Latest news with #CanadianPharmacistsAssociation
Hamilton Spectator
29-05-2025
- Health
- Hamilton Spectator
Nunavut legislature approves law allowing pharmacists to give vaccines
Within the next 18 months, Nunavummiut may be able to see a pharmacist for vaccinations and treatments for minor illnesses. The Pharmacy Profession Act passed third reading Tuesday in the Nunavut legislative assembly. It awaits assent before it becomes law. The bill is 'a comprehensive modernization of Nunavut's pharmacy legislation,' Health Minister John Main told the committee of the whole Tuesday, before the bill was voted on. 'Traditionally, pharmacists focused on dispensing medications and providing basic drug information,' he said. 'Today, their role has expanded to include a broader range of clinical services, such as administering vaccines and supporting chronic disease management.' Main said the need to modernize Nunavut's pharmacy laws came to a head during the COVID-19 pandemic. While Nunavummiut were rolling up their sleeves to get vaccinated, the Department of Health was legally unable to employ pharmacists to administer shots – something pharmacists in other jurisdictions, such as Ontario, were able to do. Examples of some of the minor ailments someone could see a pharmacist for in the future include skin conditions and urinary tract infections, Main said. In addition to expanding what pharmacists can treat, the bill establishes a pharmacist registration committee, outlines a complaints and discipline process, and allows for pharmacists to provide remote care to people in communities without a pharmacy. 'Right now, our legislation doesn't properly support remote dispensing or tele-services, but that's something that in the new bill is properly laid out and supported,' he said. The bill becomes law once it receives assent from Nunavut Commissioner Eva Aariak, which usually happens on the final day of sitting. After that, more work will be needed to draft regulations, which Main estimated would take a year to a year and a half roll out. That work will include educating pharmacists, pharmacist technicians and their employers. Janet Pitsiulaaq Brewster, Iqaluit-Sinaa MLA and co-chair of the standing committee on legislation, told the committee the new legislation will 'improve the territory's health-care delivery system as a whole.' Tyler Gogo, spokesperson for the Canadian Pharmacists Association, agrees. 'This legislation is a significant step forward and will help to modernize pharmacy care in the territory, bringing it closer in line to other jurisdictions in Canada,' he said in an email. 'By allowing pharmacists to work to their full potential across Canada, pharmacists can provide the care they are trained and trusted to deliver.'
Winnipeg Free Press
16-05-2025
- Health
- Winnipeg Free Press
Manitoba pharmacists will soon be able to prescribe birth control, HIV medication: NDP
The Manitoba government is pledging to give pharmacists more powers to prescribe medications, including birth control, directly to clients starting this summer. 'We've been waiting for this for a very long time,' said Marianna Pozdirca, a board member at Pharmacists Manitoba. 'We have a health-care system that is strained and we have over 1,000 pharmacists in the province who are educated to do more than dispensing.' Pozdirca and her pharmacist colleagues have approval to write prescriptions for a small list of minor ailments, ranging from acne to oral thrush, at present. Their full range of skills and consulting rooms, which are used for related assessments and immunizations, are underutilized right now, she said. Pharmacists-in-training in every province except Quebec take a standardized licensing exam, yet Alberta and Saskatchewan have wider scopes of practice than Manitoba, an online database run by the Canadian Pharmacists Association said. Manitoba's lone Liberal MLA, Cindy Lamoureux, raised the restrictions on these health-care providers' abilities in question period Wednesday. MIKE DEAL / FREE PRESS MLA Cindy Lamoureux noted that counterparts in B.C. have the power to assess and prescribe birth control. MIKE DEAL / FREE PRESS MLA Cindy Lamoureux noted that counterparts in B.C. have the power to assess and prescribe birth control. 'If pharmacists had more prescribing authority, wait times in clinics and emergency rooms could go down,' the MLA for Tyndall Park told the house. Lamoureux noted counterparts in B.C. — the first province to start covering oral hormone pills, Plan B and related contraceptives in April 2023 — have the power to assess and prescribe birth control. Asked about whether Manitoba would follow suit, Health Minister Uzoma Asagwara issued a straightforward reply: 'Yes.' 'That is a very reasonable expansion of scope for pharmacists in Manitoba. We want pharmacists who graduate in our great province to know that right here, in their own province, they can practise to their full scope and that their scope is going to be enhanced,' Asagwara responded. Speaking with pharmacists gathered in the public gallery, the health minister said they want to make Manitoba a leader in leveraging the health workers' wide-ranging education. A number of regulatory and legislative changes need to be made, Asagwara added. A provincial spokesperson later confirmed the government is working on regulatory changes that will allow pharmacists to prescribe birth control and some HIV medications. Pharmacists should be able to start prescribing birth control in the coming weeks, the spokesperson said, adding that the remaining expansion is anticipated this summer. Pozdirca said pharmacists are cautiously optimistic because they've heard similar rhetoric during previous legislative sessions. Ultimately, significant updates would be beneficial for everyone because they would expand access to primary care and alleviate administrative burden on physicians, she said. 