pharmacist
Meaning of pharmacist: The one clinician who sees the whole list at once, which is why duplications and interactions tend to surface at the counter.
Definition of pharmacist
A pharmacist is a licensed professional trained in medicines: how they are prepared, supplied and used safely. The work includes checking a prescription against the person it is written for, preparing and dispensing the product, watching for interactions between drugs, and explaining what a medicine does and how it is taken.
What happens between a prescription and a dispensed medicine?
The check is the substance of the job. A pharmacist confirms that the drug, the dose, the form and the duration make sense for the person named, that it does not clash with anything else they take, that the dose suits their kidney and liver function and their age, and that there is no recorded allergy to it. Ambiguities are resolved with the prescriber before anything is handed over. Some products are compounded on site, meaning they are made up individually because the required strength or form is not manufactured, and this extends to preparations that must be mixed under sterile conditions such as chemotherapy infusions. Supply is documented, since many medicines carry legal controls on quantity and record keeping.
Where do pharmacists work?
| Setting | Focus of the role |
|---|---|
| Community pharmacy | Dispensing, advice on minor illness, and the first point of contact for many people |
| Hospital | Reviewing inpatient prescriptions, dosing complex drugs, and advising ward teams |
| Clinical or specialist | Working within a team in areas such as cancer, infection or anticoagulation |
| Long-term care | Regular review of the medicines used by residents |
| Industry and regulation | Manufacture, quality control and licensing of medicines |
What a healthcare provider in this field is permitted to do varies considerably between countries. Administering vaccines, prescribing within an agreed scope, adjusting doses and ordering tests are routine for pharmacists in some systems and not permitted in others.
Why does the medication review matter?
Prescriptions accumulate. Different clinicians treat different problems, each adding to the list without necessarily seeing the whole of it, and over years that produces duplication, drugs continued long past the reason for starting them, and combinations that interact. The pharmacist is frequently the only person looking at every medication together, including items bought without a prescription and herbal products, which interact as readily as prescribed drugs do. That vantage point is also where an unexpected side effect is often traced back to a recent change.
Also known as
Used in a sentence
The pharmacist flagged a potential interaction between the two newly prescribed medications.
Good to know
A pharmacist often reviews a person's entire medication list across all prescribers, which is where interactions and duplications between separately prescribed drugs tend to be identified.
Word origin
Where “pharmacist” comes from
Formed from pharmaco-, from Greek pharmakon, meaning drug or medicine, and -ist, marking the person who practices it.