Drug Prescribing: Clinical Pharmacists in Family Medicine

Clinical pharmacists have added value to family medicine practices for decades. Postgraduate residency training and board certification are recommended for pharmacists in clinical and educational roles. Clinical pharmacists contribute to interprofessional health care teams by providing comprehensive medication management to ensure that drugs are safe, effective, and appropriate for the patients' conditions. Roles of such pharmacists include patient care, education, research, and administration. When incorporating a clinical pharmacist into a family medicine practice, it is critical to identify the needs, priorities, and roles of all health care team members. In the recruiting of a clinical pharmacist, candidates should be identified whose vision and values align with that of the practice. Finally, the effects of integration of the clinical pharmacist into the practice should be measured. Clinical pharmacists contribute to each goal of the Quadruple Aim, in addition to improved clinical, economic, and humanistic outcomes in the inpatient and outpatient settings. Although financial barriers may affect integration, many billing mechanisms have been implemented successfully by pharmacy practices for face-to-face and telehealth patient visits. Value-based reimbursement models support the inclusion of clinical pharmacists in the interprofessional health care team.