Ideal and actual involvement of community pharmacists in health promotion and prevention: a cross-sectional study in Quebec, Canada

Abstract

BackgroundAn increased interest is observed in broadening community pharmacists' role in public health. To date, little information has been gathered in Canada on community pharmacists' perceptions of their role in health promotion and prevention; however, such data are essential to the development of public-health programs in community pharmacy. A cross-sectional study was therefore conducted to explore the perceptions of community pharmacists in urban and semi-urban areas regarding their ideal and actual levels of involvement in providing health-promotion and prevention services and the barriers to such involvement.MethodsUsing a five-step modified Dillman's tailored design method, a questionnaire with 28 multiple-choice or open-ended questions (11 pages plus a cover letter) was mailed to a random sample of 1,250 pharmacists out of 1,887 community pharmacists practicing in Montreal (Quebec, Canada) and surrounding areas. It included questions on pharmacists' ideal level of involvement in providing health-promotion and preventive services; which services were actually offered in their pharmacy, the employees involved, the frequency, and duration of the services; the barriers to the provision of these services in community pharmacy; their opinion regarding the most appropriate health professionals to provide them; and the characteristics of pharmacists, pharmacies and their clientele.ResultsIn all, 571 out of 1,234 (46.3%) eligible community pharmacists completed and returned the questionnaire. Most believed they should be very involved in health promotion and prevention, particularly in smoking cessation (84.3%); screening for hypertension (81.8%), diabetes (76.0%) and dyslipidemia (56.9%); and sexual health (61.7% to 89.1%); however, fewer respondents reported actually being very involved in providing such services (5.7% [lifestyle, including smoking cessation], 44.5%, 34.8%, 6.5% and 19.3%, respectively). The main barriers to the provision of these services in current practice were lack of: time (86.1%), coordination with other health care professionals (61.1%), staff or resources (57.2%), financial compensation (50.8%), and clinical tools (45.5%).ConclusionsAlthough community pharmacists think they should play a significant role in health promotion and prevention, they recognize a wide gap between their ideal and actual levels of involvement. The efficient integration of primary-care pharmacists and pharmacies into public health cannot be envisioned without addressing important organizational barriers.

Knowledge, Perception, Practice and Barriers of Breast Cancer Health Promotion Activities among Community Pharmacists in Two Districts of Selangor State, Malaysia

“…It is crucial to better understand the barriers and facilitators of greater involvement of pharmacists in public health activities in order to integrate community pharmacists into public-health programs to optimize population health (Laliberté et al, 2012). The community pharmacists cite lack of time (80%), lack of breast cancer education materials (77.1%), and training (62.9%) as major barriers that limit their involvement in breast cancer health promotion activities.…”

Attitudes of Iraqi society towards the role of community pharmacists

“…11 Interestingly, a broadening of this role has been suggested for better involvement in health promotion and prevention activities. 8,12 In order to provide a starting point for the identification of Iraqi public views about community pharmacists; this study was conducted to assess public use of community pharmacies in Baghdad (in terms of number of visits, reasons for a visit, and factors used for selecting a pharmacy); evaluate attitudes towards the role of community pharmacists; and determine required pharmacists' characteristics and future services (such as patient records, availability of diagnostic and screening services, direct contact with the physician, automatic processing of the prescription, and immunization services).…”

Involvement Of Community Pharmacists In Public Health Priorities: A Multi-Center Descriptive Survey In Ethiopia

“…This is consistent with the findings of our result, where only 8.5% of respondents reported provision of counselling on smoking cessation. However, the involvement of community pharmacy professionals in chronic disease screening and lifestyle counselling were found to be very low compared to studies done in developed countries such as Canada and USA, where community pharmacy professionals provide a variety of diagnostic screening services for blood pressure, dyslipidemia, and capillary glucose as well as pharmaceutical and preventive care services for asthma, diabetes, and hypertension [16][17][18][19]. This is due to the narrow scope of Ethiopian community pharmacy professionals as they are largely limited to the dispensing of medications and seldom provides screening and counseling services on chronic non-communicable diseases.…”