Hospital Pharmacists During the COVID-19 Pandemic

• Autor(a) principal: Farinha, Helena
• Data de Publicação: 2020
• Outros Autores: Rijo, João
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: https://doi.org/10.25756/rpf.v12i1-2.236

The COVID-19 pandemic set a challenging scenario for the entire health system and society in general, imposing on hospital pharmacists the need to plan and organize their staff response to the challenges posed by COVID-19.In response to COVID-19 and the need to protect the teams they restructured the service, organizing themselves in order not to compromise their assistance activity and, simultaneously, to provide an effective response to the new reality, not disregarding the health technologies review and monitoring as well as the active pharmacovigilance of drugs used to treat COVID-19. They created contingency plans in continuous adaptation to the evolution of the pandemic; participated in the preparation of the institution’s response and in the approach to the pharmacotherapeutic care; reorganized distribution circuits and flows; prioritized processes; developed human resource plans, anticipating risks; trained their teams; articulated hygiene plans; equipped new services and adapted and managed stocks, anticipating needs.With outpatients, they found solutions to mitigate their travels to the hospital, such as the provision of medication for longer periods, either for those with the means to travel safely to the Hospital Pharmacy (or the caregivers /representatives), or for those who resorted to proximity dispensing services via community pharmacies or directly at home. Proximity services made hospital pharmacists teleconsultations service grew.This reorganization was done taking care of people and working as a team, all focused on identifying the most appropriate solutions, at each moment, for different hospital contexts, including for people hospitalized or outpatients. At each moment, hospital pharmacists will be able to interpret the scenarios that are happening and adapt the action, focusing on aspects of continuous improvement of processes and patient care.