News + Research
Articles and Blogs
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All Pharmacies Are Not the Same: Community Pharmacy Quality
Patients and other stakeholders need to be able to compare pharmacies based on standardized, transparent metrics with a measurement system to make informed decisions.
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The Perfect Ingredient: Vaccine Education With Pharmacy Community Health Workers
In Missouri, community health workers partnered with community pharmacists, CPESN, and others to develop a state-funded program to address vaccine gaps in local communities.
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Community Pharmacies Stepped Up During Covid—and Changed for Good
Pharmacies have long been perceived as commodities. Now, they’re a central tool for removing barriers to health care.
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Experts: Pharmacists, Community Health Workers Key to Success in Missouri Vaccine Gap Program
In an initiative to close vaccine gaps in local Missouri communities, pharmacists and community health workers proved essential.
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Experts: Vaccine Gap Program Can Address Variety of Health Care Gaps in Any Community
Jake Galdo and Annie Eisenbeis discuss their vaccine gap closure program and the ability to utilize the model beyond vaccines.
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Closing the Gap
Community health workers can be a vital component for pharmacies in enhancing vaccination rates. Featured article in NCPA’s America’s Pharmacist. Reprinted with permission.
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The role community pharmacies can play in reducing health inequities
By moving into clinical services and becoming part of comprehensive care teams, community pharmacies can improve access to care and reduce health inequities.
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Shaping the Future of Pharmacy
The pharmacy industry is evolving at an unparalleled rate. Driven by innovations reshaping the way healthcare is delivered, ever-changing consumer preferences, and a growing focus on individualized care, the future of pharmacy is filled with exciting opportunities.
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Pediatric Weight is Crucial to Perfecting the Dose
Evidence indicates that up to 25% of all prescriptions for children could be dosed inappropriately, making it the most common type of medication administration error.
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Pharmacy Technicians With Community Health Worker Training Can Improve the Value of The Pharmacy in Health Care
Community health workers (CHW) can add value to the pharmacy by addressing social determinants of health (SDOH) within their community, according to John (Jake) A. Galdo, PharmD, MBA, BCPS, BCGP, co-founder and chief executive officer,Seguridad, Inc, and CPESN Health Equity; and Christian Tadrus, RPh, PharmD, FASCP, NSC,Sam’s Health Mart Pharmacies; who spoke during a session titled Communicate, Assimilate, and Facilitate: Pharmacy Technician and Community Health Worker Roles Collide, at McKesson ideaShare 2023.
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Pharmacy Staff, Community Health Care Workers Can Team Up to Address Social Determinants of Health
Tripp Logan, PharmD, vice president at SEMO Rx Pharmacies and Logan & Seiler Inc discusses how pharmacy staff and community health care workers can work together to address social determinants of health.
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The Community Pharmacy Can Leverage Trust To Improve Health Equity Outcomes
Community pharmacies are ideal locations to identify and recruit underrepresented patients for clinical trials.
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Pharmacy Technicians, Advanced Techs Can Do More in the Pharmacy
Studies have shown that the presence of advanced pharmacy technicians in a pharmacy has a positive predictive validity to increased monthly immunizations.
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Are Community Health Workers The Key to Promoting Diversity in Clinical Trial Enrollment?
Their expansive scope of services can ultimately help to elevate the work of the entire community pharmacy.
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Richard's Blog #1
Community Health Workers (CHWs) stand at the intersection of Healthcare and Health Equity. They are the new faces of healthcare for high-risk populations.
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Richard's Blog #2
My parents were married nearly 60 years when my mother died. Together, they had been through the end of the Great Depression and a world war. They built a good life together. Suddenly it was gone.
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Richard's Blog #4
OMG! It just struck me. I’m dumber than a box of rocks. Just recently, in a local charity Trivia Competition, my team came in dead last. Every answer I was absolutely certain was answered correctly, was wrong. Even the ones I made my team members correct…….wrong! And to think I wasted all that money on a doctorate.
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Richard's Blog #5
We checked in. She didn’t check out.
One of the lessons we have learned over the years is healthcare is local. Telehealth is fine, but eyeball-to-eyeball is the best.
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Richard's Blog #6
An old friend of mine died not too long ago. I was deeply saddened at his passing. He was an old school, no nonsense, gruff on the outside, marshmallow on the inside community pharmacist.
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Richard's Blog #7
“Here, hold my beer.” In the world of Pharmacy CHWs, we recognize healthcare cannot be delivered solely in a clinic, a pharmacy, or a health system emergency room.
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Community Pharmacies Stepped Up During Covid—and Changed for Good
Pharmacies have long been perceived as commodities. Now, they’re a central tool for removing barriers to health care.
Research
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Addressing social determinants of health in community pharmacy: Innovative opportunities and practice models
Abstract - Social determinants of health (SDoH) account for up to 90% of health outcomes, whereas medical care accounts for only 10%-15%; despite this disparity, only 24% of hospitals and 16% of physician practices screen for the 5 social needs. Community-embedded and highly accessible, pharmacies are uniquely positioned to connect individuals to local community and social resources and thereby address SDoH. In this article, we explore novel community pharmacy practice models that address SDoH, provide real-world examples of these models, and discuss pathways for reimbursement and sustainability.
