Dr. Kristopher Michael Rigas PharmD, TTS

Kristopher started his journey into Pharmacy at a very young age. This early exposure was made possible by his father Dr. Michael T. Riags PharmD who has practiced Pharmacy for over 40 years. Michael wanted his children to understand what he was doing when he wasn’t at home and made a consistent effort to involve his children whenever possible. This desire resulted in Kristopher visiting and spending time with his father at work as early as age 5.

Over the years, Kristopher was able to see the impact his father made in the lives of others on a daily basis and these early experiences are credited as being the foundation and source of inspiration for Kristopher’s own passion about helping others. Over the years, as Michael continued to advance his career and impact on his patients, it also acted as a continuing education course for Kristopher. By being given a front row seat into the career of his father, Kristopher was able to see the inner workings of Pharmacy in a way many practicing Pharmacists never see in their entire career. Kristopher has always been vocal about how being able to witness his fathers career instilled into him a level of understanding, devotion, unrelenting passion not taught in school and rarely found in the industry.

Kristopher decided at age 17 he wanted to follow in his father’s footsteps. He had seen the significant impact his father’s own dedication had made in the lives of thousands of people and Kristopher knew this is what he was meant to do. Kristopher often refers to himself and his goal as becoming “Mike Rigas 2.0”, taking all the lessons learned over his fathers 40 years and using those to evolve the practice of Pharmacy to the next level.

Kristopher graduated from the University of California Santa Cruz with the dual degrees of a BS of Biochemistry/Molecular Biology and a BA in Business Management Economics with a Minor in Accounting. Kristopher had seen first hand from his father how much cost and finance limited a Pharmacy’s ability to help patients and how patient costs were often a primary factor in a patient’s treatment choice. It was from his early years watching his father that Kristopher realized his desire to be able to “understand Pharmacy from the cellular level to the patient level and then from the patient level to the bottom line”. Understanding that without a mastery of the entire cycle, start to finish, he would never be able to truly serve his patients.

Upon graduation from UC Santa Cruz Kristopher continued his dream of serving his community and enrolled in the prestigious University of Southern California School of Pharmacy. Here Kristopher was able to further build his foundation of understanding and training in the field of Pharmacy. In addition to his education at USC, Kristopher now being a Intern Pharmacist was finally able to join his father at work in a professional capacity by working at Kabafusion, a nationally recognized speciality infusion pharmacy, his father Michael cofounded. This experience continued to accelerate Kristopher’s understanding of Pharmacy by directly exposing him to the inner workings of a state of the art Pharmacy provider, allowing Kristopher to see a level of practice of Pharmacy few pharmacists are able to practice at. It was also during this time Kristopher made his first professional steps into the field of Integrative Medicine at Santa Monica Homeopathic Pharmacy. Here he began learning about treatment modalities such as plant based medicines, supplements and a more preventive approach to viewing human wellness, a practice and passion he still shares with his patients today.

After graduating from USC School of Pharmacy Kristopher decided to not join his father’s business. Instead he wanted to gain further exposure into different types of Pharmacy. Over the next 8 years Kristopher was able to gain exposure to non-sterile compounding, Long Term Care, Retail and Concierge Retail. During these years Kristopher was able to continue to add new understanding of Pharmacy, both the good and the bad. He continued his life long practice of being a student of Pharmacy and was able to evolve his perspectives on what best practices looked like at the patient level. With a unique combination of strong academics, work ethic, and a rare level of devotion to his patients Kristopher excelled in each environment further building his style of patient care practices.

In 2023 Kristopher decided it was time to take the most important step of his professional career. He realized it was time to finally after 30 years of Pharmacy exposure and 17 years of planning, to found his own Pharmacy Center of Excellence. In every professional role Kristopher had been in, he always knew there was more that could be done to help patients. He knew that his patients were not getting the most optimized care, treatment and experience he knew he could provide due to the constraints of his employers. Kristopher knew it was time to step out into the world on his own, no longer limited or constrained by employers, finally free to share his devotion and passion for people unfiltered.

Your Personal Pharmacy is an idea born from over 30 years of sitting on the side lines, doing things the way they have always been done, while at the same time knowing there was a better way. It is inspired from an accumulation of observed frustrated patients and non optimized outcomes which resulted from an outdated way of doing things. From all the professional moments where Kristopher knew he could have done more but was not empowered to do such, Your Personal Pharmacy was forged.

Your Personal Pharmacy is Kristophers vision for what Pharmacy services, Disease Management and Preventive Medicine should look like. A truly patient first, no excuses, outcomes obsessed style of working with patients one at a time to understand their individual experiences, needs, concerns, issues, fears and dreams in a dedicated effort to facilitate improved health for all.