CLINICAL PHARMACIST BECOMES AN INTEGRAL PART IN HEALTH CARE: AN INSPIRING EXPERIENCE FROM FORTIS HOSPITAL,BANGLORE

CLINICAL PHARMACIST BECOMES AN INTEGRAL PART IN HEALTH CARE: AN INSPIRING EXPERIENCE FROM FORTIS HOSPITAL,BANGLORE

Athira.B.M, Nayana.S.A, Anusree.S

       Being clinical pharmacists getting ready to run through, we were always curious to learn how a clinical pharmacist is fulfilling his/her responsibilities. We decided to exploit the opportunity PCI is providing to the Pharm D interns, that three months of the internship period can be done inside a different hospital setting. The goal was to choose a hospital with a well established clinical pharmacy department. Fortis hospital, being one of the very few JCI accredited hospitals in India is undoubtedly the first name coming up to the mind. With the great support of our college management and teachers we got an opportunity to carry out a 45 days internship programme there.    

       Fortis is a 250 bedded, JCI accredited hospital with 29 departments, 111 well qualified doctors, sufficient nurses and a clinical pharmacy division with well experienced clinical pharmacists. During the 45 day period we were posted in every important department, including all the Intensive Care Units(ICUs), Oncology, Gastro enterology, Neurology and Urology, for one week each. The ICU posting was an outstanding experience. Every patient getting admitted in Medical ICU will be taken care by a special team of intensivists along with a clinical pharmacist. Clinical pharmacist has the responsibility to ensure that the prescribed doses and dilutions are correct and are timely administered to the patient. Based on the patients’ age, co morbidities and other complications, appropriate dosage adjustments are made. In such a way clinical pharmacist prove to be an unavoidable part of critical care team. Another exciting experience was the posting in department of oncology. The chemotherapy is carried out only under the supervision of a clinical pharmacist who has to make sure that the chemotherapeutic agent, its dose, the diluents are all accurate, the dilution is carried out in strictly aseptic conditions and the medication is properly administered.       Being a JCI accredited hospital, it has to maintain cupboards with specified medications and locking systems in each critical care unit, which are audited regularly by the clinical pharmacist. Any inappropriateness in the maintenance of such cupboards, including variations in stocks, nonstandard storage conditions etc are to be recorded and reported.        In addition to the above activities, clinical pharmacist has to do his daily monitoring of each and every patient admitted in the hospital to make certain the efficacy and safety of drug therapy provided to the patient. We also had case presentations in the department, on the challenging cases we found during our posting.        We were proud to be part of a health care team providing high quality treatment and patient care. In such a set up every health care professional has to play a well defined role in which the duties of clinical pharmacist are undoubtedly vital. The way the physicians and other members of the team valuing and accepting the views and suggestions of clinical pharmacist on drug therapy really made us understand the importance of our profession. The experience was impeccable and we were lucky enough to have trained in such a great environment.