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Implementation of a self-measured blood pressure program in a community pharmacy: A pilot study
Abstract Background - Hypertension is a leading cause of cardiovascular disease in the United States and is costing the health care system billions of dollars annually. A health program that combines education, empowerment, and monitoring has shown to improve clinical outcomes and decrease overall health care costs.
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Implementation and evaluation of social determinants of health practice models within community pharmacy
Abstract Background - While community pharmacies are an ideal setting for social needs screening and referral programs, information on social risk assessment within pharmacy practice is limited.
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Evaluating pediatric weight-based antibiotic dosing in a community pharmacy
Abstract Background - Owing to pharmacokinetic variations in pediatric patients, many antibiotics require weight-based dosing to ensure medication safety and antimicrobial stewardship. Despite the need for weight-based dosing, prescribers are not legally required to include the weight or diagnosis code on pediatric prescriptions that are necessary components to verify appropriateness. Clinical decision support system (CDSS) can help clinicians improve dosing appropriateness, but little is known about CDSS in a community pharmacy setting. To determine the impact of implementing CDSS in this setting, baseline information is necessary.
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Pharmacy technicians trained as community health workers: A prospective multicenter cohort study
Abstract Background - Community health workers (CHWs) are health professionals who are experts in linking patients to health resources. Although CHWs are employed in a variety of health institutions, access to their services may be challenging for patients in underserved locations. Community pharmacies are uniquely positioned to mitigate this barrier as they provide readily accessible care for patients residing in these areas.
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EVAS: Empirical Validity And Safety
Project Summary - This project showcases a few important aspects of community pharmacy practice. First, it is feasible for pharmacies to collect clinical data, like weight or serum creatinine. Secondly, it highlights the importance of this information during the dispensing process – both clinical laboratory values when available allowed pharmacies to make interventions to optimize medications and improve patient safety. Finally, this research shows the empirical validity of measuring a pharmacy’s performance on these measures. The data shows that improvement on the measures helps improve patient care, showing the measures are a valid assessment of pharmacy quality.
Funded by the Community Pharmacy Foundation
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Through the eyes of community health workers: What was needed to increase COVID-19 vaccine uptake in the Missouri Southeast region
Public health emergencies, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, elucidate the strengths, weaknesses and significant gaps in infrastructure, compatibility and consistency in communication systems and messaging, quality of collaborative relationships and regional collaboration, funding priorities and resource allocation, as well as provider and workforce capacity. They also expose longstanding patterns of mistrust in the government and healthcare systems, and inadequacy in socio-economic infrastructures. These issues resulted in higher COVID-19 infection and mortality rates, and lower vaccination rates in many rural counties across the nation, including Missouri. In response to these challenges, the COVID-19 Response Network was formed in the Southeast corner of Missouri. The Network was a community-academic partnership that brought together community and faith-based leaders, academicians, healthcare providers and administrators, public health practitioners, and pharmacists to facilitate collaboration on education and outreach efforts aimed at reducing vaccine inequity in the 16-county project area.Importantly, the Network also included Community Health Workers (CHWs) who worked with these different agencies and organizations and were at the heart of implementing Network activities. Qualitative methods, including in-depth interviews, were used to explore the professional and personal experiences of CHWs working at the grassroots level during an ongoing pandemic. Narrative analysis revealed effective communication and engagement strategies for increasing vaccine uptake in rural communities. For instance, fear-based messaging was perceived as coercive and met with resistance. In contrast, messages that shared personal experiences and catered to the human need to protect their loved ones were more effective. Trust in the source of information was critical. This study highlights the significance of exploring and leveraging the capacities of trusted community members like CHWs to increase the effectiveness of public health interventions in rural communities.
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Feasibility of a contraceptive-specific electronic health record system to promote the adoption of pharmacist-prescribed contraceptive services in community pharmacies in the United States
Abstract
Objectives
Pharmacists in over half of the United States can prescribe contraceptives; however, low pharmacist adoption has impeded the full realization of potential public health benefits. Many barriers to adoption may be addressed by leveraging an electronic health records (EHR) system with clinical decision support tools and workflow automation. We conducted a feasibility study to determine if utilizing a contraceptive-specific EHR could improve potential barriers to the implementation of pharmacist-prescribed contraceptive services.
Materials and Methods
20 pharmacists each performed two standardized patient encounter simulations: one on the EHR and one on the current standard of care paper-based workflow. A crossover study design was utilized, with each pharmacist performing encounters on both standardized patients with the modality order randomized. Encounters were timed, contraceptive outputs were recorded, and the pharmacists completed externally validated workload and usability surveys after each encounter, and a Perception, Attitude, and Satisfaction survey created by the research team after the final encounter.
Results
Pharmacists were more likely to identify contraceptive ineligibility using the EHR-based workflow compared to the paper workflow (P = .003). Contraceptive encounter time was not significantly different between the 2 modalities (P = .280). Pharmacists reported lower mental demand (P = .003) and greater perceived usefulness (P = .029) with the EHR-based workflow compared to the paper modality.
Discussion and Conclusion
Pharmacist performance and acceptance of contraceptive services delivery were improved with the EHR workflow. Pharmacist-specific contraceptive EHR workflows show potential to improve pharmacist adoption and provision of appropriate contraceptive care.