Telepharmacy in a rural Alberta Community Cancer Network

Telepharmacy services were developed and adopted to compensate for the absence of a pharmacist in rural Cancer Centers. Preparation included the formation of an advisory committee, development of a training and certification process, establishing new policies and operating procedures, collecting utilization data and a survey of patient and user satisfaction. Pharmacy technicians at two remote community cancer centers were connected by telehealth with pharmacists at one of the two coordinating centers to oversee the compounding of intravenous (I.V.) chemotherapy and provide clinical review of physician orders. In 8 months of telepharmacy use, 247 intravenous preparations were compounded for 47 cancer patients during 109 treatment visits. Approximately 45,000 km (27,000 miles) of patient travel were averted. Pharmacy staff estimates requires an average of 10 additional minutes to process and compound each chemotherapy preparation. Nurses estimate an average of 27.5 additional minutes required to coordinate information for each patient order.