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The Paris Attacks – an Impetus for Community Pharmacy to be an Emergency Triage Point
Recently, I have written two articles relating to triaged services from a pharmacy environment and how community pharmacy could be integrated into a public emergency system. In these articles I made the proposition that Location Rules night have more meaning if pharmacies were able to be strategically located throughout Australia because of the need to…
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Phoctors and Docpharms
In these days of constant change or business disruption we often find ourselves in a constant state of anxiety. This is not good for mental health and is probably the underlying reason why mental health issues have shown such a massive increase across the spectrum of entire populations, over the past five years As a…
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The PBS $1 Discount – Strategies for Coping
The next 12 months will be a real time of testing as the discount PBS co-payment of $1 begins to bite. You must prepare to combat this process immediately to ensure that your pharmacy will survive. This cynical process adopted by government, has the potential to generate many bankruptcies after the first year of introduction. And…
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Leadership, Future Direction, Public Health and Triage Services
Most pharmacists recognise the need to expand their focus from dispensing to something wider. Community pharmacy is the most visible “face” of pharmacy, but its leadership struggles to keep its members focused on creative pathways that utilise the natural advantages of a community pharmacy – convenient location, health professional availability and access, a “core” duality…
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Medical Marijuana Creates Clinical and Financial Opportunity for Pharmacists
The Australian Government intends to amend the Narcotic Drugs Act to allow cannabis to be grown for medicine or science and ensure that Australia is not in breach of international drug treaties. In Australia currently Cannabis is prohibited or otherwise managed through Drug Scheduling: (a) when separately specified in these Schedules; or (b) processed hemp…
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Back to Basics – What is your marketing strategy?
I have heard many comments floating around in pharmacy discussions, that community pharmacy has become exceptionally vulnerable since the “Big Yellow Box” has demonstrated that it can outspend all the rest of pharmacy in advertising. In other words, only two camps exist – them and us! To me, that is a lot of nonsense, since…
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The Rules of Engagement For Practice Pharmacists Being Debated
The two leadership organisations, The Pharmaceutical Society of Australia (PSA) and the Pharmacy Guild of Australia (PGA) have been involved in preparing position statements in respect of pharmacists working within the environment of a GP practice. At this point in time I have been able to find a reasonably comprehensive document published by the PGA,…
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The Dream of Owning Your Own Pharmacy
At one stage of my life I was a mentor to all students being hosted in the Northern Rivers region of NSW. I found the exercise quite stimulating, but I found that there was a single question from every mentee that was common to all. It was: “How do I get to own my own…
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The Power of One
I came across a story regarding a police initiative to combat the escalating prescription opioid abuse that is affecting communities in the US (and Australia) and which is causing family destruction and tying up unnecessary police resources at a very high cost for government. The story is really quite inspirational and may have application within Australia,…
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Telehealth and Telemedicine – Major Pharmacy Opportunities in Healthspot concept
Telehealth and telemedicine represent a significant opportunity for pharmacists and providers to partner on cutting-edge healthcare models, and pharmacy chains such as Walgreens and CVS are looking to embrace this technology in a big way. This new and quite disruptive technology (particularly for GP’s) has been adapted as a kiosk fitted with a range of…