In today's fast-paced job market, one degree takes the spotlight for its impressive versatility: communication. This field of study equips graduates with high-demand skills that are applicable in nearly every industry. 

Luke Overmire ‘06, who majored in communication with two minors in biology and Spanish, recently shared his story as a successful business owner and speaker for the United Nations.

After graduating from Aquinas, Luke worked at Omnicell for 10 years and watched that company grow from 500 employees to over 3,500. While working there, he completed his master’s in Health Communication program at Boston University. 

In 2016, he left Omnicell and formed Diversion Specialists, LLC with his business partner.

Combating Drug Diversion 

Through Diversion Specialists, Luke works with hospitals, healthcare systems and all kinds of care providers to minimize drug diversion, the transfer of medication from the person in need to another person for illicit use. 

“What we look at is drug flow through the system. We look for gaps where people could exploit the process to steal medication,” Luke explains. “Initially, we were looking at doing gap analyses and risk assessments but have grown into other areas related to diversion prevention, detection and response. Many of our findings on the operational risk assessments are based on historical cases that have come to light. For example, if a hospital has settled with DEA (United States Drug Enforcement Administration), we might help them remain compliant. Right now, I’m working with a hospital in New Hampshire that recently settled with DEA/DOJ (Department of Justice) and their state board of pharmacy, and some interesting things have come up in that case that I can use to help other people grow their program. Other bodies are out there too: published literature with some best practices, gold standard type stuff. I use that and my experience as a part of those reviews.” 

Luke’s biggest goal with his work is to help healthcare professionals build a culture of awareness and accountability. He explains that when direct care providers are diverting, it is often for personal use. This means that patients aren’t receiving the meds they’re supposed to be, and they may even be receiving care from a provider who’s under the influence. 

“Everyone wants to have a safe place to receive care,” Luke states. “For providers, a safe place to give care. For staff, a safe place to work. On a higher level, if someone sees something that doesn’t seem right, they need to feel comfortable being able to report that. They need to have a way to report it and know that someone will take appropriate action.”

He explains that in the environments where diversion happens, it’s common for workers and providers to overlook concerns because they either don’t feel comfortable reporting them or don’t have enough training to know what to look for. 

Luke states, “It’s not that the current culture caused it. It’s that it allowed it.”  

From Ignored Email to International Influence

Around June of 2023, Luke was contacted by someone claiming they were from the United Nations. He admitted, “I kind of ignored it because I was like, that’s kind of weird. Why would anyone contact me?”

One day, however, he did respond. He sent over a few available times and ended up on a few preparatory calls for the meeting. He said, “It turns out that the person who contacted me was from the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime. One of their main missions is to ensure people have appropriate access to controlled medicines. As a part of increasing access to legitimate use, they want to make sure they’re doing their best to help prevent diversion. They had wanted me to talk about this risk of diversion because that’s my area of expertise: the whole diversion risk and how people are diverting. It goes hand-in-hand with people having appropriate access.” 

Eventually, Luke went to Vienna for a meeting to discuss improving access to controlled medications on an international level. Representatives from most U.N. countries were at this meeting, and Luke explained that hearing these representatives speak was eye-opening to the realities of other countries. He learned that in these countries, there is significant concern about access issues and the risk of theft or tampering if they were to receive more products.

“In many cases, countries outside of the US simply don’t have any drugs,” Luke explained. To put it in context, if they have to do a neonatal intubation, they were talking about how they just shove the tube in. They don’t have anything to give as a sedative. It’s very eye-opening, and it’s a huge issue. Some political-type issues are also behind the scenes. I learned that countries are allocated supplies through the International Narcotics Control Board, an agency of the U.N. But it’s all based on historical usage. So, if the U.S. uses 80%, guess what we get next time. 80%.” 

“Somewhat naively, I expected to go there and talk about how much we’re wasting in this country and how that amount of waste presents a huge opportunity for someone who is intent on diverting. When I went there, I learned about all these countries that don’t have anything to begin with. I was like, I can’t talk about how we’re wasting more than half of what we do have when all these places don’t have anything. So, I had to change my tactics a bit,” he shared. “I’m learning a lot, and the message I’m really trying to get across this year (when I return to the UN) is how to create a culture of awareness and accountability.” 

In October, another U.N. meeting will take place in Vienna. “The whole meeting will be focused on ways to look into diversion prevention, detection, and response and how to tackle that problem. We know from our experience in the U.S., where we have the most access, that we have significant problems with people abusing and people becoming dependent on controlled substances. So, getting in front of that is one of my goals for these countries that hope to gain more access to medications. If we build the awareness now, when they do have access to controlled substances, they’ll be ahead of the game.”  

How AQ Shaped Luke’s Career

When asked about how his academic journey at AQ shaped his career path, Luke shared a memory about being in Advanced Public Speaking with Dave Weinandy. He said, “I know Dave can attest to this. I will tell you very frankly, I’m not historically a very confident public speaker. Certainly, that was a huge element going through Advanced Public Speaking. I just remember Dave had a bag of 'M&M-mmys.' He brought in bags of M&Ms that you would be awarded for different categories. I believe mine was, ‘most improved.” That boosted my self-esteem quite a bit, and I think that set me miles ahead.” 

At AQ, Luke discovered that he needs to feel comfortable and confident presenting the material itself before he can comfortably and confidently present. He explained that “when you go to these U.N. meetings, it really is what you would see on TV. You have to push the button on your individual microphone, wait for the light to illuminate, and then the cameras zoom in on you and you show up on the screen in the room and across the world. It’s a little bit intimidating, but I certainly do think that my experience at Aquinas – through the communication program and the capstone project courses taught by Dave and Penny Avery, where the final requirement was to present our research project to all of our professors and peers – prepared me for this type of engagement, even though the content is certainly different.” 

“Obviously, what I’m doing now has nothing directly to do with communication, but I would argue that there’s communication involved with anything you go into. My job isn’t in traditional communications. I’m not in marketing or PR or anything like that, but I would say I use my skills every day.”