Pharmacists Can Act as Navigators for Patients Using Digital Health Tools
George Van Antwerp, MBA, senior vice president of Product Innovation and Strategic Planning at Prime Therapeutics, discusses how pharmacists can help patients decide which digital tools are best for them.
Digital health tools have quickly become an integral part of the health care industry for their uses in improving health care accessibility, disease management and patient outcomes. These tools, which include telemedicine platforms, wearable devices and mobile health apps, can be applied to various therapeutic areas.1
George Van Antwerp, MBA, wrote a commentary for the Journal of the American Pharmacists Association titled “Pharmacy 2050: A new clinical and patient experience.”2 In it, he discussed the evolving health care landscape, clinical innovations and what role pharmacists have to play, from clinical specialists to digital coaches.
Van Antwerp, senior vice president of Product Innovation and Strategic Planning at Prime Therapeutics, sat down with Drug Topics® to discuss how pharmacists can act as navigators in helping patients integrate digital health solutions into their care and how health systems can ensure that patients, especially those in lower-access areas, are able to fully benefit from advancements in digital health tools.
“[We] know that it can be challenging,” Van Antwerp said. “Consumers don’t always understand how to access their benefits or even access digital formularies. The pharmacist can begin to assess their needs and help match them up with the right digital tool, whether it’s on the digital formulary or whether it’s something that’s out on the marketplace that they have comfort with. Some of that is going to require…a matching service that exists from a technology perspective…I think the pharmacist is in a great place to do that, especially for a lot of the medical conditions that are heavily driven by medication utilization.”
