OBJECTIVES Ambulatory blood pressure measurement (ABPM), although recommended for the diagnosis and management of hypertension, has limited availability. The objective of this study was to show that if the characteristics of patients attending pharmacies for ABPM are similar to those attending primary care, the technique can be made more widely available to patients through pharmacies. PATIEN...

BACKGROUND Pharmacies in Bangladesh serve as an important source of health service. A survey in Dhaka reported that 48% of respondents with symptoms of acute respiratory illness (ARI) identified local pharmacies as their first point of care. This study explores the factors driving urban customers to seek health care from pharmacies for ARI, their treatment adherence, and outcome. METHODS A cr...

■■ Unprecedented Opportunities for Managed Care Organizations and Community Pharmacies to Work Together Over the years, a considerable amount of discontent and distrust has been expressed between community pharmacies and managed care organizations (MCOs), especially between community pharmacies and pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs). In fact, one can deduce from the pharmacy press that the discon...

IMPORTANCE Despite their increasingly important role in health care delivery, little is known about the availability, and characteristics, of community pharmacies in the United States. OBJECTIVES (1) To examine trends in the availability of community pharmacies and pharmacy characteristics (24-hour, drive-up, home delivery, e-prescribing, and multilingual staffing) associated with access to p...

BACKGROUND In India, private pharmacies are ubiquitous yet critical establishments that facilitate community access to medicines. These are often the first points of treatment seeking in parts of India and other low income settings around the world. The characteristics of these pharmacies including their location, drug availability, human resources and infrastructure have not been studied befor...

supply chain management is a set of guidelines for integration of chains, which aims to reduce costs and increase system services to customers. one of the most important issues for supply chain stockholders is procuring and purchasing requested items in a timely manner. thus, a variety of models have been proposed as purchasing strategy in supply chains. group purchasing is a system which leads...

BACKGROUND Pharmaceutical products are an important component of expenditure on public health insurance in the Federal Republic of Germany. For years, German policy makers have regulated public pharmacies in order to limit the increase in costs. One reform has followed another, main objective being to increase competition in the pharmacy market. It is generally assumed that an increase in compe...

Purpose: To evaluate the impact of training of dispensers on the process of case management of ARI at community pharmacies in context to history taking and provision of advice working at community pharmacies in Islamabad, Pakistan. Method: A randomized, controlled, blinded intervention study was designed and implemented. Before the implementation of intervention, a baseline study was performed ...

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES To assess the impact of robotic dispensing machines in community pharmacies on staff efficiency and sales of over-the-counter drugs. SETTING The study was done on 253 community pharmacies in Germany that use a robotic dispensing machine manufactured by ROWA during 2008. METHOD Data concerning the financial and economic impact of using a robotic dispensing machine in comm...