Biography
Fern Kaufman is a native of the Delaware Valley, growing up in Northeast Philadelphia and attending Northeast High School.
Just weeks out of high school, Fern departed for Israel for her first year of college at the Hebrew University if Jerusalem on a leadership training program, one in which thirty high school graduates out of approximately six hundred applicants were accepted. Completing her first year of college in five months, the program moved on to a kibbutz (a self-supportive collective community) next to the Gaza strip in the desert. Throughout the nine months in Israel, Fern traveled all over the country becoming immersed in the local culture, volunteering with children, teaching and learning about the Middle East and witnessing first hand the history of many peoples and faiths. She would return to the United States teaching Hebrew language and religious school for eight years.
Once back home, she enrolled at Temple University and earned a Bachelor of Science in Pharmacy degree, and then a Doctor of Pharmacy degree from the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy at the University of the Sciences in Philadelphia. A lifelong learner, she is now completing her Masters of Business Administration in Healthcare Administration Degree at Wilmington University.
Dr. Kaufman has spent her life dedicated to healthcare as a licensed pharmacist having practiced in both outpatient pharmacies and predominantly in the inpatient hospital setting as a clinical pharmacist. She has practiced in the hospital at the patient bedside and on the administrative side directing the pharmacy operations for a thirty-hospital Catholic health system with sites in eleven states from Maine to Florida.
A newcomer to the political realm, the issues of healthcare are imperative to Fern and the time has come for her to step into the world of public service. She hopes to bring her knowledge and expertise of the healthcare system full circle to help the state and her district come together with others in the legislature to make Pennsylvania a model for efficient and available health care to everyone in the Commonwealth.
A strong clinical and analytical background partnered with an array of sound business experiences will serve the citizens of the 26th Legislative District with passion and purpose spanning across each and every issue facing those trying to provide a safe, productive atmosphere to educate their children and live their lives.
Professionally, Fern has served as the President of the Pennsylvania Society of Health- System Pharmacists and is currently completing her presidential duties as a member of the Executive Committee of the Board for PSHP. As the only Pennsylvania pharmacy organization dedicated to the profession of pharmacy as practiced in the hospital setting, Fern has testified before the House Professional Licensure Committee twice on issues regulating the practice of pharmacy technicians in the Commonwealth as well as the expansion of the scope of practice of pharmacists in the state. Fern worked with PSHP to develop and pass Act 102, signed by Gov. Ed Rendell into law which effectively updated the Pharmacy Practice Act to allow for pharmacists to collaboratively manage medication therapy offering patients a new level of expert care not previously afforded them under the old Pharmacy Practice Act.
As a key stakeholder for healthcare in the state, Dr. Kaufman has visited Harrisburg at the invitation of the House Professional Licensure Committee to speak to the issues of the hospital pharmacist and how they affect the citizens of the Commonwealth. The opportunity to make this relationship more "official" is one in which Fern feels is imperative to furthering the horizon of health care in Pennsylvania thus opening a new avenue for Dr. Kaufman to bring her experiences as a critical care and pain management clinical specialist and healthcare administrator to the Pennsylvania Statehouse. Fern also holds an appointment as a clinical instructor at the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy and has spent much time educating students about the practice of pharmacy both from a clinical aspect as well as an administrative standpoint.
Although healthcare is a focal point for Fern, the emphasis on fairness to all is a driver for her candidacy. Property taxes, open space, environmental protection and renewable energy development coupled with creating jobs and decreasing crime are complex problems that need serious, dedicated people to work both sides of the aisle and begin the process of making life better for those who live in the 26th District and all who proudly call Pennsylvania home, as Fern has done her whole life.