Community Pharmacy and Management

 

 

COMMUNITY PHARMACY AND MANAGEMENT – THEORY

 

Course Code: ER20-22T

 

Scope: The course is designed to impart basic knowledge and skills to provide various pharmaceutical care services to patients and general practitioners in the community setup.

 

Course Objectives: This course will discuss the following:

1. Establishing and running a community pharmacy and its legal requirements

2. Professional aspects of handling and filling prescriptions

3. Patient counselling on diseases, prescription and or non-prescription medicines

4. Scope for performing basic health screening in community pharmacy settings

 

Course Outcomes: Upon successful completion of this course, the students will be able to

1. Describe the establishment, legal requirements, and effective administration of a community pharmacy

2. Professionally handle prescriptions and dispense medications

3. Counsel patients about the disease, prescription and or non-prescription medicines

4. Perform basic health screening on patients and interpret the reports in the community pharmacy settings

 

1. Community Pharmacy Practice – Definition, history and development of community pharmacy - International and Indian scenarios

 

2. Professional responsibilities of community pharmacists

Introduction to the concept of Good Pharmacy Practice and SOPs.

 

3. Prescription and prescription handling

• Definition, parts of prescriptions, legality of prescriptions, prescription handling, labelling of dispensed medications (Main label, ancillary label, pictograms), brief instructions on medication usage

• Dispensing process, Good Dispensing Practices, dispensing errors and strategies to minimize them

 

4. Communication skills

• Definition, types of communication skills

• Interactions with professionals and patients

• Verbal communication skills (one-to-one, over the telephone)

• Written communication skills

• Body language

• Patient interview techniques

 

5. Patient counselling

• Definition and benefits of patient counselling

• Stages of patient counselling - Introduction, counselling content, counselling process, and closing the counselling session

• Barriers to effective counseling - Types and strategies to overcome the barriers

• Patient counselling points for chronic diseases/disorders - Hypertension, Diabetes, Asthma, Tuberculosis, Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and AIDS

• Patient Package Inserts - Definition, i mportance and benefits, Scenarios of PPI use in India and other countries

• Patient Information leaflets - Definition and uses

 

6. Medication Adherence

Definition, factors influencing non- adherence, strategies to overcome non-adherence 2

 

7. Health Screening Services in Community Pharmacy

Introduction, scope, and importance of various health screening services - for routine monitoring of patients, early detection, and referral of undiagnosed cases

 

9. Over The Counter (OTC) Medications

• Definition, need and role of Pharmacists in OTC medication dispensing

• OTC medications in India, counseling for OTC products

• Self-medication and role of pharmacists in promoting the safe practices during self medication

• Responding to symptoms, minor ailments, and advice for self-care in conditions such as - Pain management, Cough, Cold, Diarrhea, Constipation, Vomiting, Fever, Sore throat, Skin disorders, Oral health (mouth ulcers, dental pain, gum swelling)

 

10. Community Pharmacy Management

• Legal requirements to set up a community pharmacy

• Site selection requirements

• Pharmacy designs and interiors

• Vendor selection and ordering

• Procurement, inventory control methods, and inventory management

• Financial planning and management

• Accountancy in community pharmacy – Day book, Cash book

• Introduction to pharmacy operation softwares – usefulness and availability

• Customer Relation Management (CRM)

• Audits in Pharmacies

• SOP of Pharmacy Management

• Introduction to Digital Health, mHealth and Online pharmacies