Health Care Reform: Ensure Pharmacists Are Recognized as Providers

1)    Educate policymakers

Do not assume that Congress, President Obama, or his Administration understand that you are the third largest and most accessible health care profession; that pharmacists play a critical role in providing accessible, affordable and quality health care for patients; that more fully utilizing the pharmacists can further improve quality of care and decrease health care cost; or that they appreciate that by not addressing the nation's medication use problem we will miss a huge opportunity to improve the health of hundreds of thousands of patients.

2)    Advocate for the future of your profession

Do you want to be part of the future of health care? Do you want to be part of the solution? Or do you want the practice to remain as it is today – "unrecognized".

3)    Take Action: Hill Staff are Drafting Reform Proposals NOW 

a.   Contact your Members of Congress. Visit APhA's Legislative Action Center.
b.   Communicate with President Obama and his Administration by visiting the President's health reform Web site. They are hearing from hundreds of other constituencies.
c.   Tell your story; put a face to the problem.

Describe:
i.    Your practice setting; how many patients do you serve every day?
ii.    How you identified the problem; why it was identified by pharmacy rather than another part of the health care system?
iii.    How you addressed the problem.
iv.    How the patient improved/benefited from your intervention.
v.    How you improved patient care.
vi.    How widespread are medication use problems in your practice?
d.    Share your story with us by emailing it to gvtaff@aphanet.org. We'll share it with others to motivate them to also take action.

The profession's silence speaks volumes. Are you willing to be ignored?

Learn how to take action from APhA...visit www.pharmacist.com/GA.