Pharmacist-led transitions-of-care services in primary care settings: Opportunities, experiences, and challenges

Abstract

Objective: To initiate a call to action for ambulatory care pharmacists to play a more active role in transitional care management within primary care settings by discussing relevant opportunities, experiences, and challenges.

Summary: With the shift to value-based health care, greater emphasis is being placed on improving patient care quality at the lowest cost. This represents an opportunity for pharmacist integration into primary care teams to address medication management challenges in the postdischarge period. Primary care pharmacists are uniquely positioned to close gaps in care not typically addressed by hospital-based programs. These pharmacists can provide complex transition interventions tailored toward individual patients, including comprehensive medication review, patient counseling, and direct collaboration with providers. For broad acceptance of these services, current challenges include identifying and prioritizing high-risk patients, establishing the cost-effectiveness of these strategies, and ultimately applying dissemination and implementation methodologies to increase the potential impact of these interventions.

Conclusion: Opportunities are expanding for primary care pharmacists to play a more substantial role in transitional care management in sustainable ways. For widespread implementation of these strategies, additional research is necessary to determine their clinical effectiveness as well as cost-effectiveness and to understand better the barriers and facilitators to adopting these interventions.