A unifying vision for pharmacy: Defining professional identity through stakeholder perspectives

Amid evolving health care demands, pharmacy faces a critical identity inflection point that requires a cohesive vision.

This study aimed to define a cohesive, stakeholder-informed vision for the U.S. pharmacist's societal role by analyzing perceptions from across education, practice, and policy.

The study applied a multimethod qualitative design guided by constructivist epistemology incorporating thematic analysis, metaphor discourse analysis, force field mapping, and analysis of alignment with national forecast reports. Data were collected from 27 focus groups and 8 individual interviews with 148 participants representing 8 stakeholder categories.

From these themes, five metaphorical roles emerged, medication safety and optimization; access and equity in health care; chronic disease management; health promotion and preventative services; and patient education, counseling, and advocacy, highlighting broad agreement on pharmacists' contributions. Five metaphorical roles, safety net, steward, coach, navigator, and advocate, reflected a multidimensional professional identity. Force field analysis demonstrated a balance between driving forces, such as accessibility, medication safety, and public health leadership, and restraining forces, including lack of provider status, regulatory variation, and workforce instability. Comparative analysis showed strong alignment with national pharmacy forecasts, though gaps emerged in areas such as digital readiness, economic literacy, and global practice models.

This study provides an empirically grounded framework to inform a unifying vision for pharmacy's future. Stakeholder insights reinforce the need for education reform, policy realignment, and narrative clarity to reposition pharmacists as essential contributors to health-system transformation. By embracing a hybrid identity and dismantling structural barriers, the profession can fulfill its societal mandate in safety, accessibility, and care innovation.