MOVES to second hospital pharmacists to assist in State and Territory COVID-19 vaccination (COVAX) clinics is "placing huge pressure on an already constrained workforce", the Society of Hospital Pharmacists of Australia (SHPA) warns.
SHPA CEO, Kristin Michaels, told Pharmacy Daily that hospital pharmacists accounted for close to 23% of the pharmacist workforce in Australia, and were playing an integral role in COVAX hubs.
However, she noted that prior to the start of the COVAX rollout hosptial pharmacies were already short-staffed, with the majority of Australian hospitals' pharmacy departments falling short of the staffing ratios specified in SHPA standards, adding that many did not employ any clinical pharmacists.
"This leads to patients being discharged from hospital without review and counselling of their medicines by a pharmacist, putting them at risk of readmission," Michaels said.
"This is caused by both a shortage of pharmacists equipped for hospital positions and chronic underfunding for the positions themselves.
"The impact is historically worse in rural and regional hospitals, but is now dire across the board as pharmacy departments in metro areas second staff to state-run vaccination clinics, without commensurate support.
"The risks are incredibly serious - a misplaced decimal point or an extra zero can result in a life-threatening overdose of a high-risk medicine - and these are errors hospital pharmacists prevent from occurring through medication reconciliation on admission, management of new medicines and adverse events, therapeutic drug monitoring, daily medication chart review and discharge counselling."
Michaels added that there was a need for State and Territory health authorities to allocate appropriate funding for the provision of hospital pharmacy services going forward.
"SHPA will always welcome investment into new and expanded hospitals, but this must - and often doesn't - come with dedicated funding for the hospital pharmacists required to service new beds and wards," she said.
"SHPA welcomes these discussions in the context of important national medicines policy reform."
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