In 2018 the opioid crisis led to over 67 000 deaths, and while improvements have been made, it is still a leading cause of death nationwide. Being on the front lines is where we can have the biggest impact. Florida, where I practice pharmacy, now even requires patients to be given a handout discussing alternative treatment options for pain each time they are prescribed an opioid.

With the recent Emergency Use Authorization of the Pfizer/BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine and others likely not far behind, now is the time for pharmacies to prepare for some mass immunization efforts. Here’s what you can do to get ready.

There’s nothing that can muck up a busy day like a Board of Pharmacy inspector walking through the door, unannounced, to poke around your pharmacy. Even for a pharmacy in good order, an inspector can take up to an hour of work time or more, all while prescriptions and vaccinations are backing up or you are forced to balance both the inspector’s queries and the needs of your patients.

Medications for cardiovascular disease dominate the list of most widely-prescribed drugs in the US , and there's no doubt you probably prescribe them nearly every day in your practice. However, lurking behind some of those therapies are dangerous drug interactions. This quiz covers the top 5 interactions I see regularly in my practice as a community pharmacist.

It’s no secret community pharmacists could use more hours in their day. With unpredictable volumes, the implementation of non-dispensing activities like vaccinations, and MTM that need to be completed between dispensing, pharmacists often feel stressed and short on time throughout their day.

The upcoming flu season has many healthcare professionals especially worried this year. COVID-19 alone has stretched the healthcare system to its breaking point in many places, and it remains to be seen whether we will face another surge of infections during the peak of the flu season. To make matters worse, influenza and COVID-19 are both upper respiratory illnesses with similar presentations, and the possibility of co-infection further increases the chances of misdiagnosis.

Picking up the pieces after a break-in might feel like an insurmountable task, but it’s absolutely manageable if you have the right approach. If your pharmacy was broken into, here’s a guide to get you back up and running. For this article, we’ll divide action items into three major categories: legal, safety, and financial.

The pharmacy switch is the company that routes your claim, based on the BIN number and PCN number, to the correct insurance company, and then routes the response back to your pharmacy. It's kind of like the air traffic controller, directing incoming and outgoing traffic. This from McKesson does a great job visualizing what happens to a pharmacy claim after you hit 'Send.' Oftentimes, we don't give the switch much thought, but it's actually an important decision that can affect your bottomline.

The recent PPE shortages caused by COVID-19 are leading to horror stories across the country of frontline healthcare workers using whatever they have to protect themselves from infection. I recently read a piece describing an ER physician who had been using his ski goggles as eye protection because the hospitals he covered had nothing else for him to use. Here, we’ll take a look at the available evidence for some of the most commonly mentioned improvised PPE.

Overall I would say I had a great experience in pharmacy school at UNC-Chapel Hill and felt well-prepared to enter practice after graduation. Unfortunately, though, there is one big exception to that: dermatology. From what I understand, this is most people's experience in pharmacy school; that's unfortunate, because it's a common reason people come to the pharmacy.

I work for a health-system in Florida, and, as you have probably seen on the news, COVID-19 has definitely arrived in our state (and our hospitals). It moved incredibly fast – only a couple of weeks ago we were at “We need to get ready for the outbreak,” and suddenly we are preparing for supply shortages and being overwhelmed by the crisis. It is scary to think we are actually in times, for example, where hospitals are considering DNR orders on all COVID-19 patients due to a shortage of personal protective equipment (PPE). Below are my thoughts on the pandemic and the response and on actions as a pharmacy community we have taken to combat the crisis:

Coronavirus, or COVID-19, at this point is widespread enough many are already it has reached the WHO definition of pandemic. Like it or not, it could very well be on your doorstep soon, if it's not already. So far I haven't really seen articles on how community pharmacies can prepare for the virus, so here we are!

As I’ve written before on Patient Care® Online, I’ve seen my fair share of prescription gaffes in my career. I’ve also seen our patients inconvenienced and left waiting as we tried to guess what a prescription was for, then had to call the prescriber’s office and wait to hear back before we could fill it. To help prevent that here are 5 tips from the pharmacy “trenches” to ensure your prescriptions don’t end up in our “doctor will call back” pile.

I’ve seen my fair share of compliance and operations misses as a pharmacist of nearly 10 years. Having walked into several pharmacies as a new manager, and responsible for helping with operations standardization, and legal and third-party compliance for more than 70 pharmacies, I’ve learned a lot, and can clearly see the gaps in pharmacy education in this area.

It's no secret controls are one of the biggest subjects of any inspection, so if your pharmacy doesn't have a good handle on them it's time to start! One thing I've heard pharmacists say before, when companies set new rules in place for controls, is --- "Don't they trust me?" The answer to that question please .... (drum roll) ... NO. Nor should they.

2020 has arrived and to celebrate I wanted to write about something a little different than New Year’s Resolutions. According to the Chinese Zodiac, 2020 is the year of the rat, so to ring in the New Year I’ve curated the finest collection of rodent-transmitted diseases (directly or indirectly) you’ll find anywhere. Now, since I’ll be pic

Every year, Santa brings the world’s children toys and happiness, circling the globe and working tirelessly with his elves to make sure he is prepared for the next year. But his hard work for world happiness is sometimes taken for granted, and I often wonder about Santa’s health, especially since he’s now >1700-years-old. Unfortunately, there aren’t that many doctors at the North Pole, so I also started to wonder: Is Santa’s lifestyle good for his health?

The holidays tend to be a time of emotional ups and downs for many people. Family time can bring both stress and joy, the coziness of cold weather and a fireplace inside brings people together but also makes them inactive, and people everywhere are running from place-to-place trying to prepare. For most people, the last thing on their mind is staying healthy; after all, that’s for New Year’s Resolutions, right?

How can you help your patients stay adherent? Let us do the work! Take a look at these pharmacy services that can improve adherence, and I’ll bet you’ll find at least 1 or 2 that can help your patients.