. Thien Pham is a Clinical Pharmacy Specialist in Pain Management practicing in the greater Los Angeles/Orange County area of Southern California and expert legal witness/consultant with REMITIGATE, LLC. Dr. Pham is a Navy Veteran who served his enlistment training at the Naval Hospital Corpsman School in Great Lakes, Illinois and Naval School of Health Sciences in Portsmouth, Virginia and was stationed at the Naval Hospital in Okinawa, Japan and Ambulatory Care Center in New Orleans, Louisiana. After his five-year enlistment as a Hospital Corpsman and Pharmacy Technician, Dr. Pham returned to California, where he earned his Associate of Science from Riverside City College, Bachelor of Science in Biochemistry from the University of California, Riverside, and Doctor of Pharmacy from Touro University, California.
Dr. Pham completed his Post Graduate Year 1 (PGY1) Pharmacy Residency at the VA Palo Alto Health Care System in Palo Alto, California and Post Graduate Year 2 (PGY2) in Pain & Palliative Care Pharmacy Residency at the Stratton VA Medical Center in Albany, New York. He is certified in Basic Life Support (BLS), received his teaching certificate from the Albany College of Pharmacy, Pain Management Practice Based certificate from the New York State Council of Health-system Pharmacists (NYSCHP), Advanced Practice Pharmacist (APh) certificate from the California Board of Pharmacy, and is an avid naloxone overdose kit educator. Dr. Pham has lectured live and by Webinar on various pain-related topics to physicians, pharmacists, nurses, and students.
In addition to his clinical and teaching duties, Dr. Pham has been actively involved with drafting manuscripts for publication in peer-reviewed journals such as American Society of Addiction Medicine, Journal of Pain Medicine, Journal of Pain Research, Journal of Medical Clinics of North America, PAINWeek Journal, Practical Pain Management, and Pharmacotherapy: The Journal of Human Pharmacology and Drug Therapy.
Dr. Erica Wegrzyn
Pharm.D.
Dr. Erica Wegrzyn is a clinical pharmacy specialist in pain management at the Stratton VA Medical Center in Albany, New York, specializing in chronic noncancer pain and palliative care with collaboration in an interdisciplinary team. She is adjunct faculty with Western New England University College of Pharmacy and Albany College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences. Dr. Wegrzyn has numerous publications and is an Associate Editor-in-Chief for the Journal of Pain Research. Her research interests include buprenorphine and other unique opioids as an alternative to traditional opioids, opioid transition and dosing, in-home naloxone distribution, emergency response, and technology platforms to promote opioid safety.
Behavioral Health Associates
Dr. Michael Schatman
Clinical Psychologist
Dr. Schatman is a clinical psychologist who has spent the past 35 years working in multidisciplinary chronic pain management. He is currently on the adjunct teaching faculty of the Department of Public Health & Community Medicine at the Tufts University School of Medicine and Tufts University School of Dental Medicine in Boston. Dr. Schatman is the author of over 140 journal articles and book chapters on various aspects of chronic pain management, and lectures regularly on pain management on local, national and international bases. He is also the editor of Ethical Issues in Chronic Pain Management and Chronic Pain Management: Guidelines for Multidisciplinary Program Development, both of which were released by Informa Healthcare in 2007. Dr. Schatman is a member of the Editorial Boards of numerous journals. For the past 6 years, he has served as the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Pain Research. He is the past-Chairperson of the Ethics Special Interest Group of the American Pain Society, is a member of the Ethics Council and the Opioid Advisory Committee of the American Academy of Pain Medicine, and is on the Board of Directors of the American Society of Pain Educators – which named him 2011 Clinical Pain Educator of the Year.
Legal Counsel
Dan Jochnowitz
J.D.
Dan Jochnowitz serves as our outside General Counsel. Dan is an experienced corporate, commercial transactions and IP specialist with over 30 years of in-house and private practice experience, where he has assisted technology and biotech companies, banks, developers, universities and other organizations in the U.S. and in various other countries including China, Russia, France, Australia, Thailand, Malaysia, Ecuador and Vietnam.
Dan’s practice includes a wide variety of complex technology and intellectual property transactions such as licensing agreements, research and development collaborations, manufacture and supply arrangements, distribution and reseller arrangements, sales rep agreements, SaaS subscription arrangements, service level arrangements, source code escrow arrangements, consumer and end-user facing agreements (e.g., website and mobile app terms of service, privacy policies and other end user license agreements), non-disclosure agreements, consulting and professional services agreements, and other arrangements and agreements involving the commercial exploitation of technology and intellectual property.