SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH, USA, November 2, 2017 /EINPresswire.com/ -- In a joint effort between Intermountain Healthcare’s Pharmacy Services, Primary Care Clinical Program, and the organization’s Institute for Healthcare Delivery Research, researchers demonstrated that adding an ambulatory care clinical pharmacist to the primary care team helped more patients achieve their blood pressure and diabetes goals. Their research, “Pharming Out Support: A Promising Approach to Integrating Clinical Pharmacists into Established Primary Care Medical Home Practices,” was recently published in The Journal of International Medical Research.
This study examined the effectiveness of a team of ambulatory care clinical pharmacists in Intermountain Healthcare’s Medical Group primary care clinics working with physicians treating adult patients diagnosed with diabetes mellitus and/or high blood pressure. Patients working with a clinical pharmacist to initiate and adjust medications related to these disease states were 93 percent more likely to achieve a blood pressure goals compared with a reference group that didn’t include pharmacist support.
“What was so critical about this study, was that the program was able to show a marked improvement for patients even when layered over a team-based care structure that’s already demonstrated improved quality outcomes and decreased annual cost as published earlier in 2016,” said Kim Brunisholz, PhD, Senior Scientist in the Institute.
“Not only do patients benefit by enrolling, but this study also highlights the positive role and impact our ambulatory care clinical pharmacists have on the primary care teams within our clinics,” said Greg Parkin, MD, from the Intermountain Salt Lake Clinic.
Intermountain Pharmacy Services currently employs seven ambulatory care clinical pharmacists within 13 primary care Intermountain Medical Group clinics. Jeff Olson, PharmD, director of ambulatory care pharmacy services for Intermountain, said “pharmacists embedded within primary care clinics play a valuable role in helping patients become more adherent to their medications and achieve better control of their chronic disease.”
In addition to the services highlighted in the research, clinic-based pharmacists work to ensure the safe and effective use of medications in the outpatient setting. Some of their additional responsibilities include following-up with patients to review medications after a recent hospitalization, consulting with providers to optimize medication therapy, assisting in de-prescribing potentially dangerous medications such as opioids and benzodiazepines, and helping patients lower drug costs by switching to equivalent generic or lower-tier medications.
“As we look to increase patient access to healthcare,” said Sharon Hamilton, director of the Intermountain Primary Care Clinical Program, “leveraging the clinical pharmacist embedded within primary care clinics increases patient access to timely treatment for chronic disease management and also improves patient clinical outcomes.”
Intermountain Healthcare is a Utah-based not-for-profit system of 22 hospitals, 180 clinics, a Medical Group with about 1,500 employed physicians and advanced practitioners, a health plans group called SelectHealth, and other medical services. Intermountain is widely recognized as a leader in transforming healthcare through high quality and sustainable costs. For more information, visit www.intermountainhealthcare.org.
==========================
Civil-Rights Leaders Speak Out on NAACP’s Charter-School Stance
The NAACP’s new president recently issued a renewed call for a moratorium on charter schools. This stance keeps the Association at odds with thousands of parents and community leaders of color who know, firsthand, the critical role charters play in providing quality education to those in desperate need.
In light of this unfortunate action, the following statement, which originally appeared in July, is being reissued today.
African-American Education Leaders Speak Out Against NAACP Actions
The following statement was issued on July 31 by CER directors David Hardy, founder and Chair of Boys’ Latin Philadelphia Charter School, and Donald Hense, founder and chairman of Washington, D.C.’s Friendship Public Charter Schools, in response to the NAACP Task Force on Education Quality July 2017 Hearing Report.
The NAACP’s campaign against charter schools is detrimental and disrespectful to all parents who struggle to ensure a quality education for their children.
Rather than embrace, and work to expand, the opportunities that charter schools represent to America’s disadvantaged, and to families of color across the nation, the NAACP has chosen to stand as an obstacle, and work to stifle, a movement that, for thousands of children, is the greatest — and only – hope for achieving a quality education.
The association’s recently released report is intentionally skewed to further a union-driven, anti-charter school agenda, and its “model legislation” effort is an outrageous political scheme to further support the union’s agenda by undermining the voice and will of parents who are fighting for options for their children’s education and for the right and freedom to choose.
The NAACP has a long history of fighting for justice and for individual rights that further opportunities, hopes and human dignity.
These efforts are the antithesis of that long fight, putting the association sadly, and uncharacteristically, on the wrong side of history.
Founded in 1993, the Center for Education Reform aims to expand educational opportunities that lead to improved economic outcomes for all Americans — particularly our youth — ensuring that conditions are ripe for innovation, freedom and flexibility throughout U.S. education.
The Center for Education Reform
1901 L Street, NW, Suite 705
Washington, DC 20036
==================