'We're not looking to be siloed off from other health-care professions. We are all part of the circle of care for patients,' the pharmacist added. Pharmacists Manitoba is advocating for enhanced assessment powers, as well as provincial coverage for more evaluations to reduce barriers for patients, especially those who do not have a family doctor or live in rural and remote communities. Manitobans must pay for almost all assessments that pharmacists can provide — even if they are free of charge at a family doctor's office or walk-in clinic. Alternatively, pharmacies have to absorb those costs. Winnipeg Jets Game Days On Winnipeg Jets game days, hockey writers Mike McIntyre and Ken Wiebe send news, notes and quotes from the morning skate, as well as injury updates and lineup decisions. Arrives a few hours prior to puck drop. These health-care providers are reimbursed for certain drugs and dispensing fees in Manitoba. They can only charge the province for assessing uncomplicated bladder infections. Smokers in the province are eligible for free cessation-related counselling, owing to a unique social impact bond model set up by the former Progressive Conservative government. 'If we're going to allow pharmacists to prescribe for birth control or for anything else, they need to be reimbursed for their time fairly,' PC health critic Kathleen Cook said Friday. Cook noted the Tories campaigned on further expanding pharmacists' scope of practice during the 2023 election campaign. She urged the health minister to continue growing these providers' ability to prescribe to align Manitoba with other jurisdictions. Pharmacists are scheduled to meet with representatives from Asagwara's office next week. Maggie MacintoshEducation reporter Maggie Macintosh reports on education for the Free Press. Originally from Hamilton, Ont., she first reported for the Free Press in 2017. Read more about Maggie. Funding for the Free Press education reporter comes from the Government of Canada through the Local Journalism Initiative. Every piece of reporting Maggie produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press's tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press's history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates. Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber. Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.
CBC
29-03-2025
- Health
- CBC
N.L. professor named Canadian 'pharmacist of the year' for her work advancing HIV care
Debbie Kelly says pharmacists can do more on the front line of health care A pharmacist in Newfoundland and Labrador has received a high honour for her role in providing HIV care, improving health equity and advancing pharmacists' scope of practice. On Wednesday, pharmacist and Memorial University professor Debbie Kelly was named the 2025 Canadian Pharmacist of the Year by the Canadian Pharmacists Association. As a pharmacy student in the mid-1990s, she said she was drawn to HIV care. During her doctorate training, new drugs became available that revolutionized how HIV was managed. "It just lit me up. I loved working with the patients. I'm supported by an incredible community of HIV practitioners and researchers and community," Kelly told CBC Radio's Newfoundland Morning. "It's been just the most rewarding area to work in." HIV patients used to have to take 20 pills a day to manage HIV infection, followed by additional pills for the side effects, she said. "We've now gotten to a point where HIV is managed by one pill once a day, which is incredible. And people live long, normal lives," said Kelly. Besides researching sexually transmitted diseases, Kelly also leads the medication therapy services clinic, a pharmacist clinic run by Memorial University. She said they recently studied how pharmacy consultation service impacts a patient's quality of life, with 200 patients meeting with pharmacists for an initial one-hour comprehensive medication assessment with additional follow-up meetings. They found pharmacists helped improve two-thirds of patients' experiences by removing unnecessary medications, she said. "Just being able to sit down with someone for this one-hour visit where they could ask all the questions that they have, really helped them understand their medications better and be a more active player in their health," said Kelly. Advocacy work Kelly also advocates for pharmacists to practice to the full scope of work that they're trained for, but says there are often roadblocks. "Even if they've got the ability to do it, a lot of times these services aren't covered. A lot of private insurances don't reimburse for a lot of the services that pharmacists can and and are doing for patients," Kelly said. Even government insurance doesn't always cover the work pharmacists can do, she said. "If we're talking about making the community pharmacy practice environment more ready and able to meet patients' needs that way, then we need to be able to remunerate them properly," said Kelly. If they are compensated for their work and supported — like through pharmacy assistants and technicians —she said pharmacists can be more active on health care's front line, helping patients. "I think that pharmacists are really underutilized at a time when our health-care system needs all hands on deck and every profession working to top of scope," said Kelly.
