The roles that interest you most

AJP readers vote for general service and disease state management pharmacist role followed by GP pharmacist within community pharmacy

At PSA19 conference this year, Emeritus Professor Charlie Benrimoj gave a presentation on the opportunities available for community pharmacists within a health hub pharmacy model.

This includes pharmacists branching out into specialisations.

E/Prof Benrimoj shared the top 10 emerging professional roles within community pharmacy.

1. General Service Pharmacist: For Community Pharmacy Agreement service providers, covering clinical interventions; general, diabetes and pain MedsCheck; Home Medicines Reviews; and additional new programs.
2. Adherence Pharmacist: Programs for new and continuing medications.
3. Point of Care Pharmacist: Prevention, wellness programs and detection (point of care testing).
4. Self-Care Pharmacist: Triage to general practice and emergency departments; minor ailments; pharmacy only products.
5. Vaccination and Immunisation Pharmacist: Influenza and travel vaccine administration.
6. Paediatric Pharmacist: Infant care, baby care and mother care.
7. Aged Care Pharmacist: Ambulatory elderly patients; sessional basis to care centres; and domiciliary visits.
8. Disease State Management Pharmacist: Diabetes; cardiovascular disease; asthma; mental health; single or co-pathologies.
9. GP Pharmacist within Community Pharmacy: Sessional basis to GP surgeries.
10. Medication Safety Pharmacist: Pharmacoepidemiology; data analysis of health records and dispensing data

“Essentially what we’re doing is promoting roles that would have increased health outcomes in people,” E/Prof Benrimoj told AJP.

“The way of picking these roles, what I did was look at where the market would be and more importantly where the trends in primary healthcare are.”

We asked AJP readers: Which of these professional roles you would be interested in pursuing? 

591 voters made the following selections:

• General Service Pharmacist (CI, MedsCheck, HMR) – 38%
• Disease State Management Pharmacist – 38%
• GP Pharmacist within Community Pharmacy – 37%
• Aged Care Pharmacist – 33%
• Medication Safety Pharmacist – 31%
• Vaccination and Immunisation Pharmacist – 29%
• Point of Care Pharmacist (prevention, detection) – 28%
• Self-Care Pharmacist (minor ailments, triage) – 26%
• Paediatric Pharmacist – 20%
• Adherence Pharmacist – 17%
• I don’t believe these roles should exist – 11%
• None of the above – 9%

What readers said:

I’m disappointed to see only 16% of pharmacists are interested in adherence. Improving adherence to medicines is a fundamental role for pharmacists and one we can make such a difference with. Influencing behaviour change is complex, but clearly beneficial to the patient (and indeed the pharmacy business). Much of my time doing HMRs is spent discussing a patient’s beliefs, attitudes and preferences to their health and medicines. My conversation is usually underpinned by the necessity-concerns framework. Why aren’t more pharmacists interested in adherence? – Debbie Rigby

Pity rural generalist pathway was not included – PeterC

With all due respect to all parties….this will become an academic (theoretical) vs real-world (business) discussion. What looks good on paper may not work very well in practise. This smacks so much of political correctness, trying to pigeon hole everything. In a very big business this structure may be workable but I would hate to be the HR manager. ” that was your job…No, I thought it was yours…..or more likely cross-over of roles for same patient” In a small business there will be so many part-time staff to contend with and following up with this miriad of people out of their work hours. I’m sure others will see many other areas which will be un-workable at the coal face. – Jim Tsaoucis

Please don’t make it so complex and avoid placing professional service pharmacists into neat and tidy boxes. This may suit some but it’s not practical or commercial. – Bruce Annabel

I look at that list and in the pharmacy I’m in which has a large emphasis on professional services, all of our pharmacists perform multiple services that fit into several of those categories. I think you can’t be a good pharmacist nowadays and just dispense medication. Nor would you want to – some of the most rewarding parts of my job is when I can directly connect with a customer in a deeper way and help them with their health condition. – Jacqueline Hagidimitriou