[The Issues and Prospects of Pharmacy-Based Laboratory Testing -From the Perspective of a Clinical Laboratory...

The promotion of self-medication was announced in the "strategy for the reconstruction of Japan", which was approved in June 2013 by the cabinet, with the concepts of "extending healthy life expectancy" and estab- lishing "pharmacy-based laboratory testing services". In April 2014, the "guideline for pharmacy-based laboratory testing" was published, and approximately 1,000 pharmacies were registered as service providers as of the end of May 2015. Issues of providing pharmacy-based laboratory testing services were as follows: 1) appropriate techniques for fingertip blood sampling, 2) quality control including the maintenance and management of devices and reagents, 3) infection prevention, and 4) provision of information on examination results and factors affecting the examination to examinees. The improvement of health screening rates remains to be resolved in order to achieve "extension of healthy life expectancy" and reduce medical costs. The involvement of clinical testing specialists is essen- tial to resolve the above issues for the appropriate management of pharmacy-based laboratory testing ser- vices. [Review].