American Pharmacists Month: The Total Value in Pharmacies Expanding Clinical Offerings

Clinical and community pharmacists are constantly advocating for expansions in their scope of practice across the entirety of health care. With their access to the community, expertise in patient interactions, and several additional factors, pharmacists are now showing their value to the health care sector by offering clinical services with real-world evidence of improved patient outcomes.

“I think as pharmacists we know what we're capable of, but we're not always given that opportunity to prove it to everyone else who might not understand what we're trained to do,” Alyssa Mack, PharmD, pharmacist at Gibbs Pharmacy and Compounding Center in Lebanon, Tennessee, told Drug Topics. “Even though the COVID[-19] pandemic came with a lot of hardship, it was a great opportunity [for pharmacists to step up] and we've seen a lot of changes since then.”

From emergency authorizations during the pandemic to Tennessee’s expansion of scope since then, pharmacists like Mack are continually finding ways to provide new clinical services and enhance their pharmacies’ existing services to benefit patients in the community. Furthermore, it is not just in patients’ best interests for pharmacies to promote additional clinical services, but the pharmacies themselves can also benefit in many ways.

“Your patients win because there's one more place that they can go to for these services and get care that they might not be able to easily access elsewhere,” Mack continued. “But then, it's also really rewarding to the pharmacy and pharmacists to use that knowledge and the skills that [they're] trained to provide.” On top of the rewards of benefiting patients and making health care more accessible, expanding clinical services also often translates to community pharmacy profitability.

Gain expert insights from Mack, who joined us during American Pharmacists Month to discuss the numerous ways in which Gibbs Pharmacy is transforming care within its community. She also touched on overarching ideas within the profession, including pharmacists’ perceptions, barriers to pharmacist-led care—namely, reimbursement—and many other topics.

Gibbs Pharmacy is a Health Mart corporate pharmacy supported by McKesson. Health Mart is a network of over 4000 locally owned, independent pharmacies, offering individualized care tailored to patients’ needs through a wide range of services and solutions.

Stay tuned for weekly podcast episodes of Over the Counter, powered by Drug Topics, every Thursday afternoon. Check out our most recent episode with Steve Moore, PharmD, who also helped Drug Topics celebrate American Pharmacists Month by discussing recent innovations and the importance of collaboration in community pharmacy.

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