On October 21, CDC’s monthly Public Health Grand Rounds webcast was devoted entirely to pharmacists. This was the first grand rounds program that featured a health care practitioner instead of health issues, so it’s even more exciting that pharmacists were the focus. The webcast, How Pharmacists Can Improve Our Nation’s Health, has been posted as an archived version on the CDC website, and CE for the program is available for pharmacists. 

Dr. John Iskander, a physician who leads the grand rounds program, opened the program with some general information and highlighted American Pharmacists Month and APhA’s pharmacist.com website in his presentation. He was followed by Dr. Ileana Arias, Principal Deputy Director (second in command at CDC), who made a very compelling case for the important roles pharmacists can play in addressing a myriad of problems in our health care system. In her presentation, she advocated for pharmacists being appropriately used so they could work at the top of their license. Dr. Arias was followed by CDR Michael Lee, a coauthor of the report to the Surgeon General and Director of Pharmacy at the Claremore Indian Hospital. CDR Lee did an excellent job in presenting the current health care problems in the United States, including with medications, and explained how pharmacists work at his innovative site to address them. 

The presentation by APhA’s Anne Burns focused on pharmacists in the 21st century, including their training, types of patient care services, and collaborative practice models. Magaly Rodriguez de Bittner, from the University of Maryland, provided a detailed overview of the Maryland P³ program and how pharmacists are using their skills in medication therapy management and disease management to improve the care of employer-based patients with chronic conditions. 

CDR Lori Hall in CDC’s National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion detailed various CDC programs and initiatives that include pharmacists and included a joint APhA Foundation–CDC project to describe important aspects of collaborative practice agreements. She also mentioned the need for recognition of pharmacists as providers in her presentation.

CDC is to be commended for this strong support of pharmacists. I encourage you to view the program as well as a behind-the-scenes interview between Dr. Iskander and CDR Hall.  In addition, CDC has posted a related resource list on the public health grand rounds website. Again, the archived version of the presentation along with a “Beyond the Data” segment are now live and can be accessed on the CDC website to view the videos. Great job, Anne!