What New ICU Guidelines Mean for the Pharmacist Profession

Along with her colleagues, plus support from various health care organizations, Andrea Sikora, PharmD, MSCR, FCCM, FCCP, BCCCP, recently led a committee dedicated to updating intensive care unit (ICU) guidelines. Formalizing critical care pharmacists as essential members of ICU teams, the document that Sikora and her colleagues published has the potential to truly transform the pharmacist’s role.

“To me, what this document is saying, as opposed to just saying they're essential clinical partners, it's saying you have to make sure that there is a pharmacist for every ICU patient,” Sikora, associate professor of biomedical informatics at the University of Colorado School of Medicine, told Drug Topics. “These are members of the team that need to be there 24/7, 365. Think of how crazy it would be to go into an ICU and not have a nurse or a physician. I think that this document is trying to say that is similarly not best practice to lack a pharmacist.”

Diving into these new guidelines and how ICU pharmacists’ roles have evolved over time, we caught up with Sikora to get her perspective on the paper and what doors it can open up for aspiring pharmacy professionals. According to Sikora and her colleagues, with close to 5 million patients visiting the ICU each year, pharmacists are necessary to manage patients’ medications and potential for adverse drug reactions.

“I do feel that this document does a good job of saying we know that all of [pharmacists’ roles] provide value to the health care system and to patient care,” said Sikora. “Not only do we want to celebrate that, but we want to actively put infrastructure in to support it.”

Stay tuned for weekly podcast episodes on Over the Counter every Thursday afternoon. Check out our previous episode with Bil Schmidtknecht, who shared his son’s tragic story and how it forced him into the patient advocacy space.

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Reference

Sikora A, Murray B, Henry K, et al. Consensus recommendations for the integration of critical care pharmacists on intensive care unit teams: endorsed by the American Association of Critical‐Care Nurses, American College of Clinical Pharmacy, American Society of Health‐System Pharmacists, Institute for Safe Medication Practices, and Society of Critical Care Medicine. JACCP. August 4, 2025. https://doi.org/10.1002/jac5.70084