We started the day off with a regional P & T meeting at the Regional Office. It was interesting to see and hear some of the things that happen during these meetings. Angela , our preceptor, also spent some time giving us a general overview about the rotation.
Later on that day, we started on a discussion about the reason behind having a formulary and the advantages/ disadvantages of a regionalized formulary.
For examples, having a formulary can:
– limit cost in stocking the medication and other administration work
– enhancing economy of scale by bargaining for one drug versus a little of each
– enhance medication safety by having greater drug familiarity by each practitionner
– concentrate resources on the safety/efficacy of a limited selection of drugs (i.e. developing PDTM)
Advantages of regionalized formulary:
– sharing of drugs between the hospital when there is a shortage
– economy of scale when bargaining
– having Tessa as the main communication personnelle ( one person to report to)
Disadvantages of regionalized formulary:
– need for standardization that may not meet everyone’s needs (ie. standardizing to one ACEI that not prescribers are used to in the different sites)
It was interesting to hear about the new provincial formulary. I think that this is a big step in terms of easing the transition for the patients from hospital to hospital and from hospital to community and vic versa. This will definitely enhance patient safety in the future and may potentially enhance the hospital’s buying power and lower drug cost.
In the afternoon, we had a meeting regarding the management of the flu season from the pharmacy perspective. Tailing right after this meeting, we attended a coordinator’s meeting. We learned about the difficult that the hospital faces every year in approaching the flu season. For example, which department is in charge of declaring a flu outbreak.
We ended off the day with some research into one of our new projects for the MUM rotation. The project was about the interchangeability of the different lactobacillus strains.
Current projects:
1. Art in the Pharmacy- (1) Awaiting donations from pharmacy staff (2) start collage of vial caps (3) collage of family members bulletin board???
2. Trimentoring with CSHP- pending…….This is a project that I’m still working out in my head. At the moment, CSHP has a mentorship program that includes a pharmacy student + practicing hospital pharmacist. My proposal is integrate a new practionner pharmacist into the mentorship program. The idea is to have a trimentoring program. Successes in this type of mentorship program has been shown many faculties throughout UBC, such as arts, sciences, engineers,etc. Existing programs can be found simply by googling “trimentoring.” I believe that the transition from student to pharmacist can be a challenging experience. By including a new practionner (such as residents) into the mentorship program, they share their experiences with the younger student and also gain some insight in what they can potentially do for themselves from the senior pharmacist. Currently, not all hospital residency programs have a pre-established formal process for mentorship. There is potentially a niche here that can be filled.
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