Pharmacy
Pharmacy is the health science that studies the use of drugs in biological systems. The Pharmacy profession is charged with the safe and effective use of drug therapy. A practitioner of pharmacy is a pharmacist.
A pharmacy is also the location where drugs are dispensed. Pharmacies are located in both the community as a business, or in an institutional setting such as a hospital or nursing home.
Disciplines
Pharmacy is broken into many disciplines and practice areas.
- Pharmacology- how drugs interact with biological systems. This field encompasses pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics.
- Medicinal Chemistry- how drugs interact with biochemicals, and how drugs are discovered and created
- Pharmaceutics- how drugs dosage forms are made
- Pharmacy Practice- interactions with patients to optimize drug therapy
Within each field, and practitioner of pharmacy can specialize in a number of processes, from specific types of dosage forms, to specific types of diseases (cardiology or infectious disease for example), to specific drug families (examples: ACE inhibitors or fluroquinolones).
Practitioners
The usual practitioner of pharmacy is a pharmacist. A pharmacist is trained in a professional program for 6-8 years, and is then licensed in the state in which they practice. Pharmacists generally practice in a community or institutional (hosptial) setting, and are concerned with optimizing drug therapy in patients.
Ph. D. programs are also available in the field of pharmacy. These programs are often concerned with drug development.
Areas of Practice
Community Pharmacy
A community pharmacy is where pharmacists dispense drugs upon a medical prescription written by a physician or other prescriber. Pharmacists, with the help of pharmacy technicians, interpret prescriptions, organize them into a patient profile (usually computerized), submit the claim to the patients prescription insurance policy, fill the prescription ( compounding if necessary), and finally dispense the prescription the the patient. The pharmacist is responsible for checking drug interactions, verifying the drug is appropriate based on the patient's profile, and verifying the correct drugs are given, and educating the patient on the proper use of the medication.
Community pharmacies can specialize in a specific area. Some are compounding pharmacies, focused on providing on an individual basis a drug in a dosage form that is not commercially available. Home infusion pharmacies and specialty pharmacies dispense injectable drugs that may require expensive preparation equipment and more extensive patient education.
Some community pharmacies are internet or mail order based. These pharmacies fill prescriptions from a central location and mail them to the patient. Some local community pharmacies take refill prescriptions from the internet, but the medications are available for pickup at the normal location.
Institutional Pharmacy
An institutional pharmacy dispenses drugs to residents of an institution (hospitals, long term care facilities, mental health institutions) persuent to a medication order. Institutional pharmacies often dispense the same type of medication as an community pharmacy, as well as prepare and dispense injectable medications used in the facilities. Institutional pharmacies often split their clinical and distribution practices.
Clinical Pharmacy
Clinical pharmacists evaluate patients and make drug decisions directly, usually under the supervision of a physician. These pharmacists manage difficult drug regimens, that often require more monitoring and education that other drugs, and may require the use of advanced pharmacokinetic principles. Examples include warfarin management, diabetes and hypertention management, HIV medication management, oncological drug mangement, total parenteral nutrition management, and serving as a general drug reference in a specific field.