The Institute for Safe Medication Practices (ISMP) Canada Safety Bulletin, published December 18, 2024, includes the article Clinical Assessment of Laboratory Data by Community Pharmacists Helps Prevent Patient Harm. The article explores how pharmacists can optimize health outcomes and prevent harm by using laboratory data to inform their clinical assessments. As pharmacist use of laboratory tests has been common in Alberta for some time, the Alberta College of Pharmacy was given the opportunity to review and provide feedback for the article.
The article emphasizes that pharmacists’ review of laboratory data is critical to guide medication management in collaboration with prescribers and patients. This includes decisions related to
- dose adjustments,
- therapeutic drug monitoring,
- ongoing monitoring of long-term medication use,
- screening for and prevention of chronic conditions, and
- initiation of medication therapy.
The article includes several recommendations from ISMP Canada for provincial health authorities, regulatory bodies, community pharmacy teams, and software vendors of electronic health record and pharmacy management systems.
The article also serves as a good reminder that pharmacists must review relevant laboratory results, point-of-care test results, and other clinical data in a patient’s record to inform their assessment, as described in Domain 7 (Patient assessment and providing care) of the new Standards of Practice for Pharmacists and Pharmacy Technicians. Further direction is also provided in the Standards of Practice for Laboratory and Point-of-Care Testing.
Alberta pharmacists have all the pieces in place to provide care based upon a comprehensive, person-centred assessment. Pharmacists have the ability to order laboratory tests or perform or order point-of-care tests within the pharmacy, and have access to relevant laboratory data through the patient’s Electronic Health Record via Netcare. These are all important tools for the pharmacy team to deliver quality care. Remember, pharmacies will be required to have real-time integration with Netcare in place by July 1, 2026. For more information, refer to our Full Scale article from December 2024.
