Study: Community pharmacists ready to offer personalized medicine services, but need education

WASHINGTON — The majority of independent community pharmacists are interested in incorporating personalized medicine services into their practices, but they require further education before this is possible, according to a study published in the September/October issue of the Journal of the American Pharmacist Association. Future initiatives should focus on the development of comprehensive education programs to further train pharmacists, the authors of the study concluded.

 

According to the report, 3-in-4 pharmacists expressed interest in offering personalized medicine services. But when asked to describe their knowledge of pharmacogenomics and readiness to implement such services, more than half said they were not knowledgeable on the subject and would not currently be comfortable making drug therapy recommendations to physicians or counseling patients based on results of genetic screenings without further training and education. 

 

Respondents identified cost of providing the service, reimbursement issues, current knowledge of pharmacogenomics, and time to devote to the program as the greatest barriers to implementing personalized medicine services.