Health Care Providers Increasingly Believe Pharmacists Should Take on More Primary Care Duties
A survey conducted by Surescripts, a health care solutions company, explored the attitudes of pharmacists and prescribers towards ongoing issues and challenges currently facing the industry.
Based on results from a Surescripts survey, an increasing number of pharmacists and various types of clinicians congruently believe that the role of the pharmacist in providing primary care should be expanded. Most pharmacists and clinicians were also in agreement that medication costs and employee burnout were the 2 most pressing issues within the industry today.
What’s the Issue?
To conduct its survey, Surescripts partnered with APCO Insight to ask pharmacists and various care providers (physicians, physicians assistants, and nurse practitioners) questions about topics like job priorities and challenges, impressions of the wider industry, and views toward expanding pharmacists’ role in patient care.1 Surveys were conducted from April 24 to May 2, 2024, and 506 individuals submitted a response.
According to Surescripts, 85% of pharmacists and 76% of clinicians believe that medication cost is the biggest issue in the health care industry. | image credit: dusanpetkovic1 / stock.adobe.com
As far as the most pressing issues within the industry, responses yielded medication costs and employee burnout as the highest-ranking issues. Of the 506 respondents, 85% of pharmacists and 76% of clinicians believe that medication cost is the biggest issue, while 85% of pharmacists and 72% of clinicians believe the biggest issue is burnout.
Respondents were also asked about the following statement: “We should allow pharmacists to take on more primary care duties like performing point-of-care testing and diagnostics, managing medications used to treat chronic conditions, and prescribing medications for certain conditions.” In their responses, 75% of pharmacists and 29% of other clinicians agreed with the statement. And while over 70% of clinicians still do not agree with the statement, there was a 3% increase regarding the number of clinicians that agreed.1
Why it Matters
- Addressing the disconnect—or the increasingly shortening gap—between clinicians and pharmacists, sentiments regarding the pharmacist’s role in primary care are slowly but surely shifting in a positive direction. Despite a significant drop-off in agreement of allowing pharmacists to perform more primary care duties (75% of pharmacists agree but only 29% of clinicians agree), the results of this survey illustrate how pharmacists’ scope of practice is expanding and how the sentiments toward pharmacists’ duties are evolving.
- Looking deeper at pharmacists’ feelings toward their own role in health care, just 36% of pharmacists believe that their current role completely fulfills their patients’ needs. This specific survey response demonstrates pharmacists’ desire to expand their role in providing patients with care. In an American Pharmacists Association release, they say that 80% of patients think pharmacists play an integral role as part of the general health care system, according to data from a Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health survey.2 While clinician perspectives on the pharmacist’s role in health care are lagging behind, general feelings toward their role are changing year after year, potentially paving the way for a new dynamic as far as US health operations are concerned.
Expert Commentary
- “Barriers that limit health intelligence sharing between clinicians prevent the benefits of an evolving care team, like greater efficiency and more accessible care for patients, from being fully realized. Policies are evolving at the state level to allow pharmacists to provide care at the top of their education and training. While this is a step in the right direction, a truly comprehensive policy shift is still needed to bring reimbursement and access to patient intelligence sharing in line with how care is being delivered today so that we can continue helping healthcare heal itself,” said Frank Harvey, CEO of Surescripts.1
- “This new data shows that patients are driving demand for pharmacists to provide a broader range of clinical care services closer to home, but they need to be reimbursed for these services and gain access to key patient insights to ensure they can provide better quality, safe and less costly care. Given the primary care provider shortages we are seeing, it’s becoming more critical to advance policies that allow pharmacists to care for patients at the full scope of their education and training – which includes medication management for patients with chronic conditions and provide test-to-treat services for patients for routine illnesses,” said Shannon Reidt, PharmD, MPH, MS, BCPS, Director of Medication Research and Analytics at Surescripts.1
In Depth Insights
Aside from the role of pharmacists in health care and the top-ranking issues in the industry, respondents were also asked about the handling of sharing private health care information across health care networks.
- When it comes to the safe and secure exchanging of sensitive health care data and patient information, pharmacists and clinicians agree that it is “somewhat” or “very difficult.” Of 506 respondents, 46% of pharmacists and 31% of clinicians agreed with this sentiment.1 With a question expanding outside of simply just the roles of pharmacists and clinicians, the 2 groups may not feel safe and secure due to ongoing cyberattacks and uncertainty behind the technological systems of the US health care industry.
- However, when it comes to the connection and collaboration between clinicians and pharmacists, the 2 groups shared differing opinions. More pharmacists (85%) than clinicians (57%) believe connecting pharmacists and other clinicians with centralized clinical information about their patients is a priority.1 Again, while this response is not solely focused on the role of pharmacists in health care, the overall opinions show that pharmacists are yearning for general industry collaboration more than that of clinicians and other health care providers.
