Community , Hospital Pharmacist

Pharmacist in community pharmacy

These are privately owned pharmacies or SPC outlets such as Rajya Osusal 

They are responsible in  

• prescription reviewing - yes your doctor can make mistakes they are human after all!! 

• filling the precription 
  

• providing patient counselling - this may or may not be practiced in community set up as well as in hospitals owing to the long queues in hospitals but its a very important thing that should be performed by the pharmacist to ensure the proper use of drugs by the patient. otherwise most patients will end up swallowing suppositories!!! 

and as patients you have a right to be counselled and ask all your questions and clear your doubts at the pharmacy

• providing OTC medicines - OTC medicines are your non prescription drugs such as paracetamol, Vitamins. you can always go to your pharmacists and get their assistance in OTC products. Specially in a country like Sri Lanka where Ayurveda medicines and herbal medicines are still being used for minor ailments pharmacists have a responsibility in providing information on these multitude of products. Green concepts are healthy still herbal preparations also may have interactions with food and your other medicines so please consult your pharmacist as and when necessary!!!! 

• Extemporaneous preparations - Pharmacists everywhere continue to prepare medicines in the pharmacy. This enables them to adapt the formulation of a medicine to the needs of an individual patient. New developments in drugs and delivery systems may well extend the need for individually adapted medicines and thus increase the pharmacist’s need to continue with pharmacy formulation. In some countries, developed and developing, pharmacists engage in the small-scale manufacture of medicines, which must accord with good manufacturing and distribution practice guidelines.

Hospital Pharmacists 

Hospital pharmacists are of diverse nature but the patients come in contact with the pharmacists who dispense. Other than that its your pharmacists who manages drug records, inventory control, proper storage of all your medicines, maintaining ward pharmacies along with the nursing staff and now in some leading hospitals in private sector " B.Pharm graduates work as Clinical Pharmacists"... 

hospital or institutional pharmacist:

• has more opportunity to interact closely with the prescriber and, therefore, to promote the rational prescribing and use of medicine - this ensue the patient safety.. 

• having access to medical records, is in a position to influence the selection of drugs and dosage regimens, to monitor patient compliance and therapeutic response to drugs, and to recognize and report adverse drug reactions- this is the role of a clinical pharmacists .. they may spend hours of ward round and review the BHT and medical records to make sure the patient recieves the best and most affordable health care. 

• serves as a member of policy-making committees, including those concerned with drug selection, the use of antibiotics, and hospital infections (Drug and Therapeutics Committee) and thereby influences the preparation and composition of an essential-drug list or formulary;

• is in a better position to educate other health professionals about the rational use of drugs;

• takes part in the planning and implementation of clinical trials.