Managing Pharmacy Practice education

In planning for the second edition, we started by listening to our fellow educators, pharmacists, and students. Through surveys, e-mails, and conversations we learned about what users liked about the first edition, and what they would like to see added or changed in the future. Using what we learned, we worked with the chapter authors not only to improve the ease of use for faculty and students, but also to reflect the changes in pharmacy practice and management that have occurred in the last 4 years. 

As pharmacy practice evolves from a product to a patient orientation, there are unique challenges that arise in managing the value-added services that pharmacists are developing to meet patient needs (e.g., cholesterol screening, diabetes education, drug therapy monitoring, etc.). A section of this book is dedicated to the planning, implementation, reimbursement and evaluation of these new patient care services offered by pharmacists. 

ASHP s Center on Pharmacy Practice Management monitors, analyzes, and reports on trends in pharmacy practice management. It conducts and publishes an annual national survey of pharmacy practice in health systems, conducts a leadership conference on pharmacy practice management, and coordinates other educational sessions at ASHP meetings. 

The object was to identify and describe the scope of practice that characterizes the critical care pharmacist and critical care pharmacy services. Specillcally the goals were to define the level of clinical practice and specialized skills characterizing the critical care pharmacist as clinician, educator, researcher, and manager and to recommend fundamental, desirable, and optimal pharmacy services and personnel requirements for the provision of pharmaceutical care to critically ill patients. Hospitals having comprehensive resources as well as those with more limited resources were considered. 

It has been my experience that, given the opportunity for one-on-one, collaborative practice with physicians and other health professionals, pharmacy practitioners who have been educated and trained to perform at the level of pharmacotherapeutics specialists almost invariably have convinced the former that the importance of their work will not be lessened, but enhanced, by the increased safety and dispatch with which individualized problems of drug therapy could be managed in collaboration with clinical pharmacy practitioners. 

Once employed, the professional has to maintain his own level of professionalism. Management in pharmaceutical industry will see that the professional has the adequate level and maintains that level. The senior management or directors of the hospital wiU be charged with maintaining the quality level of the professionals and employees. In community pharmacy no authority is available to observe the quality of the professional, unless the organisation of pharmacists or government sets rules for continuous occupation and continuous education and mcmitors it, which is the practice in some Member States e.g. UK. 

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