About a month ago, I, along with an assortment of individuals representing my hospital, met and spoke about the direction of the PPMI within our hospital and how to shape this initiative. It was a large assortment of individuals that would not normally (well, mostly due to the size of our institution), speak or even see each other- where clinical specialists, technicians, outpatient pharmacists, inpatient pharmacists, managers, operations, and so on, all gathered on one day to launch the start of our PPMI meetings.
It was an eventful day. We went over the ASHP self assessment for hospitals, identifying areas we struggled with and where we needed help. We talked about problems we saw within the structure of our pharmacy- from technology issues, to specialist vs staff divisions, to education, and so on. We talked about how physicians, nurses, and other healthcare professionals viewed the pharmacy department. We talked about how patients viewed us. We talked about the medical home model. We talked about smoothly transitioning the patient from the inpatient and outpatient setting more effectively. The overall theme of the entire day? We need to bring more patient care to the patient themselves, and we needed to fix our pharmacy department to do so. The physicians highly respected our role of being on the floor. The patients respected that we were there providing counseling and yet we can even bring more counseling to the patients as well, if more pharmacists were up on the floor.
It was a super productive day- we created a vision of where we wanted our pharmacy to be at, in line with the PPMI, and branched out into subcommittees focusing on areas we wanted to improve- that being education, communication, technology and automation, inpatient/outpatient transitions, and so on. I volunteered to be on the career ladder committee, helping shape the career positions for pharmacists and technicians within the hospital.
Yet, among all this, this change will not happen overnight. It's exciting to be part of this PPMI movement- however, from a fast paced culture, it's going to take time to realize that this movement will definitely take TIME to occur...maybe years. It's difficult to change a structure- it's not something that can be done overnight. Do we have enough pharmacists to fill the gaps we're creating, as we move pharmacists up to the floor? Can students be fully implemented and what duties can they help with? Can technology keep up with all of this? How are we creating a PPMI in both the inpatient view and the outpatient/ambulatory care settings? Can we even create change within our hospital without knowing what the PPMI will implement for hospitals nationwide? How can we communicate with all healthcare providers about this change? How are we shaping our educational systems for this change? And the questions go on and on.
Among this, we need pharmacists to be behind change. Some pharmacists are happy with the way pharmacy is run today- it's been like this for years, so why change- they ask. Some pharmacists are skeptical that PPMI will change how pharmacy is viewed. Recently, in one of our NPF meetings, a member of the committee brought up an article that mentioned how pharmacy is a profession which we shape ourselves. It's a career all about what you want it to be, how you envision your future to be, and it's a career where you can make out of it all you want to make out of it. And we need pharmacists who want to produce change and who are passionate about it, to really launch PPMI into our hospitals. It's definitely a group effort and without a group support, it surely will fall apart. The future PPMI model benefits the patients- helping us to really fulfill our duty as a pharmacist- from an all inclusive order verification/compounding/clinical/research/counseling/caring pharmacist position, a role that our title conveys.
So it begins. Slowly, but surely...but hopefully we'll see the PPMI take off within the next year. I'm excited to see what Midyear has to bring- a collection of thoughts, ideas, and experiences that can help all of us learn from each other and benefit our hospitals. Slowly but surely, we'll make this initiative happen......