Roles

Pharmacists are trained in phatmacology, pharmacognosy, chemistry, pharmaceutical, pharmaceutical chemistry, pharmacy practice (including drug interactions, medicine monitoring, medication management), pharmaceutics, pharmacy law, physiology, anatomy, biochemistry, kinetics, nephrology ,hepatology, and compounding medications. Additional curriculum covers basic diagnosis with emphasis on disease state management, therapeutics and prescribing (selecting the most appropriate medication for a given patient).

One of the most important roles that pharmacists are currently taking on is one of pharmaceutical care. Pharmaceutical care involves taking direct responsibility for patients and their disease states, medications, and the management of each in order to improve the outcome for each individual patient. Pharmaceutical care has many benefits that include but are not limited to:

• Decreased medication errors
• Increased patient compliance in medication regime
• Better chronic disease state management
• Lessen cost of insurance
• Strong pharmacist-patient relationship

Pharmacists are often the first point-of-contact for patients with health inquiries. This means that pharmacists have large roles in the assessing medication management in the primary care of patients. These roles may include, but are not limited to:

• clinical medication management
• the assessment of patients with undiagnosed or diagnosed conditions and for decisions about the clinical medication management required.
• specialized monitoring of disease states
• reviewing medication regimens
• monitoring of treatment regimens
• delegating work
• general health monitoring
• compounding medicines
• general health advice
• providing specific education to patients about disease states and medications
• oversight of dispensing medicines on prescription
• provision of non-prescription medicines
• counseling and advice on optimal use of medicines
• advice and treatment of common ailments
• referrals to other health professionals if necessary
• dosing drugs in renal and hepatic failure
• pharmacokinetic evaluation
• education of physicians and other health care providers on medications and their proper use
• limited prescribing of medications only in collaboration with other health care professionals
• providing pharmaceutical information
• promoting public health by administering immunizations

In some states, pharmacists have prescriptive authority to either independently prescribe under their own authority or in collaboration with a primary care physician through an agreed upon protocol.