Edita Kizevičienė, Jurgita Daukšienė, Laimutė Jonaitienė
Abstract
The experience of other countries shows that the pharmacy technician provides essential support to the pharmacist in areas including prescription entry, third party insurance management, and staff/patient scheduling and inventory control. Delegating these responsibilities to the technician frees the pharmacist to focus on, interact more intensively with patients and fulfill administrative duties. For appropriate and timely changes the level of pharmacy technician’s professional competencies should be continuously monitored. Aim: The authors of this study have carried out the research in order to determine the attitude of pharmacy specialists to the professional competencies of graduated pharmacy technicians practicing at Lithuanian community pharmacies. Methods: The method of questionnaire was applied. The community pharmacies were pharmacy technician carry out their professional practice. The return rate of the questionnaires was 92 percent. The managers, practicing pharmacists and pharmacy technician of the pharmacy were asked to take part in this study. The 82 questionnaires were collected for the analyses. The comparative (pharmacist and pharmacy technician) 10 points scale was chosen for evaluation of the number of selected professional competencies for providing pharmaceutical services and complementary works at the community pharmacy. Results: For number of analyzed professional activities the comparative score was 5: Prescription entry (mean – 5.00 to 5.27, mode – 5), staff/patient scheduling (mean – 4.97, mode – 5), pharmaceutical services (mean – 4.11 to 7.05, mode – 5). For packaging, inventory control and especially compounding (mean – 6.22 to 6, 51, mode – 5) the pharmacy technician abilities were recognized more than the pharmacists, but “collaboration with other health care professional” (mean – 3.34, mode – 3) is thought as more pharmacists responsibility. Conclusion: Our findings suggest that overall pharmacy managers and pharmacist highly evaluates the professional competencies of educated pharmacy technicians and sees them as essential support for the pharmacist in providing pharmaceutical services.
Keyword(s): Pharmacy professionals; Pharmacy technicians; Professional competencies.
DOI: 10.5200/sm-hs.2015.107
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